What's her name?
Gemma Lynn Swensen
Birthday?
Nov 8, 2016 at 3:42pm
How do you pronounce her name?
j-Eh-m-uh
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vnsTTgD0toM
Weight:
7 lbs 6 oz
Height:
19 inches
Where did you get her name from?
When I was in Switzerland I heard it somewhere and then I texted Luke. He wasn't sold on it but I was in love with it. He did get to pick her middle name though. Raleigh doesn't have a middle name so hopefully she won't feel left out when she gets older.
Did you naturally go into labor or were you induced?
Induced
The story:
I figured I had better write this down now while it is still somewhat fresh in my mind. It's crazy how fast time flies with a newborn. (much faster than a week during your final trimester of pregnancy)
I'm not even sure if I wrote a post about Gemma's pregnancy. It was pretty uneventful compared to Raleigh's which I'm grateful for.
In September I took a fall down the stairs and probably tore my acl. I still need to get an MRI to be sure but I've been a bit busy and haven't scheduled it yet. I'm in physical therapy currently to help prep my knee. My knee hasn't been giving me too much pain lately, I can walk fine (slowly but fine) with my brace on and it's only when it's off that it occasionally gives out on me. I wouldn't recommend falling down the stairs when you are almost 9 months pregnant. Luckily baby girl was fine!
About two weeks ago I had been being kept up by braxton hicks contractions. They would come every ten minutes in the middle of the night and I was being kept up using the bathroom and the added weight on my knee from pregnancy really took a toll on me. I was pretty miserable.
At 39 weeks I asked my doctor if he could help move things along by stripping my membranes to see if that could help. He told me no and I wanted to punch him in the face. Actually, I fought back tears, dang pregnancy hormones. He told me he wouldn't even consider doing it until I was overdue.
He told me that he wouldn't be able to see me at my next (and final) appointment because his wife was having a scheduled c-section that following Tuesday.
Rather than see a different doctor at that office I decided to call and make an appointment with the doctors office affiliated with the hospital who delivers the babies. They got me in for that Monday.
(I somewhat feel like I cheated on my doctor but oh well!)
I went to the appointment Monday and they asked why I wanted to come in. I told them that my doctor was having his own baby and I thought it was pointless to see someone new rather than see someone who actually would be involved with the delivery of my baby.
I had a list of reasons of why I wanted to get things moving along in my mind ready to try to convince the doctor to let me get things moving either strip membranes or schedule and induction so I wouldn't go overdue.
As soon as I was seen by the doctor she checked me and I was 3cm dilated and 50% effaced. After she checked me she says "So do you want to be induced? We can probably schedule something for this week if you want."
So obviously, anything I had been planning to say went out the window! I got a big stupid smile on my face and said, "Really?!"
She left the room to find out what days were available. When she came back in she said "Any day works but Friday."
I decided Tuesday, the next day, would work perfect. (get this baby out of me!)
We arrived at the hospital after dropping Raleigh off with our friends (Thanks again Elyse!) and checked in at 6 am.
By 6:40am they started giving me pitocin and I started having contractions. Nothing too painful though. I was probably a 2 on the pain scale.
By 8 am the doctor came in and asked if she could break my water to help speed things along. I told her the traumatic experience I had with Raleigh and asked if I could get my epidural before we broke it. She said of course and the anthesiologist showed up ten min later. I was his only patient that whole day!
Getting the epidural took about 10 min. Apparently, the last anthesiologist had a difficult time giving me mine because he thought he was hitting bone but actually my cartilage is very tight and tough and that's what he was hitting.
Once it was in I could still feel contractions in my lower belly and back. It felt like I was wearing a very uncomfortable belt! I wasn't totally numb either. I was worried that it wasn't working and told my nurse but I said that I was not in that much pain now. She said she didn't want me to be in any pain and called him back up. He came back and gave me a stronger dose of medicine into it and all the pain went away and I was totally numb.
I took a nap, watched HGTV and browsed Pinterest for the next few hours. I avoided Facebook because nothing puts you in the mood to have a baby than see everyone fighting about the Presidential Election. I guess that's what I get for choosing to have her on election day.
Around 1:00 they checked me again and I was 7 cm dilated. I was starting to feel pressure so I was hoping she would be here in a few hours.
They kept coming to check on me after that but didn't check on my cervix anymore because I wasn't having any bloody show and didn't want to increase infection.
At 3pm I remember to start feeling like I needed to poop with every contraction. (keeping it real here folks haha!) I don't remember that sensation at all when I had Raleigh. I kept thinking it would pass but with every contraction it would come. I told my nurse and she told me that if I kept feeling it after the contractions past that I should call her again. By 3:20pm it wasn't going in between but I could tell I wanted to push. I called the nurse back in and she and the student doctor came in.
The med student checked me and the nurse asked her how dilated I was. She said "I don't feel her cervix at all, that's all head and I can only get my finger to go to my knuckle." I knew when she said that it was baby time!
The rest was a blur, the doctors and nurses rushed in. I remember one nurse commenting on how I was just smiling and talking normally. Apparently, that is not normal behavior when you're about to push out a baby. I told her that it's probably because I wasn't in any pain. Two contractions and three pushes later baby Gemma came into the world! It took less than 10 min! I thought it was speedy with Raleigh.
Gemma instantly came out wanting to breastfeed (which is a huge blessing since Raleigh was not very cooperative in that area) and she (so far) has been doing great at it.
Raleigh has done fairly well at having a sister. She has regressed a little especially with sleep and wants to cuddle with mommy all the time. I'm trying my best to give her the attention she needs but this Momma is tired! How do people have even more of these things called kids?!
