Welcome Sawyer Michael Harris

He’s here! Sawyer Michael arrived on Wednesday, September 1st at 3:58am. He’s six days old now and is such a sweet little angel. So here’s how it all went down. Warning …long and detailed…feel free to skip to the pics :)

My due date was September 3rd, which is also when I was scheduled to be induced, but at about 8 pm on Tuesday night I started having really regular contractions five minutes apart but not very painful. Since the books all say your not really in labor until they’re 5 or less minutes apart, painful, and at least a minute long I wasn’t sure if this was the real thing. The last thing I wanted was to call a neighbor over late at night for a wasted trip to the hospital due to false labor. So I laid down to see if that would make the contractions slow down or go away. From 9 to 10 pm they slowed down to about 7 or 8 minutes apart but became more intense and painful. I called the doctor hoping she’d help me know if it was the real thing. I was on the phone during one of the contractions and at this point they were bad enough that I couldn’t really talk through it. She told me to come in.

I called Emily, a friend I just made this month, and she and her husband came over to spend the night with LIncoln. They were so great. They just moved in and don’t have any kids and Emily’s not working yet, so they were the perfect babysitters. It was about 11:15 at this point and we’re trying to get out the door when low and behold…Lincoln wakes up. The boy has been sleeping through the night since he was 5 months! It’s like he knew we were leaving. This was my worst fear…that Lincoln would be difficult for whoever was watching him. I knew I would be a stress case if I left with him crying so I went in to rock him; uterus contracting all the whole time.

Luckily he feel asleep after about ten minutes and we were off. When we got to the hospital it was really busy. I let the girl who arrived with me go back first and later regretted it. They finally got me back to triage around midnight. I was dilated to a five. I requested an epidural. TWO HOURS LATER I got one. Those two hours were some of the scariest of my life. I kept thinking I was dilating too quickly and they weren’t going to have time to give me the epidural and I would have to birth this baby drug free. I was not mentally prepared for that. I wasn’t mentally prepared to be contracting so long without one either. With Lincoln I’d had the epidural way earlier and just expected to have the same experience. It was crazy…I started hyperventilating and my face went numb because I was breathing so hard. I wish I knew how far dilated I was when they gave me the epidural because I feel like I was at a ten.

The epidural kicked in and I was able to relax a little bit. About a half hour after the epidural my water broke which totally startled me, and was so much more than I expected. They broke it for me with Lincoln. Then I felt like I was ready to push. When I told the nurses they asked me if I could “hold it” because the doctor was doing an emergency C-section. So, I “held it” for about another hour.

The doc. finally arrived and I started pushing at 3:51am. Two contractions and seven minutes later Sawyer was born! It was super fast…but super painful. I was screaming the whole time. I asked the doctor how it could hurt so much more than it did with Lincoln when Sawyer was 2 pounds lighter. She said the faster you deliver the more painful it is because your not slowly stretching out. And the other reason was my epidural hadn’t been in long enought to fully take effect.

The next two days were great. I love the hospital stay! Ryan left at about 9 am to go relieve the babysitter and watch Lincoln, and Sawyer and I were able to relax and have some nice one on one time. He is so sweet. I’m so happy he is in our family. I feel so lucky, blessed and privileged to be his mom.

Lincoln and Ryan came and visited both days and Lincoln which was kind of exhausting. Lincoln was semi-interested in Sawyer but mostly just into everything and wanting lots of attention. It’s good to be home now. I’m really, really tired…nursing around the clock. Which I must say is going better so far but is still a challenge to say the least. He has however put on a whole pound since we left the hospital 3 days ago so I must be doing something right!

Meeting Sawyer minutes after the birth. 7lbs 6oz. 21inches.

Sawyer at one day old.

Meeting Big Brother.

Leaving the Hospital as a family of four.

I definitely think Sawyer and Lincoln look like brothers and sometimes I think they look really similar. The first picture is Lincoln at four days old and the second is Sawyer at four days old.

This next one is Ryan as an infant. I think Sawyer looks a lot like him.

I love these two pics. Top is Lincoln at ten days old. Bottom Sawyer six days old. They are so sweet and change so fast. I really need to remember to try and savor every moment.