On December 15th, 2010 at 12:15pm, Ethan Ward Pack was born! 18 1/2 inches and 6 lbs 2 oz. We thought it was pretty cool that he was born on 12/15 at 12:15! The morning he was born I woke up at 3:15am and felt a little weird. I wondered if I was having contractions, they were very mild, but were coming at about 15 minutes apart. That lasted for a couple of hours and I slept here and there till 5:30am when I decided maybe I had better call in a substitute for school just in-case. While I was typing up my lesson plans, the contractions seemed to go away, so I sent back to bed for a couple more hours.
When I woke up I still felt a little off and decided to call my doctors office. I told them what I had been feeling and the nurse asked me if I had felt the baby moving at all, and now that she mentioned it, I hadn't felt the baby move for a while. So the nurse told me to eat some food and lie down and see if I could feel anything, and if I couldn't then go ahead and go to the hospital, and also if my contractions started coming 5 minutes apart, also go to the hospital. So while I was lying down trying to feel the baby move, my contractions started coming 5-6 minutes apart and were pretty mild, not painful, just uncomfortable for about 30-45 seconds. For some reason my expectations were that they would be much more painful. I guess they do once they go on for awhile. (I wouldn't get to experience that as you'll soon discover!) I told Brandon that we better head out to the hospital.
We arrived to Salt Lake Regional at 10:45am, and after checking-in, and getting hooked up to the monitors in Labor and Delivery it was just after a couple cycles of contractions that our nurse came in concerned about Ethan's heart rate. After each contraction, as mild as they were, his heart rate would drop slightly. The nurse said that if this continued that I could possibly have to have a Cesarean section to get Ethan out quickly as he appeared distressed. Shortly after that Ethan's heart rate started really falling. She quickly hooked me up to an IV and gave me oxygen. That appeared to help some, but his heart rate still wasn't where it should be, so when my doctor arrived a few minutes later, she told me that we had better get Ethan out quickly as something was really distressing him.
Brandon and I were both like deer caught in the headlights, not knowing what to think or what to say. We did not expect this! I thought we'd be sitting around for hours in labor and here I was about to be wheeled into the operating room!
It took much longer to get prepped with the anesthetic then how long the surgery took, it felt like forever! But once they got started, before I knew it I could hear Ethan's first breath and cry. It was sort of garbled as he had taken in some of the amniotic fluid, but he was okay, just a little greenish because he had pooped in the womb, something babies do when they are under stress during labor. My doctor said that he had his umbilical cord wrapped around his neck, but it didn't appear to be cutting off his oxygen, because his levels looked good, so she wasn't sure why his heart rate kept dropping. After the surgery she told me that she was glad we had come in when we had, because Ethan would've perhaps not made it if we had waited. That put things into perspective, a scary perspective. Brandon and I were so relieved that Ethan was delivered to us, a healthy baby boy.
We stayed at the hospital for a few days then came home with our little guy. When we got home the feeling finally set in knowing that he was ours to keep forever! That we were now his parents and that we were responsible for caring for this helpless little person. I also had a hard time realizing that this baby used to be inside my belly! Ethan was a small baby, but I still couldn't figure out how he fit in there.
We are in love with our little guy and are just amazed by the miracle that he is! Every day he looks a little different, a little bigger, makes a different face or sound. He's the center of our universe right now and we're still trying to adjust to him being a part of our family. Brandon is so helpful with him, and can burp him and put him to sleep better than I can. He calls him his "Little bug," I think that's because when they'd wheel him to our room at the hospital, they had him wrapped so tightly in his blanket that he looked like a little catapiller. His daddy is very much the proud papa and Ethan is the apple of his eye. We're so happy to have him!
We thought this was pretty funny. We looked over and Ethan had fallen asleep holding onto his ear! So silly!
This was Christmas day, and our friends Melissa and Kelly had given us this Santa outfit for Ethan. Luckily he came before his due date of December 28th. He only got to wear it for this one day, but he was super cute in it!
Ethan can go from zero to sixty in less than five seconds as you can see here. He fell back to sleep just moments later.
Here's Brandon putting Ethan to sleep. Ethan likes to hang out with his daddy.
He's definitely a cutie!
