She's Here!

Zara Petal Koontz was born on May 25...7lbs 14oz, 20 3/4 inches. She came early with a little help from me, and I am so glad that she did! She is perfect and we have really been enjoying her. It has definitely been an adjustment having a newborn again and the lack of sleep. I have learned the hard way a couple times that she is sensitive to what I eat. So once again I have diet restrictions and have been avoiding chocolate, citrus, tomatoes and anything spicy. 

 Pre-delivery..post-epidural :)

 They gave us a celebration lunch the next day at the hospital...so nice!

 Kitana's first time seeing Zara, she was sooo excited to take her home w/ us.

 Completely forgot to take a family picture w/ the four of us at the hospital :( It was a little hectic!

She is gaining weight like a mad woman and checked in at 9lbs 8oz, 22 inches at her three week appointment. I am just thrilled to have a baby that gains weight! It's been nice to not have the doctors breathing down my neck this time about her weight gain and that I don't have to supplement with formula at all. To say the least, she has been pretty much 100% different that Kitana was, which is to be expected I guess :)

 First family pictures :)

I was recently inspired to add a little or a lot more detail to Zara's birth story! I didn't write one with Kitana and wish that I did. I pretty much hated being pregnant and was pretty miserable so I decided that once I reached 37 weeks I would try everything I could to have my baby. Then I chickened out and decided to wait until 38 weeks just to make sure Zara was nice and healthy. So at 38 weeks and one day (it was a Wednesday) I decided to try castor oil. I had heard pretty successful stories about it was nervous/excited to try it. I blended it in with ice cream and milk and drank it like a milkshake. Which made it a little more bearable, but it was still disgusting! I guess Paul didn't believe me that it would work because he decided to hit up a movie with his friend Jesse that night after I took it.

It took about 3 hours for it to start working (after a few bathroom trips!) Around 8pm I started to get some mild contractions. They were really consistent and I was starting to get nervous that I was really going to have a baby soon. Well, the contractions continued and I started timing them. They were about 2-5 minutes apart for about 5-6 hours. I called the advice nurse around 2am and she suggested for me to come in since we lived about and hour away from the hospital. So we woke Kitana up, packed up, took her to my mom's and headed there.

The first nurse said I was dilated to a 2 and then a few hours later was at a 4, so we thought things were progressing and that we'd have the baby soon. While the actual doctor had to check before the would admit me for reals. He was a super big jerk and told me I was only at a 1 and that the nurse was crazy. He told me that my contractions were braxton hicks and that I wouldn't be going into labor for at least another week or so. I cried...my contractions were getting more painful and I definitely couldn't sleep through them. I didn't know how I was going to go without sleep for another week or take care of Kitana with contractions every few minutes.

We picked up Kitana and went home around 8am Thursday morning. By the time we got home it was around 11am and my contractions were still getting worse. I tried to get some rest...we were all exhausted from being up the whole night before. I took like 5 baths, took a couple showers, borrowed a heating pad from my mom, but nothing worked. The pain was awful, but I thought I was just being a baby and didn't want the doctor to just send me home again. Finally, after hours of this Paul made an executive decision to take me back to the hospital. My bro-in-law Ryan was close by and picked up Kitana and we headed back down to the hospital. At this point every contraction was putting me in tears. The pain started in my legs and would shoot up to my stomach and just squeeze as hard as possible. I could feel each one coming on and it was just so painful and hard to explain! Kitana was very concerned about her mommy, it was sad. I was so out of it!

We got back to the hospital around 4pm, I was dilated to a 7 and was finally admitted. I was relieved to know that I WASN"T crazy and that relief was finally on it's way :) It took two hours from when we arrived to when the epidural was done. My poor nurse was going as fast as she possibly could, but everything just takes time. I felt like I was at a completely different hospital from the experience we had just had in the morning. The staff was like night and day!

My water still never broke, so they broke it for me. I dilated to a 9 and was stuck there for about four hours. The nurse suggested pitocin, but I really wanted to let my body do it's thing this time and was curious to see how long it would take. And it took a while since Zara was born the next day (friday) at 12:16am. She really took her sweet time. So I was in labor for well over 24 hours. It was a crazy experience and nothing like Kitana's. After all is said and done, I am glad that she was early and would totally try castor oil again. I would probably have had a different answer while I was experiencing it. So...I know that the castor oil definitely worked for me, but I think it prolonged my labor and made it progress very slowly since I kinda forced my body into labor. Zara was never in distress so I know that she was definitely ready to come out when she did :)