Leah Rachel Taylor

She's here!! Our little Leah Rachel was born Monday morning at 5:48am. I started having contractions Sunday afternoon, and by dinner time I knew it was the real thing. I wanted to stay home as long as I could, so after washing dishes, sweeping the floor, picking up toys, and putting Kaiya to bed, we tried to relax a little and watch a DVD. I still didn't feel like I was ready to go to the hospital, so after a while we tried to go to sleep. I couldn't sleep at all, and at about midnight I decided we were definitely going to have to go to the hospital before morning. So I got up and started fixing Kaiya's food for the next day, since we were going to leave her with our neighbor, and we finished packing up and got ready to go. After our neighbor Nathalie came to stay with Kaiya, we started our 2 hour drive to the hospital. after a few bathroom stops and one very curious gas station attendant, we made it to the hospital around 3am. When we got there, I was only dilated to 3, but the contractions were coming really close together, so we were admitted. I didn't want to be hooked up to anything, but the nurse insisted I wear the fetal monitor and come back to the machine every 20 minutes to check it, so I wasn't able to walk around as freely as I had hoped. Patrick was so amazing during the whole labor. He rubbed my back during every contraction and helped me stay focused. After about 2 and a half hours the nurse came to check our progress, and said I was at about an 8. I was so relieved. I never thought during the labor that I couldn't do it anymore, but there were a few times I wasn't sure if I wanted to do it anymore. But once I heard how far along I already was I knew I could make it without any drugs. It was only a few minutes later that my water broke, and right away I needed to push. I told Patrick to go get the nurse, and when she came in she started yelling at me to stop pushing and wait for the doctor. I told her I couldn't help it and when another nurse came in to help she said "it's too late, she's crowning". So they flipped me over and the nurse delivered the baby as I lay sideways on the bed. It all happened really fast, but everything worked out great and the baby and I were totally fine. The doctor showed up about 15 minutes later, a little surprised that everything was overwith already. It was an amazing birth and this recovery has been so much better than it was the first time around. We're all home now and getting used to having a family of 4. Kaiya loves her little sister and wants to help out all the time. I realized when we were putting these pictures up that we don't even have a decent picture of the child yet, so more to come. But that's the good news for now!!