Family of Five

I really need to get back to updating my blog on a regular basis. It has been nearly 10 months since my last post and while there hasn't been a lot of occurrences in the Collis household, there has been one important happening: the birth of our daughter, London Rose Collis. After a very rough labor and delivery (I'll explain below), London arrived on June 24th at 7:39 a.m. and weighed 7 lbs, 13 oz and was 19 3/4 inches long.

The labor and delivery was rough. I went in to be induced at midnight on June 24, 2013. At that point, I was already dilated to almost 5. After getting hooked up to monitors and having consistent contractions, I was ready for my epidural. Unfortunately, after waiting 30 minutes, I determined the epidural wasn't working as I could feel everything. Screaming, crying and breathing was the only way I could deal with the pain. By 4am, I was fully dilated. I began pushing as soon as my doctor got there; however, London was not coming down the birth canal as she should have. It was now time to wait again. The pain was unbearable so they again administered the epidural in the hopes it would work this time. It helped for about an hour but then I starting feeling everything again. By a little after 7am, I was feeling the urge to push. My nurse at that time was determined to help me deliver this child. She starting having me push even before my doctor got there. Finally my doctor arrived. Still, London wasn't budging. He then told me he had to go do a c-section and would have to come back again for me to try again. I was dumbfounded and thought "He is not leaving me like this!" I looked at the nurse and I knew she could read my mind. I immediately felt another contraction coming and voiced that to her and my doctor. The nurse told me to go ahead and push. I pushed with everything I had in me, my doctor looked at me and said "okay then". He then prepped himself to deliver London.

London had a slightly rough start at first as she came out face up with the umbilical cord wrapped around her neck twice. The nurses whisked her away from me and after a few minutes of getting her to take consistent breaths, I heard her cry. It was amazing to hear. Despite the unplanned natural delivery and the pain accompanied, it was well worth it to have London come into this world.

London is absolutely perfect. She is now 2 months old and she is such a gem. She sleeps through the night most nights, and only really cries when she is hungry or wants to be held. She has brought so much joy and happiness to our lives.

Noah has been such a huge help. He is always eager to help which is so nice. Kolsen, on the other hand, is starting to come around. He has passed the jealousy phase for the most part and is just now showing interest London and wants to feed her.

All in all, our family is not a bit larger and we plan on keeping it just us, a family of 5.