Our sweet little boy Oliver Douglas was born on the morning of Tuesday, August 12. He was 8 pounds, 7 ounces and 20″ long.
It was a beautiful, intense, unmedicated, and incredibly fast birth (only 3 hours!). I woke up in full-blown labor at 2:00am, we sped to the hospital in the pouring rain at 3:45, and he was born at 5:10! I’ll spare you the details but basically he flew out of me.
Looking back on the experience I have only happy memories. I credit the lessons I learned from HypnobirthingΒ for helping me frame a positive mindset about the experience of labor and delivery which is so often negatively portrayed in the media. Hypnobirthing also helped me mentally escape from the buzz of the hospital room by visualizing imagery such as ocean waves crashing in and out. Sounds totally hippie but it worked!
I think the hardest part for me was the incredibly intense low back pain. No amount of self-hypnosis could mask that stabbing feeling in my back! I survived though.
Hubby was a total rockstar and took such amazing care of me the week after Oliver was born. He was at my beck and call with ice water, heat pads, and a freshly diapered baby. Even though it was so much work, being home together as a family for the week was like a little staycation. He is much of the reason why I made a relatively speedy recovery.
{the view of downtown Chicago from our hospital room}
Overall I am so grateful to have a beautiful, healthy baby and cannot imagine my life without him in it.
For some unbeknown reason I have exclusively called the babe “Bubba” since he was born, so I’ll roll with it!
{on our way home!}
xo,
