Eliza Jane Cowley

Our little Eliza joined our family on 11/4/11. She arrived 3 weeks and 1 day before her due date. It all began at my 34.6 week Dr. appointment... we had another ultra sound, finding out Eliza was face down in her "launching position". We also found out that I was already dilated to a 1 and 70% effaced. I wasn't exactly sure what that meant, but was very excited about the idea of meeting our baby girl early. I texted Scott at work and got a quick call back, thinking those statistics meant she could come any day. The following week at my 35.6 appointment I had progressed to a 1.5 and 80% effaced. My Dr.'s closing words were "if you haven't had your baby by then I'll see you next Friday". The best part was that I hadn't been having any contractions! That news put us into high gear preparing for her arrival. We finally got the garage all cleared out, washed the rest of her clothes, and bought last minute newborn essentials. The following week was a crazy one at work. My last Parent Teacher Conferences, three IEP's, and Sub plans. I made sure to schedule my long term sub to come in and observe. The last two days before I gave birth I was working 13 hour days with parent conferences.

Friday morning around 5:30 am my water broke. I told scott "either my water just broke or I just peed my pants". It was perfect timing because I had the day off of work. I wasn't having many contractions so we were able to shower, eat breakfast, and pack our bags. I put Scott in charge of texting family members and taking notes on his phone of the timeline. We got to the hospital around 8:00 am. They have a paper strip that changes to a blue color if the fluid is actually amniotic fluid. At 10:00 am I was put on oxytocin to speed up the contractions. At 11:00 am my contractions began to get much stronger. 35 minutes later Dr. Rigby stopped by to see if I was ready for my epidural. Right as the Dr. was preparing my epidural my contractions became much more intense. They say I was given the "perfect epidural" because the contractions were no longer painful and I could still move myself from side to side. 12:15 I was already dilated to a 7. Things seemed to have gone a little too smoothly up until this point. We found out the baby was posterior with her face facing my belly button instead of my back. At 1:20 I was dilated to a 9- getting closer! The Dr. was able to turn the baby by her hand. She had me lie on one side and turn every 30 minutes to see if the baby would stay turned. 2:35 I was finally a 10, but the baby was still posterior. 3:05 Dr. Ponder tried to turn the baby again by her hand while I pushed. When I began pushing I had no idea what I was doing. Unfortunately I had more practice pushing than I would have liked. We took a rest to see if the baby would descend farther down. Our nurse was awesome. I never realized how much work the nurses go to. It was my great grandpa Clarences birthday and kept hoping for some divine intervention during the pushing. 7:19 we could see the top of the babies head. We never did get Eliza to face the correct position, which would have allowed me to push her head out from the narrowest direction. Instead I pushed her out sideways (the widest angle of the head). We finally met our beautiful baby girl at 7:40 pm. What a relief to have her out safely. I had some very sore arms and abs the next day. Eliza's left eye and head had taken quite the beating and were a little swollen. She weighed 7.09 pounds and 19 1/2 inches with lots of dark hair (Scott and I were both bald babies).

We feel very blessed to get to be Eliza's parents. Having a new baby around the house feels like "christmas morning" every day. We love to cuddle her and watch all of her sweet expressions. We were lucky Scott got 10 days off work giving us special time to enjoy our new family. They say jaundice makes babies sleepier. Eliza dosen't cry during the day or night to tell us she is hungry. We have to wake her up to eat.We are still working on nursing. Every once in a while I get glimpses of hope when she'll nurse well. My mom bought me a double electric pump. She does however take a bottle extremely well, which we giver her after attempting nursing and having her become very upset. Although I'm on maternity leave right now I quit my job and am so excited to be able to stay home with Eliza. She has added so much purpose to our lives. We couldn't love her any more!

Our first family picture

Eliza's first bath

Going home outfit

Leaving the hospital

(we refer to Eliza as Houdini because she can always find a way to sneak her arms out of any swaddle)

Eliza spent 6 days on the bilibed due to the excess blood in her head caused by her traumatic entrance. The swelling in her head went down fairly quick, but her biliruben levels continued to increase. She was monitored every 6 hours at the hospital beginning on Saturday. The hospital was not very gentle about drawing her blood. They would clip her heel and then squeeze, gathering one drop at a time. During this, Eliza is screaming and kicking, getting blood on both feet. Poor Eliza wears the scars of many heel clippings. Luckily, she didn't seem to mind the bilibed. Her levels weren't severe enough requiring top and bottom lights with the dreaded eye mask. The warm bed put her right to sleep. We were ecstatic when we were able to get rid of the bed and spend more quality time snuggling with our little baby.

We love all of Eliza's faces...

she loves to raise her eye brows

she puckers her lips when she doesn't want anymore milk

there goes her arm sneaking out again. Perhaps she'll make a great student one day since she already know how to raise her hand and wait to be called on.

Eliza loves to snuggle with her dad