Remi's birth story

Time to dust off the old blogaroo! Haha! Almost 4 years later...

The last time I wrote a post on here was when Liam was born. It would only be fitting to do one more post about our 4th kiddo being born aka Remi the caboose! Pregnancy, childbirth, and postpartum stuff is no joke! Of course you forget about it every time and then you get pregnant again and then it all comes back and you're like oh man, this sucks! My body is pretty done at this point. And I'm okay with that. I'll just soak up every little bit with this last baby and try to enjoy all the stages as much as I can with 3 other crazies running around the house. I sure love our crazy, full house.

I had developed some minor to moderate itching at about week 35 but nothing major so I wasn't too worried about it but my doctor, Dr. Wyman, was a little weary about it and with my history of cholestasis he didn't want me to go all the way to 40 weeks. He advised being induced at 39 weeks, putting my delivery date on Thursday, November 29. Trey was able to have someone cover work for him for that day and the weekend so we were all set. My parents were all ready to come up that day to help take care of the kiddos. I'm happy to say we didn't have any false alarm labor pains this time around so I didn't have to do the walk of shame like I did with Ruby and then Liam.😂

Trey drove me to the hospital at 7am. He almost hit a deer on our way, which would have made for an interesting birth story if the deer hadn't moved. Luckily we made it there safe and sound. Trey walked me in and then headed back home to get the girls off to school and Liam dropped off at our friend's house until my parents arrived.

My nurse was so great, I loved her! I think her name was Kari? Man, I'm bad with remembering names. She nailed the IV the first time and I barely felt it go in. This mama don't like needles, which is funny considering she's the wife of an anesthesiologist. Nurse K was so helpful and attentive to whatever I needed and was just fun to chat with. I was a ball of emotions the day before having her but on birth day I felt calm and excited to finally meet our baby girl. We had it narrowed down to 3 names, Isla, Remi, or Hazel. Trey and I were both thinking Isla but at the same time I had a dream a few weeks before and the name Remi came to me and when I woke up it was in my head and couldn't get it out. So I kind of had a feeling she might be a Remi.💓

Dr. Wyman came in at 8am to check on me (dilated to 3+ at this point) and he broke my water. I remember when they broke my water with Ruby and Liam that it was a huge gush of warm water but I couldn't really feel much difference and so Dr. Wyman was like, "Can you cough for me?" I laughed and fake coughed and felt more water come out but still not like I remember it. Then a little while later Remi must have moved or something because the flood gates opened! Ha ha! Such a weird feeling. They started me on Pitocin a short while after to help get things rolling. A cool thing I was able to do with this labor that I didn't do with the others was lay in the tub, even with my IV in and fetal heart rate monitors strapped to my belly. It was really relaxing, it even had jets! I loved laying in there and the contractions were coming but I was pretty relaxed. I started to do my deep breathing and felt another gush of fluid come out so I decided to be done with the tub. I labored until about 10:30am, breathing through contractions and remembering what active labor feels like. I wanted to feel it a bit knowing this was my last but I was totally fine with getting an epidural when I was ready. They started to get more painful and more frequent and I was like, okay I'm good! I didn't want to wait too long! Haha! We called in the anesthesiologist (no, Trey was not my anesthesiologist although I'm very confident he would have done an awesome job) and in about 20 minutes I was getting the warm tingles in my feet and legs. I could feel it more in my left side so the nurse had me roll on my right side to help the medicine get there. I pushed the button to release a little more and in a little while I was feeling pretty tingly on both sides. He did a great job! I couldn't even feel the contractions.

As with Liam, I took a little nap and it was lovely! Dr. Wyman came in at about 12:30 and I was dialated 6cm, I was slowly getting there. The epidural slowed things down a bit. My nurse upped the Pitocin a good amount. And then a little while later a little more. I started watching Stardust on the Ipad and got about halfway through and I started feeling weird and then a little nauseated. And then really awful and I was like, "Trey, I need to throw up....I'm going to throw up! Can you grab something?!" He was scrambling around looking for something and ended up grabbing the garbage can and made it just in time. That was our sign that it was close to go time. Whenever I go into transition I barf!

The nurse checked my cervix right after and said, "Wow! She's right there!" She called Dr. Wyman in and he asked Trey if he wanted to catch her. Trey had never done it with our other kids and I said do it! It's our last one! So he got all scrubbed up and got down below me all ready to go. Ahh!! So much excitement in the room!!! I pushed 3 times and she came out at 3:01pm! Trey was giggling like a little kid, it was really cute. They handed her to me and I held her and looked at her beautiful, perfect little face. She definitely is a Banbury. She keeps trading off who she looks like. Sometimes I think Lucy, other times Ruby, and other times Liam. But she's also her own cute little self. We are in love!!!

Her official birth stats were...
Weight: 6 lbs 9 oz
Height: 19.5 inches long

My parents came an hour later to meet her and they had Lucy with them too. Trey took Liam and Ruby to gymnastics. Lucky Lucy got to meet her and hold her first. She's a natural mama. My parents were overjoyed to hold their last grandbaby, number 29 born on the 29th. Brad Holbrook popped in to say congratulations and meet Remi. It took us a little while to decide on her name but that night we both agreed she's a Remi. Isla and Hazel just didn't seem to fit her. And we decided on the name Kate for her middle name, named after one of our favorite people, Kate Niehoff. :)

And now we are officially a family of 6!!!