the moment i was dreading since college! giving birth has always scared me, but for the past few weeks i was more excited than scared. imagine meeting your son after nine months of waiting... but it was not meant to be easy. never.

tuesday morning of august 12 i was still working, because since my due date is on the 22nd, i filed my leave to begin on the 15th or 16th. but that tuesday morning, one day after our latest weekly pre-natal check up i was having mild contractions that comes and goes every ten minutes. bambi was so excited that he did not let me go to work on the afternoon! he also went home and stayed with me 'just in case'.

we have waited for three days, but still no water. we went to the hospital on the 2nd day but they told us to go back because i was still 1 cm. but on thursday night it was so painful that i was crying, it was then that bambi decided to bring me back to the hospital at 7 pm, which was a good thing, because after checking that i was still only 2 cm, they gave me enema (don't ask) and then my cervix dilated to 5-6 cm until 12 am.

i didn't expect to progress that fast, but since most of my pregnancy days were easy, i thought maybe this was going to be easy, too. but omg it was so painful and every contraction bambi has to get me to focus on breathing, because i was not suppose to push yet. but pushing lessened the pain, so even if i can't help it, if the pain is too much i pushed a little, and at 12:30 am i think i pushed my water to break.

they brought me to the delivery room to wait til i was 10 cm, because at that time i was still 6-7. bambi was still on my side telling me to focus and not to push. if it was that easy! anyways the pain was too much that i dreaded each contraction, which comes every 10 minutes, and even though how many times they tell me not to push it was the only thing that minimizes the pain so i really tried not to but i did anyway. at 1 am, even at 7 cm they tried to bring lance out because his heartbeat was slowing down, and tried to make me push when the contractions come, which is every 5-8 minutes.

so there they were, bambi, the doctor and three nurses all telling me to push and i was really confused because they told me i don't know how to 'properly' push the baby out. it also confused me that during labor it was easy to push when i wasn't allowed to, and now that i was allowed to push i don't know what else they want me to do.

i was told three times that if i still did not push the baby out properly i was going to have a caesarian. bambi was worried at that time, for the baby and me. i told the nurse that i don't want to be cut, and i will try again. at that time i know when a contraction is coming, but i didn't feel the pain anymore. for one hour and twenty minutes we were there until the doctor took out the vacuum and when i (finally) tried to push with (believe me) all my might, she vacuumed lance's head out and there he was! all wrinkly and small and crying so loud!

that was 2:22, although the nurses said 2:20... my baby was finally born, 13 days after my birthday, 2 days before our 2nd wedding anniversary.

bambi was crying, and i was... well, i didn't know what i felt at that time. he kissed me and he was so happy running around the place talking with the nurses. for me, it was certainly not like what maricel said (she said at that time you will feel like every pain was lifted and all your problems are gone), and even when they showed him to me i was still confused that all i said was "he's all wrinkled...?!?"

they said it was normal because he was submerged for the past nine months. they took him to the next room to clean and place him in an incubator because (as i have read in his file) he has irregular respiration due to the long process of getting him out. poor guy. i was really sorry that it took that long.

anyways the pain was not over yet. i was still there til 3, i think, for the stitches and cleaning... bambi stayed til four then he went home to sleep and came back at 10. lance was with me already, and bambi carried him all the time he was there.

after 2 days we went home, and started looking out for lance on our own. it was freaking me out not to have the nurses at our side just in case i have a question, but bambi was a natural.

since i can't move a lot he was the one who took care of lance and did everything. we were still in a daze, we were suppose to go back to the hospital on the 19th for lance's checkup, but when we went there the nurses said "it's still 18!" lol...

anyways the good thing with american mission hospital is that they are very accommodating and not so strict. they checked him up anyway.

so for now im still at home. bambi returned to work one week after but for me, not until october.


lance is getting heavier each time i carry him.

our routine for the past few days were the same: we wake up at 12 (because we didn't sleep properly all three of us), bambi will go to work, lance and i will eat and then go back to sleep. by the time bambi comes back at 10 we'll eat and ill sleep earlier, lance and daddy will stay up til 3 or four, and by that time bambi will sleep and i will stay up...

at seven days he was rolling in his bed.

after 12 days lance's umbilical dropped off, and one day after that my stitches dissolved.

in his less than two week's existence lance has been smiling and crying in his sleep, but not until this afternoon that i thought he was crying in his sleep again, but when i checked him, he was actually laughing! i laughed, too, because i was wondering what he was dreaming about!



sigh... they said this phase was the easy part. we have to wait for one month and then the real sleep-deprivation starts...