At 40 weeks exactly, February 28th, at 5:36am I met the only boy I will ever need!! I came in to the hospital around 4pm the 26th for very reduced movement and my blood pressure being high, and they kept me. They did an ultrasound to check his levels and he only scored 6/8 for not moving enough even though his heart was great, so they induced me. They inserted cervadil around 8pm. It made me cramp for a little then let up. I didn't sleep much through the night because the cervadil started giving me contractions and I was uncomfortable. They started pitocin around 9am on the 27th, and by 10, I was shaking and nauseous and felt like i was going to pass out, so they went ahead and did the epidural to help with the negative symptoms of pitocin. That was great because I ended up being able to sleep most of the day. I wasn't progressing enough so they kept rotating me and keeping the peanut ball between my legs. At one point, if I didn't progress they were going to do a c section, but I progressed 1 cm in the time frame so they gave me longer to labor. They had to stop the pitocin at 8pm because it was starting to cause him stress. They were able to restart it at 11pm: Around midnight, everything started kicking up. I was a 5 when they checked me at 1:40, and then I had them come back in to check me around 2:25 because I was in a lot of pain and felt pressure, and I was at a 7. My epidural had ran out of meds and they couldn't find the anesthesiologist so it took a while for him to come up and plug more in. That sucked. From about 3-4:30 I was so ready to give up, I was in so much pain and had so much pressure , I was exhausted and hungry from not eating for over 24 hours, and just done. When they checked at 4:30, I was 10 and ready to practice pushing. They called the dr and she was up there by 4:45 and I started pushing around 4:55. I felt like I had been drugged, I couldn't even keep my eyes open, and couldn't focus hardly on anything, I thought it would take me forever to push because I was so tired, but at 5:36am, my perfect baby was put on my chest. I immediately was able to wake up and be alert. He weighed 8 pounds 15 ounces and 21 inches long. I had a 2nd degree tear. He was absolutely perfect. I only got to hold him for about 15 minutes before they took him to the nicu. We both had to have preventive antibiotics because I had a fever towards the end of labor, the nurse said most likely because I had been in labor so long and my body was stressed. They told me after 12 hours he could come to my room. Well they poked him about 15 times and couldn't get an iv, so had to go to umbilical iv and that's more risky and dangerous, so he then had to stay in nicu for 36hrs and not be held. He then had to be given oxygen because his sats were low. The doctor okayed it for me to hold him one or two times during feedings, so I did get about 2 hours of holding time in his first 24 hours. When I went to see him around 8am the 1st, he was under the light for having a high bilirubin. That meant his stay would be extended even more and absolutely no holding him. It broke my heart and I wanted to cry. They ended up letting me hold him for about 30 minutes to feed him, but he didn't want to eat, just wanted to cuddle up and sleep on his mommy💙 he was released from everything except the lights around 6pm. The only thing keeping him here is his bilirubin. I get released today and I know I physically can't go home without him with me. They are checking his bilirubin again here soon, please pray it is good enough that he can come to my room for me to finally really hold him and that it stays good for his second test so he can come home with me. He's worth all of the pain but I'm so ready to truly get to hold him and snuggle skin to skin. I will post updates as I have them.