What a wonderful Mother's Day!!

As you all now know, I was blessed with one of the most special Mother's Day gifts this year (even though I wasn't able to spend it with my little E), a new addition to our family...little Cooper Price!! As I posted in my last entry, I did end up making that trip to the hospital Saturday night, or rather very early Sunday morning. After I wrote on the blog, I headed to bed to try and get some sleep and from about 10:30 until 12:30, I was having fairly intense, consistent 10 min. contractions. While I thought it was still too early to head to the hospital, Andrew insisted we at least go in and get checked out (we'd been hearing too many stories about people arriving at the hospital too late to receive an epidural and having to go all natural....there was no way I wanted that to happen!!). So, we headed out about 1:15am and when we arrived at the hospital, they hooked me up to the monitors to observe the contractions and noticed they were down to about 5-7 minutes apart (we were so glad we had made the decision to go to the hospital at this point!). But then, when the nurse checked me, I still hadn't even begun to dilate!! She made a call to the Dr. who told them to go ahead and admit me. They should observe me overnight and that he would be in to check on me in the morning. The rest of the morning, the contractions seemed to lessen (but mind you, still painful enough!!!) and space themselves out....great, I thought....now I feel really silly! So when the Dr. arrived around 10am, I still hadn't made any progress, so he told me to go back home and that we would just keep our appointment for Thursday and we'd see where we were then. I told Andrew there was no way I was going to make it until then with the contractions I was having. Nevertheless, we headed back to our temporary home and thought we'd just see how it went! Now, I was thrilled that Andrew had been here with me....I would have hated to get him up here and then have to send him back to Melaka had it been on a weekday!! Anyhow, we went and had lunch and then headed back "home". I decided to take a shower as I was still having these fairly consistent contractions and feeling really crappy and drained from being up all night. While we were home from about 1:00 until about 3:30 (as I tried to nap.....while Marte was being an absolute savior and taking great care of Evan!!), the contractions only seemed to intensify and get closer together. By about 3:45, they started coming every 5-6 minutes....so, yes we headed back to the hospital! I told Andrew they were going to have to do something to make the baby come this time if he wasn't on his way because there was ABSOLUTELY no way I was going to make it another day with the pain I was having. When we arrived at the hospital this time, the nurse didn't even have to monitor me to make the decision to admit me because she saw how intense and frequent the contractions were coming (and how painful I must have made them look!!) and told me to go ahead and get into that "oh-so-nice" hospital gown. By the time she did get me connected, she was already getting all the "stuff" ready and I was telling her that I would like an epidural...STAT! She checked me and said I was at about 3cm, but that I was progressing quite quickly. By the time the anesthesiologist arrived and got the epidural in me at about 5:30(which by the way, was almost as painful as the now 1-2 min spaced contractions!), I was already about 6-7cm dilated! He told me I should have asked for it sooner...ha!...if I'd the strength he might have gotten a real earful from me!! After the epidural....ahhhh....now I was ready to have little Coop! Prior to that, I had told Andrew to remind me how I was feeling right then and there (as I was digging all my nails into him every couple of minutes....you forget, I didn't practice those breathing techniques that the natural childbirth mothers learn, as I always knew I was going the painless route!) if I ever told him I wanted a 3rd child!! You ladies who go natural are my heroes!! I have absolutely no idea HOW YOU DO IT!! Had I had to endure that sort of pain any longer, I might have passed out...ouch!! Anyhow, by 7pm I was about 9cm along and just waiting for the Dr to arrive....yet again!! By 7:30, I was fully dilated and ready to start pushing. After about 10 minutes of pushing, Cooper was in my arms and it was all over.....WHEW...what a day!!! Everything went beautifully from that point on. Cooper Price Thompson arrived on May 11th at 7:40pm (Malaysia time). He weighed 6lbs, 10 oz and was 19.5 in long. It was amazing how much he looked like Evan. And believe it or not, I think he had even more jet black hair on his head than Evan did! I wouldn't have thought that was possible! He is an absolute doll and has been a wonderful baby thus far. He and Mom pulled through everything with no problems at all. We are so thankful to God that everything went so smoothly and that there were no complications! We did find out today though, that the only pediatric surgeon in the hospital would not perform Cooper's circumcision because she was concerned about how it was bent down a bit. She said she would like to wait and observe him again when he is about 8-10 months old and look at doing the circumcision then. Given that we would really rather not have to have him go under local anesthesia at that age, we are looking into getting a 2nd opinion. So we'll have to see what happens with that. With the circumcision not being performed today, they went ahead and discharged us earlier this afternoon. We are now back in our temporary home in KL, and ready to make the trip back home to Melaka tomorrow. I have no idea how we are going to get all our stuff, the 2 kiddos and Marte, Andrew and myself into one car!! I'll let you all know how that goes! Anyhow, I thought you might like to see a few pics of the new guy. I have to go and feed the little man right now, so I'll have to post Evan's reaction to his new baby brother in my next post. It was so cute and sweet, as you can tell from a couple of the pictures below.