Hudson Cole

Well, he's here!! And we couldn't be happier! Below you will find Hudson's birth story. There are some details of the birth that not everyone may want to read, so proceed with caution! :)

Just chillin'

Super strong little guy!

He loves his bouncer!

All smiles after a dirty diaper!

The Birth Story of

Hudson Cole Gillespie

Born: Monday, April 15, 2013 at 2:22pm

8 Pounds 8 Ounces

20 Inches Long

Doctor: Dianne Woolard

Pediatrician: Gary Olson

     Hudson was brought into this world 14 days early. His actual due date was April 29, 2013. It all started Friday evening after I got off work for the weekend. I started having painless contractions that I could only notice by watching for my belly to tighten into a very hard ball every so often. These contractions continued through Sunday. They started to get more regular so I started timing them. By Sunday afternoon, they were consistently 3-6 minutes apart for about an hour, but still pretty painless. We made the decision to head in to Labor & Delivery and get checked out around 6:00pm. Being a first time mom, I didn't know if maybe I was just handling the pain really well or if they really were just very weak contractions. Either way, they were very close together and I didn't want to have this baby at home!

     After arriving at the hospital, they hooked me up to monitors to take a look at my contractions. They checked me immediately and I was not dilated at all. After an hour of monitoring my painless contractions, the nurse said that my contractions were pretty weak and somewhat irregular. She said she would check me again and then put a report together for the doctor to make a decision about whether they keep me or send me home. She said that since I'm only 38 weeks (and not yet 39 weeks), they wouldn't do anything to stop the contractions or make them stronger. This time however, I was 3cm dilated! I had made progress in an hour which would help my chances of being able to stay and have this baby! After the nurse talked to Dr. Woolard, she came back in the room and said enthusiastically, “Well, do you want to stay and have this baby?!?” I was so excited!!

     We were then given the chance to move to a different room. We chose room #248, a big corner room at the end of the hall. My contractions started getting stronger that night. If they would have sent me home earlier, we would have been back again later Sunday night! Around 11:30pm, I asked for some pain medicine. Stadol was selected and wow, that was amazing! She only gave me half the dose to see how it made me feel along with some phenergan to prevent nausea. Well I was almost instantly asleep! I woke up an hour later in pain once again. We decided to go ahead and get the epidural started. They did the epidural at 1:30am when I was about 4-5cm dilated, and I felt pain-free within minutes. I slept comfortably all night long.

     In the morning, my contractions had spaced out a bit while I was sleeping. We decided to go ahead and start a little pitocin around 9am to regulate the contractions. Next, the nurse checked me again. This is when mishap #1 happened... The nurse accidentally broke my water while she was checking me! She said I was 6cm dilated. No one else was in the room when this happened, and she didn't have any towels or anything! My water went everywhere, but thankfully it was clear. We also learned at this point that the doctor would be in surgery at 10am, so it was sort of a timing game. Around 10:15am, I started feeling contractions again in my lower left abdomen. Turns out the epidural medication bag was empty and the nurse neglected to pay attention when the pump alarm went off the first time! (mishap #2) They called anesthesia back up to my room. I spent an hour breathing through contractions (and cussing anesthesia in between) while we waited for anesthesia to come hook up another epidural bag. I was not happy! Eventually they got the bag hung, but for some reason, it didn't numb the spot I was complaining about in my left lower abdomen. I gave it 20 minutes while flipping from side to side trying to move the baby or get gravity to help the epidural work faster. Nothing worked. Anesthesia was called back to my room again. She topped off the epidural and gave me some additional lidocaine. Eventually, we got the painful spot to stop hurting during contractions.

     Soon after that, I was fully dilated! We did a couple pushes, and then the nurse made a couple calls for delivery. It was time! Thomas got the videocamera set up and I started pushing. Hudson had the hiccups throughout most of the pushing! About mid-way through, Dr. Woolard could feel that he was turned a little which was not necessarily a problem, but it most definitely would make the delivery process harder. She successfully got him turned into the correct position, and after about an hour of pushing, baby Hudson was born at 2:22pm! The doctor was shocked at how big he was! (I was not in the least bit surprised... take a look at his father!) He was a little blue, so the doctor alerted the baby nurse that she was bringing him straight to her after the cord was cut. Here comes mishap #3... Thomas was quickly instructed to cut the cord, but it didn't go exactly as planned. As soon as he cut it, the doctor turned her head and started coughing into her scrubs. Some blood from the cord had squirted into her mouth!! Everyone was quiet and just stared at her. She just kept going like normal and handed him off.  The baby nurse got him crying in no time!

     Next was the delivery of the placenta (mishap #4). I was pretty distracted watching Thomas who was in awe watching over our new bundle of joy as they checked him out and cleaned him up. Next thing I know, the doctor is asking me to push to deliver the placenta. Just a few moments later, I felt a huge gush and heard a huge splash! The placenta had busted in the doctor's hands and exploded leaving a huge mess all over the doctor, nurses, bed, and floor! The doctor's somber comment was, “Sorry guys,” since all of their scrubs and shoes were now covered with the contents of my placenta! The next comment I remember that came from the doctor was, “Well that was dramatic!”

     After getting a few stitches, Thomas brought Hudson over to me to hold for the first time. We immediately did skin-to-skin contact and he took to breastfeeding like a champ! After spending a good 45 minutes with Hudson, they took him away for a bath and some more health checks. During this time, Thomas went to the waiting room to inform our families that a healthy, 8lbs 8oz, 20in long baby boy had arrived! Not long after Thom's announcement, our family members heard a baby crying around the corner... They peeked in the nursery windows and got to see our baby boy for the first time! Eventually, it was time for all of them to file into our room to see our newest addition and find out his name. So in came Grandpa Frank, Grandma Sharon, Aunt Jackie, Aunt Jodie, Grandpa Bill, Grandma Shelly, and Mark! I announced his name and they all took turns holding baby Hudson.

Daddy looking pretty comfortable while we wait...

I think I was describing what my contractions felt like. :)

He's finally out!

The proud daddy had to let our neighborhood know that Hudson
had arrived! The balloons had already blown away. :)

Hudson in the outfit Thomas wore home from the hospital when he was born!

He's not a fan of this outfit!

Please stop with the pictures mom!

Our little glow worm

He was one week old on Monday, 4/22!

Relaxing while Dad plays a video game

He's got some cheeks on him!

Already knows how to use his hands to hold his bottle up and keep his pacifier in!

Again... holding his bottle!

Today is my actual due date, and I can't imagine still being pregnant!! That would have been awful... My body must have known to go into labor early or he was going to come out via c-section!

Hudson is two weeks old today. Crazy! Time is already flying by. Thomas goes back to work today, and we are sure going to miss him! He's been quite the help, and I have been slightly spoiled :)

As you can imagine, I have much more to blog about for Hudson's first two weeks of life. Hopefully I can get a couple more posts up this week before we head back home to visit this weekend! In case you haven't heard, we will be having some times available for everyone to meet Hudson. Hope all of you can stop by (unless you're sick...)! Here is where we will be and when:

Saturday 12:30pm-4:30pm: Frank & Sharon's house
Saturday 5:30pm-8:30pm: Mark & Shelly's house
Sunday 12:30pm-4:00pm: Bill's house