If you haven't heard...

He's here! At 36 weeks Matthew William was born on March 1st at 1:10 pm. 6 lbs 3 oz 19.5 in. He's our sweet little love bug! We're both still in the hospital. I can go home if I want, but Matthew has to stay a few extra days since he was born a little prematurely. Of course, I don't want to go home without him so the hospital is letting me stay. Grandma and Grandpa (on my side) flew down asap to come see their first grandbaby. So right now it's just a waiting game for Matthew to be strong enough to go home, hopefully just another couple of days. I can't wait to take him home and get on with being a mommy! Ahead is our birth story if you'd like to read (I won't be graphic):

I was at work on Monday when my water broke about 8:30 am. I wasn't in any pain, didn't know anything was going to happen that day or anything (or I assure you I would NOT have gone into work!). My coworkers were really excited to be part of the process and our secretary put me in a wheelchair and took me over to Labor and Delivery. The funny thing is that I was not supposed to deliver at the hospital I work at. I was supposed to deliver at the Air Force base which was an hour and a half drive away. The nurse at L&D said I wasn't that far into my laboring yet so I could transfer to the base if I wanted to. I really didn't know what I should do so I did the easy thing and decided to stay put. (And it's a good thing I did...)

I called Will at work and he started making the drive over. I called Mom at home in South Carolina and she got on the next available plane.

I wasn't having any contractions by about 10:00, just a lot of backpain, which the nurse thought was weird, but whenever she "checked" me, I was making progress. By the time Will got to the hospital I was having full blown contractions. Our plan this whole pregnancy was to have a natural childbirth and we had prepared by going to Bradley Method classes. So I did the relaxing things that I was supposed to do but I didn't really want Will to do anything but sit there, poor guy! Around 11 or 12 (I'm getting fuzzy on the times by now) I was really having the contractions closer and closer so the nurse checked me again and I was at 5-6 cm. Progress.

Not even 15 minutes later I told Will he'd better go get somebody cause I was having this baby now and I couldn't do anything to stop it. My nurse said "you're a first timer so I really doubt you're ready to go, but I'll check you anyway." Yeah, I went from 5 cm to 10 cm in only 15 minutes. She was pretty shocked and ran out of the room to call the on call doc and the delivery team. So even if I had wanted an epidural, there was not time for it at all. At this point there was too much of a hurry to even have any IV pain meds. And obviously, good choice to not have taken the time to transfer to the other hospital!

Unfortunately the on call doc was in surgery at the time I was ready (about 12:30ish) so I had to hold back with the support of the lovely L&D nurses and my poor husband that I wouldn't allow to touch me. The doc finally came in the room at 1:03 and Matthew was born by 1:10. So we got our all natural, drug free birth and it was only 4 1/2 hours long! I'm a pretty happy camper about all of that.

So now we just wait for little Matthew to get stronger and we can get on with life!