Grady was born on June 1st! He was 36 weeks old. He weighed 6lbs 7oz. His length was 19 3/4 inches.
It was a fairly quick and easy labor (thanks to the epidural!). I stopped taking the medicine (Procardia) that I had been taking every 4 hours to prevent labor the previous 6 weeks on Thursday, May 31st in the morning. By 2:00pm, noticeable contractions began. We got to the hospital around 5:30pm and Grady was born at 1:16am. The doctor offered to Jeff that he could help deliver Grady, but Jeff was content with cutting the cord. The doctor was quite humorous and sang "Happy Birthday" to Grady just as he was delivered. Then, I got to hold him a short bit before they examined him.
The NICU nurses were called in the delivery room because Grady was having trouble breathing and they took him to the NICU for monitoring. Shortly after that, he was admitted to the NICU. Despite having the steroid shots (to help develop the lungs) and being 1 week older and almost a pound bigger than Landry, he little lungs were having a harder time than Landry was when he was born. Day by day his lungs developed more and was on the breathing tube for about a week, then they continued to monitor his oxygen levels for another week. He finally came on on June 14th - what a happy day!
Thank you to everyone for your prayers! Although he had rough beginning, Grady is doing great and is thriving...he's already gained about 2 pounds!
Below are pictures of the big day and a few pictures around the house.
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| On the way to the hospital (for the 4th and LAST time!). |
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| Just waiting... |
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| and waiting... |
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| One of the best moments of my life! |
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| Holding Daddys finger. |
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| Try changing the diaper with all these wires! It's tricky! |
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| We had to gavage feed him for several days before he was breathing well enough to introduce bottle or breast. |
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| I took this picture while holding him...he had just tooted...I thought it was funny. |
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| Children were not allowed in the NICU, so we improvised and showed Landry a fake "Grady" to show him Grady wasn't in Mommy's belly anymore. He's pointing to his "brother" :) |
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| Sorry...I don't know how to rotate the picture in this program :( |
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| Landry loves being the big brother now and "helping" out. |
