Finally! We welcomed Luke Randall DeBoer on Easter Sunday- April 12, 2009. He is an absolute joy and we are thrilled to be new parents to such a precious little boy! (forewarning- this post will probably have lots of exclamation points and pictures, we hope you don't mind)
Luke officially entered our world at 9:01 pm after a somewhat stressful labor. I started feeling contractions about 11:00am but they were mostly inconsistent so I chalked it up to another set of false labor contractions (which I had been feeling a lot of lately). Matt and I were going to go out for a walk when those contractions got extremely intense and fairly close together. It was obvious that this was the real deal when the contractions forced me to my knees and those contractions continued to get stronger and were coming every 5 minutes, like clockwork. Matt brilliantly suggested that we head to the hospital versus going on a walk and we were off! We arrived at the hospital around 2pm. I was already dilated to 5cm and having strong contractions about every 3-4 minutes apart. About 45 minutes after arriving at the hospital my water broke (quite the mess, let me tell you). I opted to go for the epidural (which I am convinced was one of the best decisions of my life! I give worlds of credit to women who give birth without drugs- yikes!) Within 2 hours of getting to the hospital I was resting comfortably, watching the cubs game with Matt in our labor/delivery room. However, while I was feeling fine, poor little Luke had gotten himself tangled up in his umbilical cord and was getting distressed! Everytime I would have a contraction Luke's heart rate would plummet. I had to be on oxygen the entire time I was in labor and would flip from left side to right side every hour or so to see if my position would help keep the heart rate up. Luckily, I was progressing at a pretty good pace. The on-call doctor opted to let me try and push at that time rather than go in for an emergency C-section right away. Once Luke moved into the birth canal his heart rate stabilzed, thank God. I pushed for a grand total of 40 minutes and then there he was! All 7 lbs, 11oz, 21.5 inches of beautiful baby boy!
Due to the fact that his heart rate was so irregular during labor the NICU was in the room during the delivery. They took Luke immediately after he was born and got him breathing, cleaned up, and all that good stuff. He wasn't breathing very well at first and they were debating about bring him up to the NICU to keep an eye on him. But, again, luckily, they let us try to get him settled by placing him directly on my chest to see if my breathing would help regulate his - worked like a charm! Within minutes Luke was calm, alert, and rooting around!
Matt was amazing. He was by my side the entire time, extremely supportive and encouraging. It was such a thrill to watch him follow Luke around after he was born doing all the typical father things- counting fingers and toes and other body parts, telling me what was going on with Luke, etc.
I'm doing well... tired and sore, but feeling great overall. At the time of this post we are still in the hospital waiting to be officially discharged and head home!! Yesterday we had a steady stream of visitors, which was wonderful. It was so great to feel so supported and loved by friends and family. Thank you to everyone who came by, called, wrote emails, facebook, etc. We feel very loved and encouraged by all of you!
As promised - here are some of the pictures from our Easter Adventure. The first of many!
Nice and puffy, on oxygen, waiting for Luke to make his grand entrance.
Little Luke Randall
Proud Dad overseeing the activities.
Luke likes to keep his hands up by his chin just like Matt did as a baby.
Matt had to wait an hour before he could actually hold his son.
After that, he wouldn't put him down.
This is our nurse, Nicole. She was fabulous!
Proud Daddy
Grandma and Pops Thomson were the first visitors - at 1am!
Our happy (and very tired) family!
8 comments:
Oh my goodness! He is just so precious. Congrats, Matt and Lisa. So happy for you both and glad that little Luke arrived safely. Can't wait to meet him. :)
Congrats! He is adorable. He looks like a good mix of the two of you! Best wishes for the days ahead and hope to talk with you soon!
Oh my that just made my heart melt! Love it! So happy for you and I think this deserves a million exclamation points!!!!!!!! Thank you for updating the blog for those of us far away:)
Congratulations!!! We are just so excited for you guys. I'm still jealous that Mark has already gotten to meet Luke. :)
Congratulations you guys! He is just adorable! I'm glad it all went well after having a bit of a stressful delivery, and so glad you didn't have to have a C-section.
Yeah!!! I was so excited that you got a Easter baby and a natural delivery! That is wonderful and a HUGE Blessing. We can't wait to see him of course. Just love the name. Let me know if you need a meal or cookies or something fun as you settle back home!
Congratulations! He is absolutely beautiful and I'm so thankful to hear that you both got through the stressful labor and delivery. Sophia was born with her cord around her neck, so I remember the stress of the dropping heart rate. Thanks so much for sharing!
A happy, tired, healthy, and beautiful family! Congrats!
p.s. Lisa, don't listen to anyone, you looked GREAT out there golfing!
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