Here is Grey now!
And here is the story of his birth from Mama Lisa's perspective...
I thought that he would be early. I had been having contractions for almost a month. More than just practice contractions, I had to stop and breathe through them at times, but not enough to birth a baby. But my due date came and went and I was ready to be sleeping next to a beautiful new baby, instead of sleeping with a cramping belly. We started hiking and went to Mt. Bonnell, too. I don’t know if it helped labor, but it was a nice distraction, and the weather was beautiful, like now. Eight days after our agreed due date, we (my husband, good friend Jax, 16 month old Lily and I) come back home after one such hike to have lunch. As I was sitting down on the couch, my water broke. Just a little trickle and my contractions weren’t getting stronger. I went to lay down with Lily and we had a nap. When we woke up, they were slightly stronger, but not much and we went to the park. By then I was really ready to see this baby. Today. But even after playing, walking around the park and up and down hills, things were still not happening, so we went home and had dinner with friends, Alex and Nick, and my mom, Pat, too. After dinner, Alex and Nick left, kind of uncomfortable around a laboring woman and Lily went to bed. It was just Neil, Pat, and I left, and Jax joined us soon after. Christy arrived around 10 PM, which is just when things started picking up. I was alternately in the tub, sitting on the toilet trying to pee, which was hard, and sitting on my exercise ball. Sometime during the night my sister Claire arrived from Dallas and Faith, Christy’s partner midwife, arrived. Everyone was pretty tired (especially Christy and Faith, who were at births the previous two nights!) so everyone went upstairs to rest, giving me and Neil some privacy. The tub was warm and comfortable, a little too much, because we began to get really sleepy and soon both of us were leaning on the side of the tub half asleep. So we decided to get out of the tub to wake up a little. I went back to the bathroom to pee, and began feeling like pushing. I began pushing and I pushed standing up for a little while, and then got back in the tub. The baby was moving down, but it didn’t seem to be going further than a certain point. After a while Christy asked if I wanted her to check and feel what was going on with my cervix, and I did. She joined us in the tub and checked. I had a piece of it that was not letting the baby’s head down. She held it back while I pushed, and his head shot way down. It wasn’t long before he was crowing. By this time, Lily had woken up, excited at the commotion. She came down with her Nanna, and as soon as she saw the baby’s head appear between my legs, she knew what it was. She shouted “baby, baby, baby!” and was alternately excited and fearful until he was born. He was born inside of his amniotic sac, which Christy had to tear away so that the rest of his head and body could be born. Right after his body was born, Christy helped this little person onto my belly, and Neil and I held him like that for a little while. His size amazed me; he seemed so big and solid compared to my little pixie daughter. His face was squished and his features were swollen, and his skin was bluish from being born in the water, which made him look like an Aztec god. We looked at him and saw we had a boy; we named him Grey. After we got out of the tub, had a short visit, and Grey and I got checked out, everyone left us for home (Lily spent the day and night with her Nanna and Grandpa). We spent the next day in bed, sleeping and cuddling, and getting to know each other. When Lily came home the next day, we spent the day much the same way, getting to know each other as a family.
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