Esmé Ruth Ahn!!

We are finally home. Well at least we aren't in the hospital. Ash got discharged last night and we headed to Greenville to meet up with Zoe and Adia who had been staying at MawMaw's. So I guess I should go back a few days and recap. Monday: I had gotten my stuff at school in order for a week and Ashley picked me up at school and we headed to Greenville to drop off the kids. Tuesday, early: Ash and I headed to Asheville for the induction. Ash was being induced due to the fact that she was diagnosed with a blood clot a few months ago and needed to time the blood thinners just right. But all has been well with the clot and up until Tuesday - life had pretty much returned to normal. We checked in and went up to our room - it was facing the mountains and was a pretty glorious sight - quite a plus for a hospital - we never closed the blinds. I realize now that had someone been looking up a few floors late that night they would have gotten quite a show of beauty and terror. We had a really good nurses - and the conversation as we went along through the night and day was pretty amazing - the first one just has a best friend whose child was just diagnosed with type 1 and so I told her about Triabetes and Insulindependence and whipped off my insulindependence.com bracelet and told her to give it to her friend. She promptly put it on her own wrist and off she went. Our midwife, Ann Brown, was absolutely incredible. She works with MAHEC (whatever that stands for) but she works out of the same office as the maternal-fetal specialists of western NC. So we had the best of both worlds. We thought that when the clot issue came up we knew we wanted more of a medical hand in the delivery and we thought that would rule out a midwife - but not in Asheville. But Ann - what a great person and midwife. Ann was there when we got there at 8am and then just slept at the hospital that night in case we needed her. Wow. Double wow. Oh, and she is a beekeeper and chicken-keeper (even just wrote an article for a home chicken magazine (that sounds funny - kind of like southern living for chickens...but its not)

We discussed some options and measured Ashley and decided that it might be best to wait to break her bag of waters and just do a light dose of pitocin to see if contractions could be coaxed into strength that way (Ash had been contracting off and on for days). That was at 10am. We went on through the day - Kathy came up until the afternoon - we contracted, we talked bees, we talked chickens, we talked all kinds of stuff...actually I should say that Ashley contracted while I talked bees and chickens and whatnot. At one point even I realized that I was taking my eye off the prize and I toned it down a bit. By 4pm the contraction had been relatively powerful and she had dilated a bit and thinned out some more and we decided to break the waters.

Game on. Not much came out during the first few contractions. But apparently the baby shifted at one point and Whoosh! out came the flood. That didn't happen with Zoe (trickle) or Adia (water had to be broken after she was born). From that point on - for the next 6+ hours, Ashley the Legend, was created. Apparently back labor hurt a whole lot. Ash stayed positive all day into the night and just worked hard while only fueling up on broth, jello, and water (and those wonderful ice chips). But sometime in the dark, the tide changed. The pain in her back went from hurting really bad to white hot fire with each contraction. Ann was amazing keeping her going - coming up with different coping mechanisms, positions, distractions, etc. But slowly I saw Ash getting closer to her limit. Then I saw her at her limit. Then she was past her limit. But Ann kept her going and by that time she was really close. I've never seen someone in that much pain and exhaustion before... even Ashley. By the end she was hanging over the bed and I was holding her up while the nurse worked on her back and Ann and Dr Sigmon (she is a great doctor - very holistic and a beekeeper to boot) worked on hip bones and cervix lips.

Finally it was time to push. But Ash was done. She had tried to push a few times but the pain was so bad and she was so tired that she blew through them. Then it happened. Like Rocky Balboa picking himself off the mat ... and his old coach says "one more round!" She roared through the pushing (and by roaring, I mean roaring...later she would say she felt bad about scaring all the poor laboring mothers on the hall:) And then it was over. Esmé Ruth Ahn entered the world at 10:05pm Tuesday January 13th, 2009. She was 7lbs 7oz and 19 inches long. She nursed right away and slept and slept. And at that moment, we had 3 wonderful kids. I remember thanking God and everyone - just grateful for the moment. And now I look forward to running a marathon this summer with Ashley. Amen.

For pictures - you can click on the scrolling pictures to the right or go to our Picassa album