We are happy to announce the birth of our daughter, Audrey Kathryn Schwarz, at 10:43 AM on Monday, September 12, 2011. She weighed 6 lbs, 1 oz and was 18.25 inches. Audrey was born at Abington Memorial Hospital in Abington, PA.
I woke up at 7AM and immediately called Mike, who was already at work, to come home. Mike took a cab from the city to his car which was parked at the train station in Manayunk (to go to a DR apt later that day) and from there drove home, hitting an immense amount of morning rush hour traffic. Meanwhile, Grandpa had already been planning to pick Ryan up around 8AM and watch him that morning so he stayed with me until Mike arrived. Grandpa loaded my bags into my car and I sat in the passenger seat patiently awaiting Mike's arrival while my contractions quickly increased.
Mike and I made it to the hospital around 9ish and I walked myself to the Labor and Delivery floor with the squeeking of my flip-flops from my fluid. They took a look at me first and I was 3 cm and 100% effaced (at my appointment a week earlier I was 1 cm and 25% effaced) I was hooked up to monitors but laying on my side so apparently not all of my contractions were being picked up. I was asked if I wanted an epidural but minutes later when we asked the nurses if they thought this was going to be a long labor they said no but no one knew it would be this quick - Mike's parents were on their way with Ryan and my mom was on her way from Lancaster. It quickly went from the Triage nurses asking a Labor and Delivery nurse to get a room ready to demanding she come get me pronto. It seemed like only a matter of minutes and I was 9 cm and ready to push. Audrey was born about 1/2 hour later; a head full of long, dark hair and the longest nails ever!
My labor with Audrey was shockingly similar to my labor with Ryan - I woke up around 7AM with both of them, didn't have time for medications with either of them, and both of them were born in the 10th hour of the morning.
As with Ryan, everything happened SO quickly that I didn't have time to digest what was going on so I was in a little bit of shock immediately following. I held her for a few minutes after she was born but babies that are born this quickly tend to have some extra mucus so the nurse took her away to work on that and that is when we found out that her temperature was a bit below where they like it to be so she had to stay under a warmer for a few hours. By then I was transferred to my recovery room and she was given a bath. A few hours went by and no Audrey and finally when a tech came to my room to take my vitals I asked about her and I was told that she was in the well-nursery and I needed to ask for her - this was all so new to me!
The next morning Audrey went through the typical newborn tests and it was discovered that she was jaundice to the point where they had to put her under the lights in the nursery from Tuesday AM to Wednesday AM. This was not a surprise to us as Ryan was jaundice and under the lights for about a week. She was brought to me every 2-3 hours for feedings. Wednesday morning she was re-tested and her bilirubin level decreased enough to take her off the lights. I was to be released from the hospital Wednesday around lunch but they allowed me to stay until dinner because Audrey needed a re-bound test to see how she was tolerating not being under the lights. We were preparing yet again to not bring our baby home with us from the hospital. There was a room I could stay in overnight after being released while Audrey was still being treated. 30 minutes before leaving the hospital we were told the wonderful news that we were bringing her home with us so we arrived home about 7:30 on Wednesday night - a dream come true!
