Its funny how things work out. With all the bumps we’ve hit bringing the baby home, labor and delivery were the smoothest parts of the road. E went into active labor at around 3 am on May 3^rd. By 11:30 am she was pushing. By 12:33, our daughter was in the world.

We were of course overjoyed and terrified. Would she be ok? Would they need to rush her upstairs to the NICU? What happened from here would determine the rest of our lives.

She came out screaming and red with anger. The NICU team began their examination but we soon joking and chatting with each other and us. “They’re joking,” I whispered to E, “that has to be a good sign.”

It was.

Anna was 5 pounds 6 ounces — big for a 33 weeker, and she was doing well. They let E hold her for thirty minutes or so while Dr. A worked to removed the placenta. Turns out, the placenta was the hardest thing about the delivery and there was some concern it wasn’t all removed. So, after too short a time, the baby was taken to the NICU and E was taken in for a DNC.

With no complications from the DNC, E recovered quickly and was soon making her way up to see our daughter, Anna.The whol thing had been remarkably smooth and painless, but there’d be more hurdles to overcome in the NICU.

Read about our PPROM stay here and our NICU stay here