First 11 days

Day 1, Wednesday, was pretty much a blur to me after my c-section.  I had some good pain medicine and slept most of the time.  I know we had several visitors but can't really remember much more than that.  Clay and I had decided ahead of time to have Gavin sleep in the nursery at night and just come to the room to be fed so that we could get as much sleep as possible while in the hospital.  I told him he was going to have to keep me strong because I was sure that I would want Gavin to stay in the room.  But I was so sleepy, I put up no fight at all.  I am pretty sure this was the night that they took out my catheter and made me get up and go to the bathroom.  Oh my goodness....that was painful!!  Gavin also had a traumatic experience that evening, poor little guy was circumcised.  The nurses said that of all the boys that were circumcised at that time, he was definitely the maddest.  Needless to say Gavin takes after his Mom in the temper department, he wears his emotions on his sleeve just like me!  Gavin took to breastfeeding just fine and had a very healthy appetite. 

Day 2 , Thursday, I don't really remember much of either, my brother and his girlfriend came and visited.  He had been in Houston the day before acquiring his first professional job as a geologist. 

Day 3, Friday, the doctor came and visited and said that I was healthy enough to go home if I wanted.  I told him I wasn't sure.  I was worried about going home mainly because it hurt so much getting out of the bed at the hospital with all of the rails to pull up on, I didn't have any idea how I was going to manage getting out of the bed at home.  I was also worried about taking care of Gavin on our own, since we didn't have anyone staying with us at the house.  At the hospital if he wouldn't quit crying, we could call the nurses in the nursery to come and check on him and make sure we weren't doing anything wrong.  Clay however was extremely tired of sleeping on that tiny little chair/bed and told me he promised to take super good care of me at home, so I agreed to leave my comfort zone and strike out as a parent :-).

The next couple of days were a blur but not b/c I was taking pain meds, but because we were starved for sleep!  I truly didn't know you could be that sleep deprived and still so gloriously happy.  Sunday Gavin had his hospital checkup to check his weight and make sure he hadn't developed jaundice.  His weight was down to 8 lbs 11 oz.  But that was still less than a 10% loss from his birth weight so, he was just fine!  By Sunday night we were desperate, Gavin hadn't slept at night since we got home, he would sleep just fine during the day but at 10 pm, he decided sleep was unnecessary and would stay awake and cry/scream until 6 the next morning.  We had no idea what to do.  We read and reread Babywise, trying to figure out how long we were supposed to let him cry, of course they didn't say.  So we prayed and prayed and the Lord heard our desperate prayers and Monday night he slept after his midnight feeding and Tuesday night he slept after both his midnight and 3 am feeding.  You would have thought we had discovered the cure for cancer we were so deliriously happy Wednesday morning!  That day I went and got my staples taken out and they said I was healing just fine.  Since then Clay and I havetaken close to 500 pictures of our little miracle from God.  We have also been spoiled rotten by our friends bringing us dinner every night.  We have eaten so good, I will probably never loose my baby weight :-).  We are so blessed to have so many good friends and such a beautiful little boy.  I just can't explain how happy we both our!  Clay has been absolutely amazing, I have no idea how I would do this on my own.  He is absolutely wrapped around Gavin's tiny little finger, it is the sweetest thing I have ever witnessed.  I think I can finally imagine just the tiniest bit of how much God loves each of his children by experiencing being a parent myself.  It is truly humbling and awe inspiring!

See the link below to Clay's Picasa web album of the first couple of days.  Be forewarned, he did get a shot of my open abdomen when he was taking the first picture of Gavin.

http://picasaweb.google.com/ClayB1377