Gunner is HERE!!

We are SO very blessed to have baby Gunner in our lives. We are so in love and love every minute with him.
So I'll try to tell you the process and what happened on December 1st as Derek and I went to the hospital to have Gunner. Keep in mind... after the surgery I was apparently quite out of it so my account may not be the most accurate.

I took Friday the 30th off of work because my mom and sister Jennifer were flying in from Georgia. As soon as they got in we went shopping! It was great to have a day to spend time with them. Admittedly - I was a bit stressed about the upcoming events but we had a great day!

The morning of December 1st Derek and I woke up at 4 am and got ready to head to the hospital. My mom stayed with us that night and really wanted to go to the hospital with us but she got sick on the way out and was unable to come the day of the cesarean. As we arrived at the hospital everything went quite smoothly. We were taken right to our room and I was instructed to get into the hospital gown. As soon as I was dressed they came in and started the poking and prodding... they were trying to draw blood and put in the IV. I believe I counted when I was in the hospital and they tried 10 different places to place the IV until finally placing it in the crook of my left arm. We were supposed to go into the operating room at 7:30 but because of the delay in getting the IV in that delayed the spinal block. The anesthesiologist was concerned by the fact that the nurses were having a hard time putting in the IV and of course by that point my blood pressure had risen so that was an added concern. The anesthesiologist called in an additional anesthesiologist to assist. She was concerned that because of the complications adding an IV that we might have similar problems putting in the spinal block. She also talked to us about the possibility of being put under full anesthesia if the spinal block was unsuccessful. I was concerned about that because of course that means that Gunner would have been affected as well. During the complications and waiting time Jennifer made her way to the hospital and was able to stay with us until they took me back to the operating room. I had Derek give me a blessing right before going into the operating room so that hopefully everything would go well and we would not have to worry about me being put under.
Derek and I went into the operating room and everything went according to plan. Derek did NOT want to watch any part of the surgery which I admit - I would have been a little curious to watch but kinda glad I couldn't see because that might have freaked me out even more.
I remember as they were cutting Derek said, "Do you smell that" of course I couldn't smell anything but he could smell my burning flesh as they cauterize the skin as they cut to help with bleeding.
Shortly after we heard Gunner's first SCREAM! He sounded like a baby dinosaur! Which we laughed at seeing as we decorated his nursery with a dinosaur theme in mind! The doctor even commented and said, "wow! He is Mad!" As they shuffled him over to the area where they clean him Derek was able to stand over there and help clean and take pictures. I remember looking over and thinking he has some huge hands! I even counted his fingers making sure he only had 5 fingers! As soon as they cleaned him up and fixed me up they wheeled us back to the room where Jennifer and now Brina were waiting for us. They were shocked to see that Gunner was in my arms and they could see him right away! We took pictures and I know people were calling and I tried to talk but I was quite out of it. There were a couple of times where I was to out of it to talk.
I stayed in the hospital for 4 days. Thank you to everyone who brought Derek a meal while he stayed with me for those 4 days with basically no food other than the food that was brought to him and the few times he went to the cafeteria with my mom. Mom and Derek stayed with me most of the time and Derek was quite the trooper staying with me the entire time sleeping on the futon in the room. What a guy!
Mom stayed with Tracie and luckily the hospital was on Tracie's way to work and she dropped mom off every morning before heading on to work.
Being home has been a whole different world. My mom has been a great help and I honestly don't know what I'm going to do when she leaves. I will probably cry all day. I have come to rely on her probably a bit to heavily.
So - that's the story! We're home and just learning and getting to know our little guy. We look forward to being able to see his little personality and learn more about him. Right now we are loving our Little Piece of Heaven!