A new arrival...

Meet the newest addition to the Quirky Bean Family!

Baby Lynton is 8lbs 4oz of squishy loveable perfection! He ended up being 11 days over due so on the 1st of October at 7am I went in to be induced. My waters were broken at 8am and I was started on Oxytocin, I didn't have my first contraction until 11am. As the hours progressed I didn't and bub didn't look like he was going to make an appearance on his own. I stayed 3cm dilated through horrible irregular contractions until late afternoon, it was hard hearing that after so many hours of such irregular pain I hadn't gotten any closer to meeting our baby boy, I found I just couldn't cope any more on gas alone. It was just crushing, the little amount of control I felt I had went out the window and I ended up needing an epidural. For about an hour afterwards I was so exhausted and tried to sleep... guess what happened?! While I was dozing I dilated the remaining 7cms! I remember the midwives telling me to push then the obstetrician coming in...all she said was that baby needed some help coming and all of a sudden things started happening around me. Forceps, an episiotomy, internal stitches, a manual removal of the placenta and 800ml of blood loss later baby Lynton was finally born, put to my chest and oh my the world just stopped turning. Meeting our baby at 7.33pm was the most incredible experience of my life! A part of me is disappointed that I couldn't go into labour on my own, that I couldn't birth my child without needing all the drugs available to me, that when it came down to it I couldn't push effectively enough to bring him into the world on my own but I couldn't have planned for any of it to happen and there was nothing more important than our little guy's safe arrival. Of course then I was stuck in birthing suite until 5am the following morning because the epidural hadn't worn off until then, I was trundled off to a room and from then on our lives changed forever! It's now 11 days post birth and like all new parents we're stumbling our way through it all; even with all the troubles that come with learning to breastfeed, the sleepless nights, the worry we feel over every little hiccup and noise our baby makes, we are absolutely smitten with our son and really, we finally know that somehow everything will just be ok.

Now that he's here we're focused on our BIG move to the Northern Territory in 2 weeks time and somehow planning a trip to see my family before we leave, lots of huge changes are coming our way, lots of new experiences and I'm sure lots of new stresses but to be in our space again with our own routines and essentially having our own lives back everything we've been through up until now seems worth it. Adjusting will be the biggest step for me, and I'm terrified that my depression will sneak back but at the moment, taking it one day at a time is our best and only option.

Welcome to the world, my darling Baby Shmoogle Bean!