Welcome to the World!

Nolan Taylor Holick was born on Friday, March 18th at 7:47 a.m. He weighs 7lbs. 14oz. and is 20 inches long. All ten fingers and toes are perfect and he has such a great personality already.

His birth story isn't too exciting given the fact that it was a planned c-section but here are the highlights. Eric and I arrived to the hospital two hours before the surgery to be admitted. I thought we would have some down time to relax and hang out before getting the ball rolling. I know...what was I thinking? I apparently thought this was a party instead of a medical procedure. Anyways...they got the IV going and started monitoring the baby's heartbeat and by 7:15 Eric and I said our "goodbyes" outside of the OR until my spinal was done and I was prepped to deliver. The spinal was a piece of cake...thank God for a great anesthesiologist, and I was numb pretty quickly. Eric came in right after that and sat at by my head and within five minutes little Nolan was born.

Since Nolan was a breech baby he was delivered by the hips, butt first. We also found out that the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck so this may have been the cause of why he was unable to turn himself around in my belly. Nolan didn't cry right away. He decided that he wanted to take everything in first before letting us hear his voice. He just looked around at the doctors, smiled at my OB/GYN and then decided he better cry. His cry was truly the best sound in the world and I automatically broke down at that moment. Nothing like it.

While they closed me up, Nolan was taken over to the warmer for a bit and then wrapped up and given to Eric to hold and bring over to me. Luckily they didn't strap my arms down during the surgery so I was able to touch him at this point and was able to hold him as we left the OR and headed down to recovery. We spent almost three hours in the recovery room snuggling and waiting for me to regain feeling in my legs and hips and then were off to our hospital room to meet the grandparents!

It has been one week today since his birth and I wouldn't have changed a thing about our experience. I'll be honest, it isn't the easiest thing to recover from a c-section but I do feel better each day and am so grateful to have had four days in the hospital to recoup, bond with Nolan, and learn from the nurses. Who, by the way, were fabulous during our stay!! Giving birth is an experience I had been told about for nine months but words cannot explain how exciting and fun it really is and how quickly you fall in love with someone you just met!