Eli William Carter

Eli William Carter

Born October 8th, 2018 in La Mesa, CA at SHARP Grossmont Hospital at 2:10 pm

9 lbs 10 ounces and 21 inches long!

We had decided that I would be induced on my due date since we had complications during Avery's birth. Despite my attempts to go into labor on my own, we called the hospital at 3:15 am on October 8th to make sure they had a bed available. We arrived at the hospital at 4, got checked in and they were able to check me at 4:55, but I was only about 1.5 dilated. The anesthesiologist had just arrived for his shift or had just been woken up, so he was eager to get the epidural done. I knew I wanted one so I didn't bother waiting. I think he had the epidural done before the nurses even had my IV done! I started pitocin at 5:10 am and after an hour was having contractions every 2-3 minutes. At 8:25 they checked me again and I was only at a 3. Just after 10 Dr. Goff came in to check on me and I was almost at a 6 and 100% effaced so she went ahead and broke my water. Just under two hours later, 11:56 am, I was at a 10! The nurse helped me start pushing and at 12:33 Dr. Goff came back to help too. After 20 minutes pushing with the Dr there, total pushing about 50 minutes, she decided I should take a break and let the contractions push the baby farther down. I was told to let the contractions do the work and try to breathe through them. This period of time was extremely difficult and I remember telling Mitch at one point that I couldn't do it anymore. In fact I'm pretty sure I repeated if multiple times. I was really happy that my doctor suggested we take a break. I had wanted to try to breathe through the contractions as much as possible. Even with an epidural I can still feel a lot. I can't imagine doing it without one. Trying to breathe and not push was so hard and there were times where I really felt like I needed to, so I tried to listen to my body and do what I felt was best. This period of time felt like it lasted forever! Turns out that I only did it for about 30 minutes! At 1:25 Dr. Goff came back and we started again with the serious pushing. 9 hours of labor and an hour and a half of pushing. Eli was born at 2:10 pm!! When he came out Dr. Goff and the nurses were all shocked by how big he was!

Getting to hold my brand new baby right away was better than I could have hoped for. I didn't get to have that experience with Avery and I was crying tears of joy holding my sweet baby boy. We are so thankful that Eli's birth story was smooth and without complications. We love our big guy!!