Last birth center visit

Yesterday we went to the birth center for the last time. It made us both really sad because we’ve been so happy there. I was excited that we were in room 3 since I wanted to take some pictures of the room where Morgan was born… not only did we forget our camera (so the only pictures we have are from when my mom came with hers) but we were only there for a few hours afterwards and pictures weren’t the first thing on our minds. Besides, I’m not exactly dressed, so those are just for us to see.

Here’s me with Morgan on the edge of the tub where she was born. This is where I got into as soon as I could after we got there, and the water felt lovely, let me tell you. That may have been the reason I thought childbirth was so doable, who knows. It was definitely relaxing. Maybe I should say it was soothing, since I wouldn’t exactly describe it as relaxing… more exhausting, actually. Anyway, the water was nice! (Why do I require so many extra words to say such a simple thing?)

Adrian holding Morgan in the chair where he took her after he dried off while I was getting out of the tub and taking care of the, um, after baby stuff. That only took a few minutes because it was a lot easier than pushing out a baby!

This is the bed where we all went for the next few hours, where they checked me to make sure I was okay and did Morgan’s newborn exam and all that.

Here’s Morgan with Val, one of the midwives. Ali was actually the one on call when she was born, but we probably had the most visits with Val before the birth, and we hadn’t seen her since at our other appointments, so it was nice to see her again. She admired Morgan’s beautiful head shape. Hehe. She had heard about the birth from Ali, but we got to tell her our side of it and how we felt.

I’ve tried to not fill the blog with too many stats, but I feel I need to report that Morgan was 9 pounds, 4 ounces, which I think is awesome for a baby who was 6 pounds, 5.5 ounces 7 weeks ago. She’s made up for surprising us with her teeniness at birth by gaining plenty of weight since. It makes me happy to know she’s growing well. Also, yesterday was the first time I felt like she really smiled AT me. She’s been smiling for a while, once when Adrian got home but mostly at lights or windows, which she really likes. So of course that made me happy.

Like I said, we were sad to leave the birth center. We both teared up a bit saying goodbye and telling Valerie how grateful we were to be able to come there. We miss home in California a lot, but I know that if we were there we wouldn’t have had this opportunity, since Orange County doesn’t exaclty have the hippie mentality you can find up here. If for no other reason than that, we’re glad we’ve been here during this time.