Some of you may have noticed the lull in posts here. Our last trip was in December, and there hasn't been any since. Shanna had reached the third trimester by January, and wasn't able to do all the walking / touring that come with our travels, so we took a break.
On Thursday morning, April 17th, Shanna woke me up a few minutes before my alarm was set to go off to say her water had broken. Thankfully there were no other signs of labor, so it wasn't a mad dash to the hospital. I was able to take a shower, take the dogs in to the kennel, and grab some breakfast to bring back. By the time I got back to the house, our suitcase and bags were at the door, ready to go. We made a brief stop on base to pick up the translated versions of our Birth and Marriage certificates (needed for his Birth Certificate), then headed to the Charlottenhaus. That's the hospital we'd decided on to give birth at.
When we first got there, they checked Shanna out and found she wasn't dilated at all yet. Since the water was broken, they had to induce. The first few hours were painstakingly slow. From 11am to 4pm, she only increased to 3cm. For the first hour, before they gave her an epidural, we sat out on the balcony of our hospital room. It had a beautiful view of the city...we could even see our house from there!
By 4pm, the doctors said they would try one more dose, and if that didn't work, it would have to be a C-section. Thankfully the second dose did the trick, and our little Benjamin Ethan Norton was born at 6:34pm, weighing 8lbs (3.63kg) and 21 inches (53cm) long.
I'd never witnessed a live birth before, and it was an experience. I knew babies looked nothing like they do in the movies, but had no idea how different it was. When Ben came out, he was purple from head to toe. The doc checked him out, said he looked good, but did put a little hose blowing out oxygen into his face. Within 5 minutes, his skin had changed to a normal color. After 9 months of waiting, it was amazing to finally meet him. He only made a few sounds to indicate his lungs were clear, but other than that, he never cried. He just looked around with wide eyes.
After all the normal health checks on Mom and Ben had been completed, they wheeled Shanna and Ben to her room. One of the nice things about this hospital was they offered Family Rooms. That means there were two beds, one for Shanna and one for me, so I could stay with her. In Germany, they require you to stay for 3 days before you're discharged after a birth. If she'd had a C-section, they would require you to stay for 5-7 days.
At this point, every one was exhausted. Shanna, for obvious reasons, but her Mom and myself were too. It had been a long day for everyone. I drove Pattie back to our house, then headed back to the hospital. The first night wasn't bad at all. The nurses gave me a crash course in diaper changing and putting him in clothes. For the first 24 hours, babies can eat, but they don't have to. They still have plenty of nourishment in their bodies from the womb. So he only woke up twice through out the night, and never really cried. He also only dirtied one diaper. We thought this was going to be easy, but that was definitely NOT a preview of things to come.
From Thursday night through Sunday morning, it was a blur of feeding, diaper changing and sleeping. Every morning I'd drive back to the house to get Pattie, we'd spend all day at the hospital, and that evening I'd drive her back to our house. After the 24 hour mark, we started the every 3 hours feeding. That doesn't stop at bed time...we've continued with feeding him every 3 hours ever since day 2. He's started hitting a growth spurt, so sometimes we feed him even more frequently than that. Thankfully we've worked out a shift schedule that works. Shanna has to get up every 3 hours regardless to feed him, but once that is done, whoever's "shift" it is stays up with him until he falls back asleep. The other goes back to bed to sleep. We're both tired all the time, but it's worth it.
On Easter Sunday, the pediatrician visited us to do the 72 hour check on Ben. She gave him a clean bill of health, and cleared him to head home. Shanna had picked out a "going home" outfit a month or two back, so it was time to get him dressed up and ready to head home.
A month or so back, I was talking with a friend at work, and she mentioned that when she had her daughter, and they headed home, she was terrified because she now had a baby in the backseat. At the time, I thought that there was no way I'd feel that way, but man, was I wrong. I was glad it was Easter Sunday, because there was no one on the road. We live in the city, and the hospital is in the city, so the speed limit was 30mph (50kph) the whole way...I was happy to drive that.
The next few days we stayed at home. Between the Midwife and a lady from the New Parents Support Group on base, though, we've had someone here helping out every day to make sure Ben is doing well. They've given him high marks, and say he is coming along just as he should be.
This past Thursday, one week after Ben was born, we took him out for his first outing. It wasn't anything big, but it was nice to get out of the house. We first headed to Real, which is a German version of Target. We had a few things to pick up, and it was a good first test of the stroller.
It was a beautiful day out, and we weren't worn out yet, so we headed to a great Italian place near our house. They have a nice outdoor seating area right across the street from a park. We had a nice lunch, then walked over to the park for a little bit.
At that point, we were ready to head home and take a nap.
Nothing much else has happened since, but this week we're planning a trip downtown to Frühlingsfest. This will be the first year we've gone down during the day just to walk around. The past 4 years we've gotten tickets for the tents and gone at night. This year we'll be walking around during the day with Ben in his stroller. I can't wait!
The primary purpose of this blog is a travel blog, but occasionally I'll deviate for major events...this qualifies. So if you don't see many posts over the next few months, that's why. We are still planning some trips here and there, but it takes approximately 3 months for Ben to get his citizenship and passport. Until that happens, all our trips will be within Germany.
If you'd like to see up to date pictures, we started a Facebook account for Ben. We're using that to store all his pictures. If you have a Facebook account, and would like see them, search for "Benjamin Ethan". If you can't find it, send me a message and I'll send you a friend request from his account.
The pictures above don't link to a picture page, they will just show you a larger version of the image.
Speaking of Ben, I think I hear him waking up...time to go bring him to Mommy for lunch!
