Part 2: The Delivery: "Push! Push! You're doing great!"

(Again, WARNING: Seriously, for reals: There might be TMI for people who really don't want to know TMI about me. Or TMI in general. TMI=Too Much Information. Like, a baby coming out of privates. Just saying. But if you want to know TMI about me [which I know a lot of you do]...continue on!)

I wanted to punch the doctor and nurses in the face for saying that.
For repeating it over and over again.
The nurse told me that whenever a contractions came along to hold my breath like I was going under water and push.

The nurse also told me to lift my legs up and put them in the foot holding things:
I don't think this nurse has ever had an epidural.
I tried with all my might to lift my legs!
I stared at my legs very hard as I tried to use The Force to move them.
Nothing was happening.
"I'm sorry, I can't move my legs." I told the nurse, and she helped lift my left leg up.
"Chris, do you think you could maybe lift my right leg up? I can't." And that was his work out for the day.
It must be leg day.

Believe it or not, its actually pretty hard.
Pushing a baby out. Of your body.
Even if you can't feel the pain.
It is exhausting.
In one of the pushing moments, I was holding my breath and pushing and they kept saying, "Don't stop! Keeping pushing!" But I could feel that I was running out of breath. It literally felt like I could drown.
I stopped pushing and gasped.
Then I said, "I'm sorry, I couldn't breathe."
I apologized to them, hahaha! I'm sure they got a laugh out of that too...I was too busy having a baby to notice though.
My knees were up in my face and a group of strangers were staring at my crotch.
I felt the complete opposite of glamorous...

But in all honesty, I didn't care that these people were strangers or that my legs were spread wide open for all to see.
I really thought that I would care.
I thought about it for 9 months and imagined myself throwing my gown in between my legs from embarrassment.
But when it came time to push Serena out of my freaking body I didn't care if News10 was in there recording the whole thing.
You lose your sense of privacy after/during having a baby.

I wanted to stop pushing and take a nap. Eat a pop tart. Read a book.
I wanted to do anything but push.
"Her head is crowning!" the doctor said.
That's nice, I thought, But pushing is exhausting and I would really like to take a nap.
The doctors and nurses kept cheering me on, but I just really wanted them to.....shhhh.

Then I heard Chris say, "I can see her head!"
I looked over at him, "Really?!" I asked. Yes, Sabrina, because Chris would joke about this right now.
"Yeah!!"
"Her head?!"
"Yeah!"
"You can see her??!"
"Yes!"
And that did it for me...I wanted to push.
Chris looked so excited to meet his daughter, and if that's not motivating, I don't know what is!
Chris is one heck of a motivational speaker (;
Just hearing it from him made all the difference in the world to me.

The doctor asked me if I wanted to touch her head. Whaaaaat? Nooo gracias.
Then she insisted I touch her head which was coming out of me at this time in my life.
Seriously, she was like, "Touch her head."
And so I touched her head. Which was totally weird.

I just can't express enough how weird it is to touch a head that is coming out of you.

When I reached down to touch her head I could NOT see where my hand was going.
I felt something hairy and quickly pulled my hand back...
I was certain my baby was coming out bald.
Turns out she has a lot of hair!
And the hairy thing I touched was her head!! (Whew!)

Sooo I continued to push and push and push.
It felt like 5 minutes, but it wasn't 5 minutes!
It was 26 minutes (total). Yup. Go ahead and read that again.
Started at 4:03AM all the way to 4:29AM. And all I felt was glorious pressure.

AND THEN we heard the doctor say she was here, but I didn't hear a cry...
"The umbilical cord is wrapped around her neck." the doctor said calmly.
Um, I just...I just felt like this is something that people shouldn't stay calm about.
I looked around the room to see if anyone shared my concern.
Really, I was just looking for someone to panic so that I could panic too.
But Mom, she looked calm.
Nurse? Calm too.
Doctor? More calm than if she were having a spa day.
Other Nurse? Calm as flat ironed hair.
Chris?? He looked at me like, Should I go over there and cut the umbilical cord or something?
Well, if everyone is calm, I guess I could be too. Darn you guys for not letting me panic. But really, thank you.
Seconds later the doctor had cut the cord off her neck and she let out a little tiny squeaky cry.
I looked at Chris. Our daughter!! That's her!!! Whaaaaat?!
And then I thought, We're parents now. For reals.

Goodbye sleep.

The Little Alien

Chris and I were both pretty much in our own little world when one of the nurses said, "Did you want to take pictures??" And Chris was like, "Oh yeah! Almost forgot!"








March 15th, 2014
Serena Lea Hamann 20 1/2 inches, 7lbs 7oz.


So it was over. The nurses and doctor left. I pushed her out and we laid with each other for hours. Nothing different than when she was growing inside me, except that I could see her. Her tiny long fingers. Her tiny little body. She is absolutely beautiful.



And I could feel the epidural wearing off...
Oh, crap.

Read the last part here: Part 3: The Recovery: We did it!
I love you all, thank you for reading and enjoying the experience with me!
If you haven't read Part 1, you can read it by clicking here.

Sabrina, the Mom (officially)

Part 1: The Labor: I support drugs.

(WARNING: There might be TMI for people who really don't want to know TMI about me. Or TMI in general. TMI=Too Much Information. Like, a baby coming out of privates. Just saying. But if you want to know TMI about me [which I know a lot of you do]...continue on!)

1. My Mom was two weeks over due with me.
2. I was a giant headed 10lb 9oz baby.
3. I broke her tail bone.
4. She thinks of me every time she sits down (:

You're like, "Sabrina, how do you know all this? You were just a baby, you can't remember."
Weeeeeeeeell, I have heard the stories non-stop from everyone who was there, literally since I was born.

Now, with this in mind, I think we can safely say that I was a little bit...slightly...nervous. A tiny bit.
Baby Hamann was due March 8th (Saturday), but nothing exciting happened that weekend. So my doctor scheduled me for an induction for that Friday, the 14th.
I had very mixed feelings about going in to be induced. I did want to do it, I didn't want to do it.
I may have cried about it for hours (those hormones, man).
I wanted to go into labor naturally, especially for my first child.
But my fear of pushing out a giant baby really scared me.
I kept my induction scheduled and I felt very unsure of everything...
Until I got to the hospital.

We got there early morning on Friday.
I felt like a little kid full of excitement, holding my pillow like a portable hug as Chris and I sat down while the nurses checked us in.
Everyone seemed so calm, how can they be so calm?? Don't they know what is happening?
They walked us to our room, told us things (that I don't remember), then (my favorite part) taking off all my clothes and getting into that fabulous gown. Gosh, I felt like a princess in that thing! har har

That is a nervous soon-to-be Dad if I ever saw one!

They came in and gave me oxyclean (I can't remember the names of anything) or something to help my contractions along.
(Oh, PS I was already at 3 cm when I went in, but I had been like that for about 2 weeks.)
I was having contractions but not painful ones, and I got to 3.5 cm.
I was at 3.5 cm for a long while, when they decided to break my water since it wasn't breaking on its own.
They broke that, and that hurt. That was weird. So weird. Everything about having babies is just weird.
My contractions started getting stronger and more often. I thought, I may be able to do this naturally!
While I was on a trip back from the bathroom, a very painful contraction came. I stopped walking and said owowowow, and Chris was standing a little bit away and I had the sudden urge to murder him.
Really! I did!
He was going to walk over to me to help me out (because he is the sweetest), but I feared for his safety and told him (maybe yelled at him) to stay there. Because I really wanted to punch him in the mouth and kill him. The contraction stopped and I looked up at Chris with wide eyes, "I need that epidural now!"
I was only at 4 cm!
(Side note: I most likely won't induce again.)

I would say the hardest part about the labor was getting the epidural. But the nurses were right there helping me stay calm and relaxed and then it was over. I didn't get to see the needle, aaaand I didn't want to.

That drug though.

I became numb and I couldn't feel the painful contractions anymore, just wonderful pressure.
Wonderful, wonderful pressure.
And I looked at the ceiling.
And I looked at the walls.
And I looked at Chris.
Everything was wonderful.
I. felt. freaking. fantastic. I.F.F.F #ifff

As you can see below:

This is the boring part:
I napped.
Chris napped.
My Mom came, and she napped.
We all napped. We were just a bunch of happy nappers waiting for a baby.
Chris (left) and Mom (right)






The doctor said at the rate that I was going the baby probably was going to get here in the late morning/early afternoon (Sat. 15th).
I thought, Woohoo! All that sleep!

The nurse would come in every so often to check everything and that would wake me up, and I'd just go back to sleep.

AND THEN the nurse came in and looked at my monitors and quietly said while still staring at the computer, "It's time to push." and then rushed out of the room.
I was a little bit groggy from sleeping and my brain wasn't registering anything.
And then it started registering things.
What!? Where'd you go, you little nurse nurse?? You can't just leave me!
"Chris...Chris. Chris! Chris!!"
"Hm?"
"It's time to push. Wake up my Mom!"

The nurse came back and started doing weird things to my bed and foot things appeared where I could put my feet up. Then she pulled down a light from the ceiling. Where are all these things even coming from??

The nurse said to practice pushing until the doctor got there.
Um, I don't even know what that means, everybody.
I don't know how to practice push, I only know how to real push.
So I started to real push around 4:03AM.
So long, sleep! I will miss you terribly and never get you back.

The doctor arrived and said don't push.
These people are sending me mixed signals.

The doctor puts on her gloves or something and says, "Okay, start pushing whenever you feel a contraction."

Mixed signals, I tell you.
--------------------------

Here is Part 2: The Delivery: "Push! Push! You're doing great!"!!
(Part 3: The Recovery: We did it!)
This post is already too long.

I love you all!

Sabrina

Forever pregnant (it feels like)

I feel like I've been pregnant my whole life. I can't remember what it was like before growing a human.

Do I have toes? I can’t remember.
I must still have toes…I’m still walking about (more like waddling).

36 weeks!! Whew, this is tiring.

Early on in my pregnancy I would hear ladies talk about how uncomfortable it was to sleep and how they were having such a hard time sleeping while pregnant.

Of course I did the nice thing and showed sympathy toward them. But in my head I was laughing evilly.
I just thought to myself, Mwuahaha, I don’t know what you’re talking about. Please excuse me while I go sleep for 18 hours.
Yes, I was slightly uncomfortable, but I didn't care because I was sleeping like a log.
The key word is was, everyone. WAS.
I don’t know what it is, but sleeping is incredibly hard nowadays.
It’s just what I get for laughing evilly at those poor women. And I apologize to all of them.
It may be because I’m a little antsy for baby Hamann to arrive, buuuut I seriously doubt that would stop me from sleeping. Especially since I know I won’t be getting a lot of it after she gets here.
Oh boy.

I think I have been sick more times while pregnant than in my entire life.
But this past week has definitely been the worst. I've been hacking like I've smoked for 50 years.

And Chris needs an award (like always), because he has been the greatest!
Everyone needs a husband like mine (just kidding, he’s mine, and I’m sure your husbands are awesome too). He is always trying to make me the most comfortable as possible!
Where did he even learn that?? Husband school??

One of the many things that really attracted me to Chris when we were first dating was the way he played with kids. Seriously, that’s like the Golden Ticket to any women’s heart. There is a tip for all you bachelors reading! Ha. Ha.
Anyway, back to Chris; it was just a sign to me that he wanted to be a father and what a good one he’ll be!

My sister-in-law just had her baby girl (child #3), and that really isn't helping with MY patience. What is it with precious little newborns? They are so cute! Where is mine?!

We can’t wait to meet her, and I am sure you all want to too.

Ah! My pregnant brain has my thoughts in a jumble and I lost my train of thought. It seriously flew of the track with a toot toot. Haha, train. I’m so funny.

And I hate posts without pictures, but next time, okay? Okay.

Thanks for reading. 

I love you all!

Sabrina

New year, new blog, new life

Good morning everyone!
It has been an incredible 2013 year with SO many blessing!
1. Chris and I got married.

2. We moved into our house.
And like those weren't life changing events enough;
3. We're having a baby girl!!

I cannot even express how ecstatic we are!
You should hear Chris talk about her, there is nothing more attractive than seeing his excitement about being a dad.

I am in the middle of my 35^th week and getting pretty anxious. We’re so close, but still so far away.
I get all those songs that say that now.

I feel a lot like a rolley polley. Roll out of bed, roll into the shower, roll out to the car, roll to work.

Roll round roll round roll round.

But it’s cool though, because we get a lot of mother-daughter time.
She surprises me with a quick kick, and we laugh about it later.
She is very convincing too…
When I look at a tub of ice cream, she tells me its broccoli and that it is good for me and I must eat a lot of it. Which is kind of evil…she must take after her mother (;<

Back in July I started working at the Cordova Recreation and Park District. If you ever call to complain about a park in our district, we've probably talked (:
And no, we won’t help you try to “relocate” a coyote. Call the animal control, they can better assist you.  Or the insane asylum.

It is the best job I have ever had because 1. I work inside the Rancho Cordova City Hall and 2. I have the most amazing co-workers in the WORLD. I think it comes with the job though…you have to be a certain kind of person to work for the District.
I almost want to put off having a baby just so I can work there longer.
I’m afraid they might fall apart without me!!

Chris started working the day we got back from our Honeymoon at the end of April (check out our honey moon post here). And Him getting this job to provide for our new family has been such a blessing! I tease Chris all the time about how he is going to have this job forever until he is old (which is not what he wants to do). SO that is why is he is going to school this semester.

We had a Hamann Family Reunion in July, which was wonderful because I got to meet ALL of Chris’ siblings and their kids. I see why Chris is so amazing! He’s had so many great examples!

Chris has already met all of my siblings and their kids. You can ask him about that (;

For Thanksgiving we went to Utah to visit my Grandma D and my Mom’s siblings.

Next time we see any of our relatives in other states we’ll have a baby (or two)!

Now that you’re pretty much caught up on everything, I will blog more frequently so you don’t just have “yearly” updates.

Thanks for reading,
I love you all!

The Honeymoon!

If you didn't know, we went up up up way north of California to the gorgeous Crescent City.
It is like a magical land to me.

This is us in the car getting ready to leave Sacto.

I decided to let Chris drive...

Ooooh waaaait! Before I go any further I have a story to tell you all.

As Chris and I were driving to our hotel after leaving the reception, a cop car honked at us!
We looked at each other pretty confused.
I asked Chris, “Were you in his way?”
“I don’t think so…” He replied.
Not long after that while we were stopped at a stop light, the car next to us honked!
I looked over at the car, hoping it was someone we knew, but it wasn’t.
As I tried to see passed the writing on our window, I saw two Mexican boys waving at us.
I smiled and gave them a thumbs up.
“What the heck is going on??” I asked.
“I have no idea!”

Again I looked over at the car next to us through the writing on our window…
The writing on out window!!
We forgot all about the window paint that was all over our car!
I started to read the backwards writings on my window.
Honk…4…baby…

Please let this light turn green!

Clever, clever family of mine. Thank you.

We didn't end up washing our car until about Thursday. Almost a week later!

So we get to the place we were staying at (The Lighthouse Inn) and I get out and immediately take this picture:

I just realized we didn't actually take a whole lot of pictures...soo...

here are some more!

Chris and I are not fans of sea food.
He knows that. I know that.
We both know that!
But sometimes I forget. ):
So I came up with the idea that we should go to this restaurant and try sea food, just in case our taste buds have changed or something! I'm such a genius.
We get to the restaurant and there were seals! Or sea lions...I'm actually not sure.
But they're hanging out behind me like villains.

 This was also outside the restaurant...just in case you couldn't tell, haha.

Moral of the story?
We still don't like sea food.

I have never in my life had such a hard time eating a meal before! I made the mistake of getting oysters too, oysters of all things!
We did figure out that we liked cod though! (:

We did a little hiking around some rocky hill things on the shore.
I actually styled my hair this way. It wasn't windy at all.

But hey! Look at that view!

This is Chris being...Chris. Ahahahahaha.

If you know Chris, you know he loves food. With a passion.

So it was his lucky day when we decided to go to Red's Diner!
They have this burger that has five patty's on it. FIVE!

It was so big they had to stick a giant knife through it!
I present...the Tsunami burger!

Chris was so incredibly excited!
They have a challenge where if you finish that Tsunami burger, a basket of fries, and a basket of fried jalapenos (on your own) in 13:45 (I think) then it was free!
I talked Chris out of doing the challenge though, I didn't want him getting sick. (He thanked me later:))
I promised him we could go back another time (when we weren't on our honeymoon) so he could do the challenge.

The fried jalapenos were surprisingly tasty!

We went to the beach of course! Though the outside weather was nice, the water temperature was ice. So we didn't really hop in the water, though we tried! It literally hurt our feetsies.

In case you couldn't see the ocean, here. Let me point it out for you, haha.

We went to go see a lighthouse too!

We cannot take a couples picture to save our life, ahaha.

 I just feel like we are just the most awkward couple in the world.
See those things off to the right? They were next to the lighthouse hanging from a tree. Pretty odd...just like us, hahaha.

The last day we were there it started getting pretty cloudy, and while we were leaving we ran into some fog!

Just looking at this picture makes me want to pee my pants. Like, if you stare too long one of those scary faces are going to jump out.

And this is a giant lumber jack!

Thanks for reading and keeping up with us!

I'm married, I live it, I love it!

One of my favorite things about being married is...
being married to Chris.

He's definitely the love of my life, and a mild weird.
I say mild because I'm fully weird, and I feel that he is just...mild.
Like the sauce you get at Taco Bell that says funny things on it. Gosh, those are happy making little packets.

Anyway, Chris is just full of surprises!
For example, this:

Chris works from midnight-8am and usually has breakfast for me in the morning (because he is so wonderful).
Well, just the other morning he had breakfast and this baby yellow rose bush waiting for me!
I laughed. Chris will soon find out that I don't have a green thumb. And this unlucky little bush will most likely not survive ):
And by not survive I mean it's gonna die.

Oh! Our honeymoon was a lot of fun!
We saw cows, which is pretty exciting:

And I think the cows made Chris...hungry?

I have more pictures of our honeymoon on my camera (these are from my phone) which is somewhere near...I hope.
We are still in the process of unpacking in our new house, and I am trying to organize everything.
Trying.
So I don't know where anything is...except the vacuum. I found that (:

Chris and I are still not use to any of this.
Actually, Chris is handling everything just fine. I think it's just me with the issues.
We were out and about the other day, and I had said something and then said immediately afterwards,
"Oh, I almost called you my husband!"
And Chris and I stared at each other for a short moment.
He was just waiting for my slug of a brain to process...like a dial-up internet computer.
"Oh, just kidding! You are my husband!"

Pretty much every time I say "my husband" or just the word "husband" I look over at Chris in bewilderment and I'm like, "You're my husband?!?! I have one of those!?"
I really do. Ask Chris. He will testify.

Thanks for reading, I love you all!

It's over!

I'm a married woman!

I don’t know what I was stressing about in the first place! That was pretty easy, everything magically worked out just fine for the reception!

During the engagement I kept asking myself, “Why doesn’t everyone elope?! This planning a wedding thing is hard!”
And now I see why.
I cannot tell you how much fun it was to party and see everyone, and meet Chris’ friends and family.
I’m sure Chris was a little overwhelmed by MY family and friends, haha.

Just so everyone knows, if you need help with a wedding don’t hesitate to ask.
I cannot tell you how grateful I am for everyone that helped out!

People keep calling me Sister or Mrs. Hamann, and I keep staring at them like, “…hm, that’s a nice name.”
After getting sealed (for time and all eternity!), I walked out expecting to feel...well, married!
But it felt like just another day hanging out with Chris…

There were a few things that day that kept reminding me that I was married:
1. I was wearing a wedding dress
2. Everything was about me (not that that's too unusual ;)
3. I have never worn so much make-up in my life, and I could feel the layers of it on my face.
And I loved every minute of it!

As we were driving down from the temple toward the luncheon, I think I was sort of freaking out.
I thought I was pretty calm, but Christopher insists that I was not.
I kept looking over at him and saying, “Hi, I’m married.”, “You are my husband.”, “We’re married!”, “I’m Sabrina Haaaaamann.” Repeatedly.

Still trying to wrap my finger around it!

Hello, my name is Sabrina Hamann.