Sooner Than Expected, We Welcome Claire Ellen

At one day shy of 28 weeks getstation, Claire Ellen Allspaw Pomeroy was born on Sunday, May 22, 2005 at 6:23 p.m. via emergency c-section. She weighed 2 pounds, 1 ounce, and was 14 3/4 inches long. She's less than a week old now, and is doing amazingly well. She was only on the ventilator one night, and is now breathing without any aid (her nasal canulla came out today). She's an amazing little fighter, and we're absolutely in love with her. She'll be in the hospital until around her due date (August), but we'll see her every day and care for her.

We had to deliver her because I had a uterine infection. We tried having a vaginal birth, but it was stressing her out too much, so we decided to do a c-section. It was a pretty whirlwind weekend, with cramps, tests, amniocentesis, labor-inducing drugs, labor-stopping drugs, and a patchy epidural which meant they put me under general anesthesia for the c-section. I saw her for the first time almost 24 hours later, and actually got to hold her at that time. We hold her for about an hour every day.

Her name comes from the middle names of both of her grandmothers. Allspaw is in there as another middle name because she's got to have that in her, too. She's a stubborn fighter, a "spitfire" in the words of one of the NICU nurses, so is definitely an Allspaw woman.

For me, the hardest part is getting used to not having her inside anymore. I just wasn't pregnant long enough, and I'm sad to have missed out on almost the entire third trimester of pregnancy. When I'm with her, though, everything else disappears: my own pain from the surgery, my fears, etc.

I'm pumping milk, which is cool but also a challenge to my right breast, which is VERY sore. Alas.

You can see pictures of Claire here. We'll post more as we get them. We're amazingly happy that she's so healthy, and that we've got good doctors to take care of her and to have found out the bad things before they got worse.