Owen's Birth 10/28/12

Owen Wright Van Sicklen was born October 28, 2012 at 9:04 p.m.  He weighed 8 lbs 7 ounces and was 21 inches long.  Wright is my maternal grandmother's maiden name.

They don't call it labor for nothing....  The class we took at Meriter regarding child birth kept on contrasting real life birth to what you see in the movies.  Accordingly, the mantra was that rarely does your water break in a public place, or even at all prior to labor beginning.  So I was convinced that my labor would start with slow contractions and I would have plenty of time to pack up my bag and get myself organized.  On the contrary, while thankfully I was not in public, my water broke at around midnight of October 27 (which was my due date).  I always wondered how one knew if their water broke or if labor begins - I will just leave it at you know.  So we dropped Murphy off at a friend's house and headed to Meriter.

Things were kind of slow in the morning and we had the blessing at being at a hospital in downtown Madison the morning after Halloween celebrations.  We spent some time watching Roseanne (not sure why that seemed to be the only thing on TV) and kept our eyes peeled for some walks of shame.

Then around 10 a.m. the nurses decided I was feeling a bit too good and decided to kick start the labor with some Pitocin.  Then things got real.  I will spare the gory details, but Barret was able to watch most of the Packers game - albeit on mute.  And then Owen eventually made his debut that evening and it was worth all the pain.

Owen is the first grandchild on both sides and is already spoiled.  We called our parents when my water broke (which was around 1 in the morning when we got around to making that call).  Both of our parents have obviously been through labor in the past and recognize that it takes a long time with the first baby.  Regardless, my mom hopped in her car and headed to Madison from the Twin Cities.  She popped into the hospital around 5:30 a.m. and Barret's mom made an appearance around 6:00 a.m. (again, Owen was not delivered until after 9 that evening).  They did not stick around the hospital that entire time, but they were anxiously waiting in the lounge when we were able to have some visitors after the birth.

We got to go home on Tuesday and were happy to be back in the comforts of our home.  Everybody is happy and healthy and adjusting to life with a newborn.

Murphy keeps a watchful eye on Owen.  He also does not like to miss any openings to get a couple licks on the unsuspecting baby.