Amos's first day and my Grandfathers last

Hey, Brent here. I am way overdue to add to Sarah's extremely thorough and loving account of our son Amos's amazing entrance into this world.

Sarah, as you may have gathered, is one incredible lady.  In this particular instance, this particular incredible lady worked for 30 hours or so to birth Amos the way she wanted and then graciously gave permission to the pros to do what they had to do to get him out.

By the morning when Amos was finally autonomous, complete and utter exhaustion had set in for both Sarah and me. As she has mentioned, she had this little disagreement with the rather healthy serving of morphine that she was given...and so on the first day of the rest of Amos's life, Sarah was rendered mercilessly nauseated.

My parents played a really big role that day.  My mother had flown to NJ a little less than a week prior to be with my Grandfather. He had just been admitted to the ICU and she and her sisters, fearing that his decline would be rapid, decided to travel to be with him. As his health leveled out just slightly, my mom decided to head back to Colorado to take care of some things so that she could come back out to help with the baby once Jackie (Sarah's mom) had to head back. So either fate or providence or both had it that the day she traveled up to NYC to be ready for an early departure the next morning wound up being the night that Sarah went into labor. My mom changed her plans and my dad decided to fly out so that they could meet their young grandson the next day. Well, as Sarah's account does an incredible job in describing, hours of labor turned into days of labor, vaginal birth turned into a Caesarean birth and a recovery time turned into several more hours of shaking and morphine induced nausea. So, by the time my parents got to the hospital, with Sarah finally sleeping the deepest sleep of her life, I broke down in a way that they hadn't seen since I was probably twelve. They were there that day to help me be the dad that I needed to be but did not yet know how to be.

My Grandfather did pass away a short time later and we celebrated his life at a Memorial Service for him on July 25 at America's Keswick Conference Center in New Jersey. If any one is interested, there was a blog set up for him at baraws.blogspot.com.

Thank you all for your prayers throughout this amazingly hard time for our family.  We have grown through it all.  

Baby Amos is awesome.  

The Dickinson family emerges from seclusion

Hello everyone!

It's been 2 weeks and a day since Amos was born. I, Sarah am feeling MUCH better than I did when we came home last Monday. The body is amazing to watch heal. Each day I can perform amazing new feats. Like get up from a sitting position! Or hold my baby without tiring! And stand up straight! I am slowly getting around the house more and more every day and even am allowed to go on 2 block walks each day. And, I found some time to hit the computer and reconnect with everyone today. I am sorry it's been so long. I can't promise I'll be consistently in touch so please be patient. Once Spa Dickinson returns back to the normal Dickinson home I am sure I'll be pretty scattered until I get a routine going with little Amos (my mother has been taking care of us like royalty. I simply could not have done this recovery without her. I vote her the first Presbyterian saint!)

I guess some of you are wondering about how the labor and delivery went. Well, it started out great and should have gone really fast (baby was fully engaged and cervix was fully effaced for about 2 weeks prior to delivery) but...baby Amos got stuck. After 28 hours of unmedicated labor and with that I must say it was back labor which isn't so fun and in that 6 hours of pushing things still just weren't working. Not like I have anything to compare it to, but it sure didn't feel like all the birth books said it would. But I forged on, committed to our plan and hopes for a natural delivery and in good spirits. After about 20 hours of labor though with really great pushing (they kept thinking he would come out any second!) my dear midwife Corrie was beginning to think that something was up. It seems like the baby was big and that the baby was wedged. These both turned out to be true. All of my fears and hopes were swirling around in my head, but I could tell in my body that something wasn't going how it should. Maybe I read too much about labor but all the feelings and sensations I had learned to expect just weren't happening. Still, we tried for many more hours using every position known (I was squatting like an Aboriginal Brazilian!), plus acupuncture by my tireless doula Michelle to get things going more. The time came and I could see it on Corrie's face. She suggested getting an epidural so that I could rest and then try pushing one more time. (my body had been shaking uncontrollably for about 12 hours at this point and I hadn't been able to sleep between any of my contractions since they began 24 hours earlier because of the constant back pain) Sadly, I agreed and we had to leave the wonderfully quiet and serene Birth Center and head to the Labor and Delivery floor. After some sleep we tried again but with no changes. Corrie said that I was pushing harder than she had ever seen anyone and that no one would be able to get that baby out better than me. I don't know if she was just saying that, but I had reached a point where I could tell that my efforts weren't helping and that was making me feel how tired I was. My cervix was at about 9 cm and 9/10 cm but Amos could just not get his head around and through. His head was swelling up and molding so it would just get more impossible. So Corrie didn't even need to say the word, I knew our only option left was surgery. At this point I don't want to get into more details. If you want more you have to take me out for a very expensive glass of wine. :)

After all of the blah stuff was past (and it wasn't all blah, the surgeons were exceptional and my midwife, doula and Brent were by my side the whole time), then the wonderful beginning of our life with baby Amos began. I was pretty rocked for a long while from the operation so Brent went into daddy and mama mode. He was amazing. I cry just thinking about. More details on that requires more wine...

Now our boy is settled into life in Brooklyn. He's a serious sleeper, just like mama and just like Doug. Learning to breastfeed has been a challenge but a beautiful (and painful!) one. I find myself spending most of my time feeding him and then snuggling him close and watching him sleep. Funny how I don't give much of a crap about all the things I worried about before he came (don't worry I will still finish my CD though!). Now I just hope and pray for his life and health and safety and pull flakes of skin off of his face. Yes, he's experienced quite a transformative molting the past week or so! My doctors say it's normal "imagine what your skin would do if you were in a hot tub for 9 1/2 months".

My mother leaves on Sunday. She has been a blessed gift to us. She rushed to the city once she heard about the surgery and she's been hard at work ever since. (and taking two weeks of vacation from her full time job!) She's been there with everything I could possible need, glasses of juice when I couldn't sit up and reach the table, amazing meals all day, helping us learn how to take care of Amos and cleaning this whole apartment in all the places we never would think of (the top of the refrigerator? ah.... around the oven? oh....) She simply has been amazing. Thank you Grandma Lentz!

The also amazing Frisbie's have been such amazing supporters during this time. They made a photo album long before we did and kept bringing food and love and laughter to the hospital and beyond. Beatrice Frisbie is now officially betrothed to Amos. My goodness I can't imagine his wedding day. I think I'll just take it day by day (day 15) for now.

And here's our album of Amos' first days. Keep checking here or do that RSS feed thing that I don't understand and I'll keep posting photos here.


We thank you all for your prayers and support during this exciting time. The Dickinson family is ready to rock!

love,
Sarah, Brent, Amos and Doug (who's getting used to this whole thing now. we're all getting better day by day including Doug the Thug Pug. :) )

He's here!

Hey friends and family,
So.....he has arrived! Amos Marshel Dickinson arrived into the world on Thursday, June 26th at 7:06 am. We are overjoyed! I will write much much more when I can. But, I am one pooped out mama right now. Things with the birth didn't really go as we had hoped. I was in the hospital until Sunday and am just able to sit up at the computer today. I'll fill you in a little more in a few days. But, in the end, we have an awesome (and big!) baby boy. He is quite handsome I must say as well. :) Thank you for all the prayers and good thoughts and love that you have sent over the last week. We are amazingly blest. Thank you.

love,
Sarah, Brent, Amos and Doug (who isn't so happy these days. He could use some prayer!)