The Offical Tour

Mark and I filled out the various bits of paperwork and toured, officially, the Labor & Delivery area where Drew will be making his first appearance in this world. We felt a little disappointed when they used the room I hung out in a couple weeks ago on the tour instead of a different one. And while we absolutely love their "rooming in" policy for new babies (staying in Mom's Postpartum room instead of lining up in cribs in a glassed-in nursery), we missed oohing and aahing over all the newborns. Thankfully I wasn't having a horomonal swing, otherwise I might've started banging on postpartum room doors, demanding to see a cute, scrunchy-faced baby. And the L&D area has a computer with internet access, so I'll be able to post the news of Drew's birth myself on this blog when it happens. Tres exciting.

Mark and I put together a birth plan of sorts as part of the paperwork we had to fill out. For medication: wait and see. I've got a lot more options for pain management than I realized, and I'd like to experience what my labor is going to be like and try out a decent amount of those options before I decide on narcotics and epidurals. Of course, I may get the full force of labor beating me over the head right away and start screaming for DRUGS NOW. So, "wait and see". Also, we're going to pick up a few fun aromatherapy lotions and oils to have on hand. And we'll pack a nice goodie bag of suckers and such in case I want to keep my mouth moist with something other than ice chips. We also noted in out birth plan that we're scientists and don't mind and even prefer to have the details of what's going on given to us.

But we're most excited about the music we're going to bring. Given my drama queen tendancies and Mark's sense of humor, we're laying down odds that Andrew will choose some sort of climactic music sequence as the moment of his birth. We're going to help him out by bringing a decent selection that's soothing for me, gets my muse juices flowing (I figure what better way to distract myself from painful contraction than to run through plot and outline ideas with Mark--especially when I'll be ready to start putting my characters through serious hell and map out the horrid demise of the villains), and also provides Drew with several appropriate crescendos and finales for his first big moment.

It's getting down to the wire, and Mark and I are pretty excited as we face this big, huge, gaping unknown. We're both pretty stoic about things, knowing that at some point, Drew's gotta get outside of me. We don't know when and how exactly and we're not entirely sure what we're going to do once he's out except wing it with a lot of love, but we've got our A-game with us and we'll be ready to accept whatever the details will turn out to be. Setting up the birth plan has allowed us to furnish the process with a few personal touches that will bring a sense of the family we've built already to the moment when Andrew shows up to bring his own personality to the mix. Feels good.