Her water having been manually broken, my wife jumped to the bathroom, in major pain, and demanded that they get an anesthesiologist there immediately to give her an epidural (she also had a few choice words for me and the nurse). It only took about 15-20 minutes for the anesthesiologist to get to the room, set her up and for the epidural to take effect. Boy was she flying high and it was pretty funny to see.
It was around 7:30pm when my parents came around to see how we were doing. As they were about to leave, the doctor came, checked my wife and announced and that we were about to have a baby. My wife and I were shocked to hear this. It had only been 2 hours since they broke her water and she was now fully dilated. The following hour and a half was a huge blur. I remember the nurses tasked me with announcing the sex of the baby.I urged my wife to push. It all seemed so surreal. I could see that a small crowd had gathered in the hallway. Along with my parents I could see one of my nieces, my sister and her husband and my inlaws. At 9:28pm my son finally came into this world. The nurses brought him to0 me but at first I couldn’t see the sex as the umbilical cord was in the way. After a second or two I could finally see and exclaimed “it’s a boy!”, and the hallway crowd erupted in cheers and claps. I cut the umbilical cord and they whisked him away.
Nicolas measured 18.5 inches and weighed in at 5 lbs 7 ounces. The next hour or so is still a blur. They cleaned him up, measured, weighed him, did the apgar test and applied the eye ointment before I could even notice it. I then got to hold my son for the first time and it was an indescribable feeling. Multiple emotions hit me all at once: joy, love, happiness, giddiness and amazement. Once able to do so, I introduced my wife to her son. I could see that she felt the same emotions that I was feeling.
After a while our visitors started coming in and gushing over our little guy. He got held by grandma and granpa. Our company didn’t stay long though, realizing that Erin needed her rest. That first night we both woke up often. Every little noise made us rush to his side. I would also find myself waking up and going to just watch him sleep.
We ended up having to stay a few extra days in the hospital due to his low birth weight and him being borderline jaundiced.We finally got to take him home 3 days later on the Saturday. We’ve had some rough nights and some adjusting to do but that’s insignificant to the joy that he’s brought into our lives. Even 3 weeks later I fall in love with my son every single time I see him, I hold him, change him or feed him. A chapter of my life has closed, but a new, brighter one has opened up, and so I’m loving every minute of it.
