It’s wonderful being at home with Eleanor. I want to update friends with some details:
Name: Eleanor Dorothy is named after my mother and grandmother (both Dorothy), who died weeks after I found out I was pregnant. She never knew Ellie was on the way. My grandmother was an intelligent, fierce, Scotch-Canadian who worked as a social worker and union organizer in Toronto. She was known as “Red Dorothy” to her friends and family. She was among the least cuddly grandmothers who ever roamed the earth and never once told me she loved me. But she did very much and I am happy to honor her.
Eleanor has long been a favorite name of mine. I’d like to see my Eleanor be a combination of Eleanor Roosevelt (Whip smart, independent) Elinor Dashwood (Sense & Sensibility: Smart, competent and kind) and Eleanor Bold (Anthony Trollope: Beautiful, faithful and loving). And, no, I don’t mind combining fact with fiction.
My Mom calls her Ellie D., Daniel calls her all manner of baby nonsense that I can’t publish here for fear of ruining his tough-guy image (mostly he calls her Ellie). I imagine her using Elle if she grows up to be very chic, Nora if she turns out to be a romantic, poet-type and Eleanor if she’s awfully serious.
Birth Details: Eleanor was born at 7:20 am; she weighed 7lbs, 8 oz and is 20 1/2 inches long. I was admitted at 8pm the night before and the induction with Cervidil started at 9:45. Despite fantastically frequent and painful contractions, I made very little progress for the first 6 hours and didn’t feel like I could keep to my birthplan-wish of a pain-medicine-free delivery, so I requested an epidural or IV narcotics. However, some miscommunication between my midwife, nurses and anesthesiologist led to a delay in any analgesia. By the time I was getting set up for an epidural at 5am, I began to feel the need to push and had dilated 3 cm in 1 hour – it was likely too late for an epidural and there was no way I could sit still for one either. An hour later, I was fully dilated and pushing. We called our mothers who made it for the final pushing stage. Pushing was actually a great relief: you get a break in between the contractions and when you push you actually get to do something with the pain i.e. push it out. I hollered and cried out very loudly during each push and surprised myself with my volume and force; it felt great to make the noise. Many folks have asked me if I was happy I had people present (Lisa A. was also there). The United States House of Congress could have been present in that delivery room for all I knew or cared — I was so intensely focused on the pushing and feeling Ellie’s head come down (and out!). However, I did appreciate having Lucille, my mother and Lisa help me move around and I also liked their quiet cheerleading. Mostly I am so glad that Ellie’s grandmothers knew her from her very first moments. Daniel stayed close to my face encouraging me the entire time — he was phenomenal throughout the entire experience.
First Impressions: The midwife had Daniel pronounce that Ellie was a girl and they laid her on my chest. She was alert with her steel-blue eyes open and she looked up at me. The first thing I did was to double-check that she was, in fact, a girl since so many Asian manicurists are rarely so wrong and Daniel’s no anatomist. I was amazed at how perfect she was: no birthmarks, malformations, baby acne and a good covering of dark brown hair. I told Daniel “she’s pretty enough to be an Eleanor” and that was that. She has a wide mouth with very pink lips. When taking care of infants, I classify the very loveliest of babies as “Rosebud babies” (no matter what their skin colors, some newborns have a pinkness and lushness about them). I could hardly believe that I had delivered a rosebud.
How I’m Doing: Great. I was up and walking in the minutes after the delivery and felt fit immediately; a clear benefit of the (unintentionally) drug-free birth. I took advantage of the Tylenol #3s for the first day of delivery but have just needed Motrin since then. I’m still a little swollen but very surprised at how quickly my stomach has gone down. It’s wonderful to sleep on my stomach & back and have some use of my stomach muscles again.
We only spent about a total of 36 hours in the hospital as both of the midwives and the pediatrician who came to see us were pleased with our progress. They also needed the bed. So now we’re home and all is well. My Mom has been a huge help and cleaned our apartment and filled it with flowers upon our arrival back home; she’s making us Chicken Biriyani tonight. Ellie is also eating quite nicely and I think my milk is coming in today. 
We took her outside for the first time in her Moby wrap (A+ baby product). We walked about 1/3rd of a mile around the neighborhood with the dog and I was beaming with joy and pride.
It’s been great having visitors and we love when people stop by. Our policy is: just call. If we’re sleeping, we unplug the phone. Otherwise, we’re really happy to have people come over. Finally, I’ve appreciated all the calls, blog comments and emails so much. As happy as we are, it’s especially welcome to know other people are sharing the experience with us.
We’ve posted another album on Picasa if you would like to see more pictures.
