I had worried about what I'd do if I was by myself with the kids and Darnell were on the other side of the city (quite easily a 2+ hour commute!) when I went into labour, but of course, we were in bed and our dear friend Reg was sleeping in the spare room so we didn't even have to call for our helper, Sam, to come in the middle of the night and we weren't faced with an hour of traffic either. Sometimes things just work out right :)
I had contractions for most the night but didn't wake Darnell until 3:30am and we left the house soon after. Teyah was born at 7:22am so despite being only 5cm dilated when we arrived at the hospital, she came pretty quick. This was my first delivery with an epidural/anesthesia so it was completely different. Makai's delivery was so painful that I had nightmares about it after. This time I decided to go the pain-free route and while it was kind of surreal to push a baby out without screaming, crying and sweating, it was sure nice to skip the pain! I had delivered 2 babies with no drugs and had nothing to prove anymore :) Darnell was sitting there kind of dumb-stuck when I calmly told him that I was having another contraction and felt like I had to push. What a different experience!
Teyah has been a wonderful baby so far and is doing really well. She feeds really quickly and is already going longer stretches between feeds at night. She's recently started the evening fussies so we've been rocking a little screamer after the boys go to bed and going to bed ourselves a little later than we'd like. But it has really been a good transition into three kids and the boys have been great. Cody loves holding her or lying down beside her and letting her "kick" him. Makai is also very gentle with her- yesterday I found him talking to her sweetly while driving his cars around her and piling them up at her feet. I am so thankful that the boys play well together (for the most part!) and at this stage, Teyah just sleeps a lot so she gives me lots of time to still be with her brothers.
I should tell you all about her name too. Her first name is after my Oma's best friend who looked after my Dad in Germany when he was small. Her name was Dorothea, but in German its pronounced Do-ro-tey-ah and she was called Tante Thea ("Tante" is German for Aunt). Darnell's grandmother (his Mom's mom) was also named Dorothea. I have always liked the name Teyah and we knew we would use it for a girl even before Cody was born. But we also wanted it to be spelt phoneitcally and not be pronounced with a "th" so the spelling is original. We couldn't decide on a middle name until a few weeks before Teyah's birth when we were asking our friend Reg about meaningful Tagalog words that would sound good as a middle name. Words like faith, hope or peace certainly didn't sound right.... pananampalataya, umaasa, kapayapaan.... not quite what we're looking for :) I asked Reg, "What about Malaya? What does that mean?" She told us that Malaya (pronounced Ma-lie-a) means free or liberation and is a deep Tagalog word. We thought it was perfect.... sounds pretty and has a good meaning! So that's the story of Teyah's name.
Thank you all for the love and prayers sent our way during this last month. We are so thankful for our family and friends both near and far.
Much love, from the five of us :)
Thank you all for the love and prayers sent our way during this last month. We are so thankful for our family and friends both near and far.
Much love, from the five of us :)
