The Soto Family Journey: The Delivery

Daddy looking on with Dr. Richardson and our nurse, Caroline. It all went so fast! Water was broken at 8:30am and I was pushing by 11:25am.

After 4 pushes, Marek entered our lives at 11:33am, "sunny side up" according to the doctor.

We have some nice photos of the actual birth, but I decided not to gross anyone out. :-) It was quite exciting. My mom kept getting this tense look on her face, as if it was hurting her, and when I would breathe after pushing I could hear her let out her breath, too. I didn't feel any pain at all, just lots of pressure. As is the case with a fully working epidural, I couldn't tell if I was even pushing at all, but the animated words of encouragement told me to keep doing what I was doing. The first thing we all saw was the head come out. I have to be honest, I thought, "Oh my, is there something wrong with the baby?", because the head looked HUGE to me. As Dr. Richardson was suctioning out the nose and mouth, she said, "Are you a boy, or are you a girl?". Then the rest of the baby came out, the legs opened, and I think we all saw it at the same time, as somebody exclaimed, "It's a boy!!!". Jonathan maintained all along that it was a boy, but as he now tells it, even though it was a boy, he still couldn't believe it. The vast majority of guessers swore it was a boy, too, minus me and Elli. Such an incredible surprise. It made all of those months of wanting to know worth not knowing.

Daddy cutting the cord.

Holding my son for the first time.

We were all stunned at how big he was! Ellison was almost 3 pounds less than he was! The nurses commented on how big his head measured, too, but assured me it was within a normal range. :-)

Check out the size of those hands. We all immediately said he has Granpapa's hands.

Very soon after entering the world, Daddy was going to town tossing around the three names on our list: Ari Luciano (or Lorenzo), Soren Eli, and Marek Eli. We both pretty much said at the same time that we were pretty sure we wanted to go with Marek.

Daddy's announcing the news to someone.

Doing "kangaroo care" - skin to skin contact after birth.

Proud Grandma

Daddy holding his son for the first time.

Grandma holding Marek for the first time.

I love his mouth in these two shots. The second one looks like he's pouting. I wanna bite those lips!

He found his hand. It reminds me that we have an ultrasound picture of him sucking his thumb at 18 weeks.

Check out our beefy little man! He looks like he's ready to play football. He looks EXACTLY like me in the hospital picture I have when I was 2 days old.