So much to say.....

So where to start? I have so much to say and so much going on in my head that it's a little hard to get this all out coherently, but I'm going to try.

We are home. And I am so glad for that. I am so grateful that my little family is now a bit bigger. I am so glad that Georgie has been so good for her Daddy while I was gone. She hardly seemed to miss a beat, (which, I must admit, hurt a little) but I would much rather have her cope really well than really badly! She is fascinated by her little brother, and I can see all the little wheels turning inside her head trying to process how he fits with us. But for the most part, she is being a champion.

Charlie has been fantastic since we have been home. He has just been sleeping, and sleeping and sleeping. Which I'm finding a bit odd to be honest. But he hardly slept at all in hospital, so I think we are making up for it now. I am so glad that he is okay.

He is lovely. He is a very big boy. But it is big... not fat. He has huge hands and feet, and he is so long! He is well covered without being chubby and he is just absolutely delicious. He is in 000 clothes, but I don't think he will stay in them for long. He is the size Georgie was at about 8 weeks! I think he is going to be a big man like his Daddy.... it's odd to think of him towering over me one day! I look at him and can't believe that just a few days ago he fit in my tummy. He is feeding so well. It made such a nice surprise, because from the word go, he just seemed to know exactly what to do when it came to feeding.... such a change from Georgie who gave me so much trouble in the beginning. I am so grateful for that.

Shane is doing okay. He is terribly tired and is a bit stressed out between so much going on here and a lot going on at his work at the moment. But hopefully things can settle for him soon and he can relax a little.

I'm doing okay too. I have been pretty exhausted. The labour took a lot out of me this time. Plus, I didn't get very much sleep at all in the hospital. My body amazes me. It has bounced back quite well. I continue to be blown away by the way we are created. God is surely an amazing God. I am still sore, but I am loving the fact that I didn't need stitches after Charlie was delivered (a miracle!). My back has been quite painful, and I have to be careful as my tummy muscles have torn a bit, but hopefully with time everything will heal.

And the birth? That part I don't really want to talk about much. I had planned on recounting it all as I did with Georgie's. But honestly, I just want to block it out. Suffice to say it was probably the single most intensely painful experience in my life. It's funny, so many people have told me I have done an amazing job, but I just don't feel it. I feel a little odd now about the title of the last blog post. Because I actually don't feel that way at all. I just feel pretty awful about the whole thing. It wasn't all terrible, the beginning and the very end of the labour went well. But in the middle I felt totally helpless and lost and so incredibly vulnerable and I just don't want to remember any of it. I had a young midwife with me, who didn't have a lot of experience. I ended up trying to push even though I knew it didn't feel right when I was only dilated to 8 centimeters, and it took Shane taking control, making them check me, and then him calling my Mum to come in for things to get back to okay. Fortunately though, the delivery went very well.

I also ended up pretty shattered after being left alone with Charlie for almost all of the night after he was born. I hardly got any sleep for the first 3 nights and so I've been pretty exhausted. The whole experience has been a bit damaging. I didn't realise how wrong it all was, and how badly it affected me until talking about it with my sister Jenny, who is a nurse. She got very upset and angry about it, and said it should not have happened, and that helped. It made me feel better to know that it was not okay. But..... Charlie is here, he is perfect, and it is over. God has seen us through this and somehow he has managed to help me out with so many of the really important things. So I am grateful.

This little face? It's worth it.