Final night at the hospital

We have one more night at CPMC in San Francisco, then it's back over the bridge to San Rafael. The hospital treated us us a nice meal, we put Jack into the nursery while we ate and talked about future plans. A really nice night. Doug and Julie visited, and I learned a new technique to calm him down which I'm all chuffed about. Doug and Julie are expecting their first child, a girl, on August 29th.

This afternoon I left the hospital for the first time since Saturday (when I got the car out of jail). I didn't do anything productive, just to the bottle shop to sneak in a big Belgian beer for dinner :). Here some more pictures from today. Tomorrow he gets to meet Gus and Lola, I'll try to workout how to get video uploaded for that.

Picasa Album

I've just discovered that these pictures are automatically uploaded to a Picasa album. Check out http://picasaweb.google.com/mark.ruder/MarkHevAndJack

Wednesday AM (updated)

Jack and Heather are sleeping so I pulled some pictures together for a post. Most of these are from yesterday, some were taken by Heidi and Wayne. The last one is 2 minutes before he was born.

The blue and red headphones are from a hearing test this morning.

I upgraded a few pictures and saved this post again at 11:35am

Tuesday - Jack day 3

We had paternity issues today. Janelle is a medical technologist so knows a bit about blood. After I explained I''m B positive, she explained that I can't be the father! After a phone call to England we got it all worked out (for future reference I'm actually A negative!)

Jack found his voice last night proving the 2nd night is harder than the 1st. He went from extremely contented to miserable screamer in seconds just as I got comfortable in the cot. We were up most of the night, I did get some sleep and Heather maybe got 2 hours. We will work this science project out!

Today Jack had his manhood messed with; his foreskin was removed. This is a common procedure in the states with 50% of babies having it removed for hygiene reasons. He handled it really well, It bothered me more than him. When he came back it seemed he wasn't bothered at all.

We had a lot of visitors today; Stacey, Kenneth, Janelle. Gary (Hev's parents), Heidi (sister), Wayne, Rebecca, Josh, Sarah, Cristy and Chris. we are forever indebted to all these guys who have helped out during this time, especially with our two dogs. I'll get them on here later in the week.

I'll get more pictures up soon, Jack is being, well, a baby.

Monday - Jack day 2

Day 1 is done! We are learning all his new ways and pesky traits. We are dealing with crap, crying, swaddling, feeding (and that's just me, hah hah).

Heather is recovering great, but isn't quite in the mood for pictures. I, like all fathers before me, have an extreme respect for the mpother of my child. Jack is behaving, doing the stuff I'm told these little monsters are supposed to do. Currently the poor little blighter is lumbered with me for everything but feeding as ma is still pretty much bed bound (but walking a bit today! ).

My baby duties include:

wrapping him up as tight as possible
checking for poop or wizz
handing to mum for food
burping
checking for poop or wizz
visits to the nursery for various tests
various moments of love (see pic)
repeat






Here are a few more pictures.

1) The donation plaque for our labor, delivery and recovery room. "Donated by the Beavers". Classic.

2) the view from our new room on the 4th floor. It's taken from my camera phone yesterday, a little cloudy but you might be able to make out the Transamerica and B of A buildings (but probably not).

3) This is me waiting to go into the delievery (operation) room, right before the colonel showed up (see previous post).

4) Today's day board. I'l keep doing these until we leave. Mabel is quite an artist eh?

5) Jack Day 2! just like Jack day 1 but froma camera phone instead of a superb camera!

I promise pictures of Heather tomorrow to prove it's actually her child (not like you couldn't tell already eh?).

Sunday night update

The last full update explained that the doctor was coming in at 12 to check in on Heather, and I had a pair of scissors in my hand cutting the cord before that hour was out. Mental eh? I had no idea things would happen that fast.

After 3 days it was obvious to the doctor that the baby wasn't coming out via normal means. Heather had a fever, she couldn't stop shaking and was totally wiped out because of extremely limited sleep. I had 5 minutes to get my scrubs on, pack up the rest of the stuff, move stuff to a recovery area & head into the staging room where they were to perform our C-section.

While Heather was being prepped the the anesthesiologist came past me asking "are you nervous?" "Of course" came the obviously reply, "I'm shitting myself". OK, Nah, I didn't say that last bit but it sounds better than my jelly spine whimpering. He picked up the accent and started whistling the Colonel Bogey March which was a nice touch.

I was called into the room and sat up at Heathers head, with a partition from her neck downward. She was still shaking and it was al in alll a daunting experience, even though we had both researched and seen videos from our classes. Old Colonel Bogey was great, he had me stand up and watch the birth. I took some pictures but I've no idea what to do with them! Oh yeah, first girlfriend. Right.

I cut the cord and then me and our kid were off to the nursery while Heather received the final touches to the procedure.

We took his temperature (high because of Heather's fever), did all the tests and given an APGAR score of 8 to 9, which is apparently splendid.

We had a bunch of pictures taken by Heidi, Sarah with me looking like I'm about to pass out but confidently happy. We gave him a bath there and we went to meet mum in the recovery room.

Heather was given something that stopped the shaking, she is looking great now. The fever went down, we are not to sure what that was all about.

We moved to the room where we will spend the next 4 days. Heather's parents, sister, Josh and Sarah came in, which was great because she hadn't seen people in a while; it was great for her to feel good enough for it.

I've now changed a crappy diaper and learned the swaddle wrap on something that isn't a doll. Amy, our nurse, gave me a great breakdown of what we are up to with the new science project. She is another excellent staff member of CPMC.

We confirmed "Jack" right when I did the last post.

And here we are. Heather just found Extreme Makeover Home Edition so is totally set up.

Finally, my ma told me that today was the date of my Nan's birthday. She also died on my birthday, i think 6 years ago. My mother thinks she is somehow watching over me / us. That's a pretty nice thought and, if you know anything about me, while that kind of comment is not my typical reaction I'm rolling with it.

Introducing ...

Jack Aaron Ruder. Born July 13th @ 12:58PM. 7lbs 13oz, 19". Everything is checking out great, Heather is the most relaxed and contented I've ever seen her.

More to follow later.