Mara has been a pleasure so far. I don’t know if it is just the birthing coma or what but she is “almost” as easy going as Thane was.

For bit of history on how we came up with her name. Jay and I both love the name Mara and, in coincidence, in some languages it is a variant of Mary, the name of Jay’s mom who passed this year. A friend told us the name Danaë when we were pregnant with Thane and we fell in love. It has some great mythological stories around it (click here) and Gustav Klimt (artist of the famed “Kiss”) depicted her as well. We were going to do that as her first name but Lisa Marie and Mary Beth convinced us that was an absolute no-no.

Thursday day went by in a blur. Baptist has some new policies and, unlike Thane (who also had some breathing issues immediately after birth), I was able to spend the better part of the day with my brand new daughter. We had several visitors come meet the new baby. It was wonderful.

Thursday late afternoon, Mary Beth and Glenn brought Thane by to meet his little sister. He was even wearing his big brother shirt Adam and Kellie gave him. I held her in my arms while Thane came up to the bed. He gave me hugs and looked over at the little wiggly baby in mommy’s arms. There was no jealousy. Later, he gave her hugs and kisses. When we asked him where Mara was, he looked at my belly then looked at her. He looked a little confused but seemed to take it all in stride.

I started walking around Thursday evening and was even able to put on real PJ’s. The first time I got up, the nurse commented on how strong I appeared. She asked if I had been working out. I will give half the credit to the StrongMommies program at Baptist and the Prenatal Yoga program at 12 South and the other half to how well I recover from surgery.

Thursday night went well. She had been feeding fairly well. We sent Mara to the nursery around 9 pm. At 12:30, I called for her back in but could not rouse her to feed. I tried again at 1 and 2 with no success. Jay was sleeping on the couch. At one point, I tried to wake him and ask his advice. His response…? “Steph, I have been up since 6 am, just let me sleep.” Oh, really, now? I laughed and let the poor boy go back to sleep. I woke him again at 5 and asked a question (I can’t remember what)…his answer….maybe that is because of the Zofran. “What?” I replied. He then sleepily said, “I don’t know what I am talking about, I am still asleep. Give me two minutes and I will wake up.” True to his word, he woke up a few minutes later and I enjoyed telling everybody for the rest of the day what a funny man I married. He does not give me many opportunities like this, so I have to enjoy them when I can.

Friday morning I managed to be relieved of all devices attached to me and took a shower and got dressed. I was human again. The nurses were impressed, with one saying that I was not allowed to look better than her a day after major abdominal surgery and another saying that I was the best patient she had seen. I was given the green light to get off the liquid diet at lunch.

Then I opened up to Grand Central Station (and loved it!). We are so grateful to have such supportive friends and family. Emily and Anna came by in the morning and Anna seemed to love the new little girl. At lunch, Julie came by, then the security team, then Father Gregory came by to bless the baby. Bret came by in the early afternoon and brought me a chocolate shake. I was in heaven and could have kissed the man. Thane got to hang out with his little sister and open the present Anna brought him…a new book! We read it three times before he took it home. He once again hugged and kissed Mara and watched as mommy fed her. The true test will be when we go home but I think it will be ok. After Thane went home, his old teachers, soon to be Mara’s new teachers, Erica and Kimberlee, came over and we spent a relaxing time chatting and laughing with them.

Last night was uneventful. She went to the nursery and came back when she needed to feed, which was not often. We put her in a cute purple outfit which seems to be more comfortable for her.

I cannot tell you how very happy we are.

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Tags: Baby, Delivery, Family, Friends, Hospital

This entry was posted on Sunday, December 7th, 2008 at 10:38 am and is filed under Hansen News, Mara 0-6 months, Posts with Photos. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.