Penelope Jane Sauder - aka "Penny"

Alissa and I took a guess who would be the first to say a common phrase using our new daughter's name. She guessed either my dad or her Uncle Mark. I thought Mark might be the one. We were both wrong: it was her dad, Tom! We should have known! "A Penny saved is a Penny earned," he said. After all, he is a financial guru, so this makes total 'cents.' Drum hit, please.

Going into the process of coming up with Penny's name was actually pretty fun this time. My memories from last time for Nora weren't bad memories by any means; however, I remember not wanting to do that again anytime soon. (The end result I think was well worth the consternation, though!) This time around, I was wanting to come up with a few ideas of my own to throw into the pot of names, and that helped me get into it more that last time. All credit for the process though goes to Alissa, again, not surprisingly.

I think we both agreed that we wanted to have a name that was fun & playful, yet unique and possibly classic in feel. So, we both came up with our own lists and compared them. We actually had some that matched, which was a surprise to me! I couldn't really remember that occurring last time until we actually landed on Nora. So, you're probably thinking Penny was on both of our lists. Well, she wasn't. She actually was on mine, but I think Alissa kind of liked it when she heard it. I won't reveal some of the other names, as they may come into play at some point, but we did like some of our common names, too. I think the playfulness of Penny, with the elegance of Penelope, won us both over. So Penny/Penelope it is! For those who are wondering, Penelope has many meanings, none of which were the main reason for choosing the name. However, some of the meanings do apply well to our family, including 'weaver' (Alissa's quilting), 'duck' (Nora likes to quack around the house and it's probably her favorite animal), and 'loyal' (who could not want that from their child?) The middle name of Jane was from Alissa and it flowed very well with Penny. It also has a classic feel to it, so it works out great. Alissa's Aunt Kim insists on calling her PJ, and it may end up sticking, but so far she's alone in that one. I'd personally be interested in hearing any other nicknames and/or penny phrases that we perhaps haven't thought of, so send them our way!

Changing topics to the birthing experience begins actually Saturday night, Jan. 1. We had the unexpected opportunity to go on a date that night when my mom offered to watch Nora and keep her overnight. We thought that was great, so Texas Roadhouse, here we come! After an awesome meal, we started heading home. Along the way, we pass right by the hospital we were going to have Penny, and Alissa had thought she maybe felt some things happening, so we decided to do a quick stop in just to see if Alissa was progressing towards full-on labor. Well, that was a mistake. Our quick check turned into a 2.5 hour stay as they put her on the monitor to see if there was any progression. All along, we had a sense we would probably be sent home, but we tried to enjoy the time by walking around (a lot) and reading the paper and just hanging out. You really can enjoy almost any moment together as a married couple if you're also best of friends. Alissa felt a little embarrassed about being sent home, but I told her I had a great time with her just hanging out, even if it was in the hospital. I did promise not to tell anyone, though, but her tuned changed on that when things changed a few hours later...

After a brief 2.5 hours of sleep, Alissa woke me up at 2:30am with a surprisingly calm voice to say, "Guess what, I think my water broke." Woohoo! Here we go again, but this time we knew we weren't going to be coming home until a baby was born. So, we packed up the remaining necessities (well, I packed up the remaining necessities as Alissa tried not to leak all over the house!) and got to the hospital around 3:15. At this point, she was starting to feel the contractions at a reasonable level, so we began the waiting/squeezing hand/breathing/waiting game. This lasted until about 9am, when Alissa said she wanted an epidural.

We had gone into the final weeks of the pregnancy leading up to delivery time wanting to have as medication free an experience as possible. It's not that we're against the use of medicine, at all, but we felt that using as little as possible, especially through an IV into the bloodstream, would be a good thing for both mom and baby. Last time with Nora, we used IV painkillers and they didn't work as well as we had hoped. In fact, I think they helped contribute to Alissa's endless vomiting. So, after talking it over with our doctor, we decided that IV painkillers were off the table, but an epidural would still be an option if needed because it didn't flow straight to the baby in the blood.

So, at about 9:45am, Alissa received the epidural, and life got much better for all in the room :). This was great for several hours, but then she started to hurt again, particularly on her right side. I honestly started to feel concern at about this point, because of the nature of a vbac (having a baby normal style after a c-section delivery.) The hospital made clear to us several times the inherent risks of a vbac and we had to sign several forms that we understood them. These forms erred ridiculously on the danger side of the possible consequences of a vbac, and we had to pause a moment and think for a second before signing, even though our doctor was totally cool with the vbac delivery.

However, Alissa was beginning to complain about a burning sensation and she couldn't really pin down were the pain was coming from. It was just clear that it hurt; real bad! Once the nurse walked quickly out of the room to talk to the doctor about this, I began wondering if a possible rupture of some kind was in the works. This was the only point I felt a little nauseous, so I sat down for a few minutes. There wasn't a thing at all I could do about the situation. Except really, there was. I began praying, nothing fancy, nothing long, just asking God to continue to protect Alissa like he had from the beginning.

Alissa had some great company in the delivery room in the form of her sister Meredith and her mom Pam. They were a great encouragement to her and definitely made the experience more bearable for her. Meredith even made up some Team Alissa t-shirts for me, herself, and Nora that had our own names on the back. It was a great support system, and I know Alissa & I really appreciated it. That support really came into play as Alissa progressed past 5cm (where things stopped with Nora) and as the pain came back to the right side. And with the uncertainty of the burning sensation inside, it was great having them there.

The anethesiologist ended up coming back and giving Alissa more pain medication, but it still didn't seem to solve the 1-sided pain relief. So, the nurses kept having Alissa rotate from one side to another, as the pain would allow. Soon, we had progressed to 10cm, and I couldn't believe we were almost ready to push. I already was so proud of Alissa for wanting to do a vbac after having the relief of a c-section last time (though c-section recovery isn't real fun). She never suggested she wanted a c-section once, and her commitment to breathing correctly and staying as relaxed as possible revealed her desire to have a normal delivery. When I heard we were at 10cm, though, my heart really overflowed with love and pride for her. Then when I heard she went from needing to have the baby come down more before she could push, to the baby was in position in a matter of only a few minutes surprising even the doctor, probably because of her rotating sides somewhat frequently, because of the pain on her right side, I knew I was witnessing God's hand at work in our situation and in my wife, and it just made me smile.

It was awesome to watch little Penny start to poke her little spikey mohawk through, and then eventually see her come out. Again, Alissa performed amazingly. Penny however, had some issues right out of the gate, and NICU was called in briefly. She apparently pooped on the way out and may have breathed some of it into her lungs - a very bad situation. She was very blue/grey and I realized that things weren't quite right. They were working on her, trying to get her to breathe. Finally, she did, and it was really wild to see her color return to her in a matter of seconds. Again, God was so good to us and we are so grateful for His hand in all of this. I mean, a completely normal delivery, if that ever happens, is a miracle in and of itself, but just to know God helped us through a couple little additional things, is really humbling. You just realize how fragile life is, and how much we really do need Jesus.

So, now we're home about to have our first night of sleep. Hopefully, we can all catch up on rest, but I'm not putting any money down on that - Money Penny that is! Again, I'll give a penny for your thoughts on any nicknames/penny phrases that you have!

Thanks for letting us share,

Josh