It’s been a rollercoaster since the day our daughter was born. Emotionally & physically draining, an overwhelming amount of new information and choices to make for our little one as newly deemed parents made for a lot of challenges. Of course, there has been indescribable joy to go right along with it that makes everything worth it. This is the story (with photos) for our special day; the birth of our daughter.

We got to the hospital (Renown in Reno) on the morning of Saturday May 29th, for our scheduled induced labor. We were very happy with our doctor on shift, as we had good experiences with her prior. We felt comfortable and safe knowing she would be the one helping us bring our sweet baby into the world. We checked in and got to our room, and began to setup in hopes to take a sterile environment and make it warm and welcoming. Most of the staff was happy to enter our safe space where the most common comment was, “Wow, it smells so good in here!”

Meagan’s body had already been preparing for this day the week prior at a great rate and was considered favorable for a successful inducement. Since Meagan had already come into the hospital farther along than anyone expected, the doctor determined we didn’t need cytotec (an inducement medication to progress labor) and we were very excited and relieved about that!

Meagan was given Pitocin to start the induction at a low dose. It was Meagan and Cameron’s wish to have a more holistic approach to the birth experience as possible, even with the circumstances given. Pitocin causes contractions that are a bit more harsh and painful and as they needed to increase the dose, Meagan became increasingly more uncomfortable. Cameron supported her through each contraction as they progressed using different techniques they learned from an awesome birthing class they took together.

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Meagan’s longtime friend, Jenna Dykes, joined Cameron and Meagan in the afternoon as their support person during labor. She had come from a camping trip she had planned ~6 months prior, and she was very much appreciated and loved. Jenna helped support Meagan with Cameron by putting to good use different pain management tools such as, meditations, affirmations, massaging, ice-feeding, water drinking and most importantly dance sessions throughout the increasing contractions. Pitocin had been increased a few times at this point, and not a lot of progress was being made until around 7:30PM.

The Doctor came with news that she wanted to break Meagan’s water to get things moving, since the Pitocin was starting to get the results they wanted. They explained how things would get a bit quicker, and more painful afterwards. It was around 7:45PM when they went ahead and broke her bag of waters. Within an hour, Meagan progressed to 10cm dilated on her own with 100% effacement – the Doctors giving Meagan the OK to start pushing.

At around 9:30PM, after a bit of pushing and one very exhausted Meagan, the health care team decided pushing was causing too much stress on Meagan and baby. The doctors left the room, giving Meagan, Cameron and Jenna about 30 minutes to break “before the storm hit”. Meagan got an epidural at this time, and the Doctor’s team came back to start the heavy labor and pushing with a game of tug-of-war. The Midwife on staff that night coached Meagan on what to do; hold onto the sheet while they both pull super hard and push during the contractions while Meagan held her breath.

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This process went on for a while and with a ton of support from Jenna, Cameron, the doctors, nurses, and various other team members who entered the room (at one point Cameron remembered over 10 people in this small room) … there was pushing and pushing and …

There she was.

Our sweet daughter, born at last. She made it and the room was filled with joy, tears, blood, sweat and love.

Indigo Azalea Somirlight

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She was born May 29th, 2021 @ 11:54PM weighing in at 5lbs 8oz and 18″ in length. Her cute giggles, cries, hiccups and squeaking sounds delighted Meagan as she held her daughter for the first time. Cameron reveled at the hard work the team, and Meagan had pulled off to make this a reality. The arrival of our sweet baby girl started our new chapter as family, after 8 months of pregnancy.

The rest of the night, a blur. Wrapping up paperwork, getting baby clean, packing up our belongings and carting to our postpartum room to heal, taking care of Indigo’s first feeding and diaper sessions, barely sleeping at all the first night, being poked and prodded the entire next day for vitals, blood, lactation, and postpartum care practices. Phew!

Cameron, with the stress of being 100% present in each moment and being ready for whatever support was needed during labor, ended up getting sick with stress & allergies. He had forgotten to keep up on his own self care and his energy had depleted down to less than 50%. He had a really hard time helping Meagan and baby while trying to recover himself. Especially with a mask. Meagan was learning how to get out of bed, and walk again after very low iron levels and some rough side effects of the epidural. The nurses and Cameron were by her side to help every step of the way.

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The first day in the room with Indigo was beautiful and stressful as she wasn’t taking her food well. She would sleep through all the energy in the room; even the constant feet pricking for blood sugars didn’t arouse her awake. She failed to progress, and was eventually admitted to the NICU for additional monitoring, and consistent care. The second night without Indigo in the room was a sad and emotional one… the nurses reminded us to take care of ourselves and so we tried our best to heal…

The second day at the hospital, we were discharged; leaving our beautiful Indigo in the NICU for the foreseeable future. We left with an estimation of 2 days to 2 weeks or more, based on her progression. Her goals were to hit consistently healthy levels of blood sugars, have her jaundice taken care of, and have her feeding on her own as well as for her to not be so sleepy all the time (she takes after her Dad’s sleeping habits) in order to come home with us.

*3 weeks later*

Today is her original due date of June 19th, 2021. She is now 3 weeks old, and she is still in the NICU. With her very first month of life flying by, we do our best to hold on to the good things. Good things like: our skin-to-skin time with Indigo, learning how to swaddle, change diapers, give her a baby bath, hear her delightful little sounds and funny breathing sighs that sound just like our dog Ezra. We’re both feeling so much love and an immense amount of emotions for our sweet baby girl. It has been so hard to not have her home with us, and at the same time, we are grateful that she is healthy and safe. She has made wonderful progress and now all that is left is for her is to continue to build stamina and learn to feed consistently. She is full of personality already and is known to have quite a bit of sass with the NICU staff. We are so proud of her.

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We want you all to know that we appreciate all of your love, support, patience and communication. It truly means so much to us. We may not be able to respond as quickly or show up as often as we used to, but please know we are so happy to have you all along for the ride. It’s been unexpected, but we’re keeping our heads high and hoping Indigo will make it home soon to enjoy the wild and full-of-love family that we are. That’s all we have for this update. Please keep Indigo’s release in your thoughts & prayers and we’ll update you all as soon as we can.

Lots of love & light,

– Meagan & Cameron