Welcome, Baby Girl!

Our little lady was born last week!

We named her Darcy Kathleen Brown, and she is such a sweet little peanut. I wish I could say there was tons of personal meaning behind her name, like there is with Forrest’s, but the truth is, I’ve just loved the name Darcy for years. In college, I worked a receptionist job that involved me making dozens of phone calls to a bunch of camp counselors over the course of the summer. There was a Darcy on my call list that I ended up talking to on the phone over and over throughout the summer, and every time I called her I thought to myself, “What a happy name.” I thought the name Darcy just sounded so sweet and nice and happy, and I’ve loved it ever since. And I happen to like the subtle Austen literary nod (although that wasn’t a reason for us choosing it—just a nice perk). We tossed around a few other names early on—I liked Hannah, Elise, and Grace, and Jeff suggested Alexandra or Quinn—but in the end, we couldn’t get Darcy out of our heads. It was the name we planned to give Forrest if he had been a girl, and it’s hard to imagine anything else when you’ve imagined having a girl named Darcy for years! Her middle name, Kathleen, is after my own mom, who is wonderful and deserves to have a whole bushel of grandbabies named after her.

I was induced at 39 weeks to try and avoid a repeat of Forrest’s birth (over a week late, a grueling marathon of a labor/delivery, and a huge monster baby that was nearly impossible to get out of me), and was so, so, so nervous about Darcy’s birth. I really can’t overemphasize how difficult and traumatizing Forrest’s labor/delivery was for me, and how much I did NOT want to repeat it a second time. I guess I shouldn’t complain about it too much—we both ended up healthy and well, and there weren’t any major issues or complications, but it was just not what I had imagined birth being like, and I would be thrilled to never have to go through something like that again. So, needless to say, I was very nervous about getting this little girl from the inside to the outside.

(Here I am the morning of Darcy’s birthday—39 weeks, 2 days.)

I’m not really one for long, detailed birth stories, so suffice it to say that things went really, really smoothly. I could not have dreamed up a better labor and delivery, especially compared with my very difficult experience with Forrest. From the time the pitocin started running to the moment she was born was about 9 hours total (which is less than half the time I was in labor with Forrest), I was smart enough to ask for an epidural early on before things got nasty (a mistake I made with Forrest was waiting too long to ask for it, then having to wait 2+ hours for the anesthesiologist to arrive, so I was in agony for far longer than I had ever planned), the epidural worked like a charm (not the case with Forrest . . . it was much, much closer to a natural birth than I ever wanted), and I pushed through a whopping two contractions to get her here (about 5 minutes total vs. 3 hours of pushing with Forrest . . . that poor boy is going to have to live the rest of his life hearing the horror story of his birth compared to the easy ride that was Darcy’s birth).

Don’t let that cute picture fool you—he did not want to hold her, but I had to have a picture, so we more or less just plunked her on Forrest’s lap and snapped one quick before he realized what was happening. He is not terribly interested in his little sister, which I actually think is probably a good thing. He certainly doesn’t dislike her, but he more or less ignores her and just goes about his normal day, so I don’t think it’s been a big adjustment for him so far. He does, however, like to be in charge of pacifier duty, and helps to put it in her mouth when she’s crying:

He also gets very concerned if he can’t find her (she’s definitely never hidden, he’s just the world’s worst searcher and will walk straight past her saying, “Oh no! Where Baby Daw-see?! Where she go?!”), and thinks every little sound she makes, from hiccups to grunts to cries, is hilarious. We’re all doing well so far—Darcy is a sweetheart, and I’m recovering nicely and feeling a little closer to normal every day. I’ll definitely be happy when she starts to sleep a little longer at night, but I’ve managed to get at least one nap in every day so far, thanks to a mom who lives close enough to swing by and give me a breather, and Jeff having a nice break from work, so I’m doing okay so far.

Thanks for all your kind thoughts and well wishes as we prepped for her arrival, and your congratulations via Instagram. Feel free to follow me there for more sweet baby pictures—my name is maybematilda :-)