Happy Birthday, Laya!

I don’t think I have ever been more excited to wake up at 3 a.m. as I was today. Today is the day we have prayed for, planned for, and counted down to. Today is the day we finally meet our angel.
We picked up Jessica, and were at the hospital by 5:15 on January 2, 2012. Soon after that, she was taken back to Labor and Delivery to get ready, and then we were brought back to her room to wait out the last few moments that stood between us and realizing our dream of becoming parents. While we were waiting, Jessica reported she was feeling some mild contractions, which was confirmed by the monitors that had been applied.
Around 7:30 they came and took her back to the delivery room, and left us to don the “father suits” (aka blue paper scrubs, shoe covers, and hair covers. We were brought into the room after the c-section was under way. We were careful to keep our eyes OFF of the surgical area, which was not hidden by more than a drape 3 or 4 inches tall. We overheard the OBGYN say that she was in active labor, and we later found out that if she had not had the c-section today, she might have suffered from a ruptured uterus.
Layla arrived at 7:54 a.m., weighing 7 lbs 5 oz, and measuring 19” long. (for my friends in the medical profession, her APGARs were both 9!!) The moment they pulled Layla from Jessica’s womb marked the beginning of so many things for us! The next several hours were a mixture of every emotion possible. We were thrilled, overwhelmed, terrified, anxious, and a thousand other emotions that cannot be put into words. The hospital where she was delivered was very small, and not very familiar or comfortable with adoption, which led to a lot of frustration over the next few days. Some of the staff even tried to convince Jessica to reconsider her decision. I was allowed to hold Layla for a few seconds after we stepped out of the delivery room, before they took her to the nursery. For the next several hours, we were only allowed to see her through the nursery glass. We waited anxiously for Jessica to be out of recovery (she did well with the c-section) and back to the room, and then had to wait on Layla to have additional tests/x-rays, before the 3 of us could finally see Layla for an actual first meeting. Throughout the day, we were introduced to many members of Jessica’s family, none of which who were supportive of her decision to place Layla for adoption. We handled their looks, remarks, and attitudes with grace (if I do say so myself) that we can only attribute to the result of lots of prayers.
The day was filled with lots of visitors (Jessica’s friends and family), and trying to juggle spending time with Layla (which we were only allowed to do in Jessica’s room), communicating with friends and family who were anxiously waiting on information about Layla, and figuring out how to be parents to this new arrival. By 10:00 that night Josh, Jessica, and I were all exhausted. We left the hospital and headed back to our hotel room to spend what would be the last night with just the two of us.