How to lose 20 pounds in one week

Well, she's here!  Our baby girl Mae Flower arrived on Monday the 18th, just as scheduled.  Seems she probably would have arrived Monday even if not scheduled, because I was already in labor when we arrived at the hospital for labor induction Monday morning at 7am.  The doctor decided to proceed with helping the labor along.  It seemed to go quite slowly, then became very rapid toward the end (as predicted by hospital staff), and Mae was born at 7:47pm. 

It was only after comparing Libby's delivery with Mae's delivery did we finally comprehend just how sick Libby was when she was born, or what a healthy "normal" delivery is supposed to look like.  There were so many differences that I won't list them all, but here are a few examples:

1. When Mae was born, they put her on my stomach and left her there, and let Dad cut the cord.  When Libby was born, they took her away from me and cut the cord themselves even though they had previously promised that Dad could do it.  They did not bring her back to me until after she had been weighed and bathed, etc, a procedure I assumed was normal at the time. 
2. Another difference is that when Mae started coughing up amniotic fluid, it appeared clear and as runny as water.  She did stop breathing the first time, but the nurse told me that was only out of surprise or fear, and I think I agreed.  When Libby was coughing up fluid, it was not clear, and she stopped breathing because she was choking.
3. Mae was strong enough to hold onto one of our fingers with her hand as soon as she was born.  Libby couldn't do that.

It did make me wonder if anything would have been different if we'd had the healthy baby before the sickly one.  In the end, I suppose not, since Libby is now perfectly healthy and eats and breathes without any trouble.  But maybe I wouldn't have checked Libby out of the hospital so early the first time and we wouldn't have had to return.  I don't know.  But we're just ecstatic that Mae is doing so well.

She was born at 7lbs 9oz and her doctors and nurses all say she is at the "head of the class" in terms of weight gain, strength, and ability to feed.  I'm not so sure about her ability to feed, I think she was just showing off for the nurse that day, but we're working on it.

My health has improved greatly starting just a couple days after delivery.  The scale says I've lost 20 lbs from my pre-delivery weight, and my energy and mental health are bouncing back more quickly than I thought they would.