Special Delivery

I'm way behind on posting and many of you have already heard the labor and delivery story from either Mike or myself, but I'll put it out there for those of you who haven't heard the story yet.

Oct 20, 4:46am, 40 weeks and 4 days pregnant--After having woken up for the usual bathroom break and climbing back into bed, I felt a contraction. This wasn't uncommon, I had had irregular contractions and cramping for weeks after getting up in the middle of the night. But the second contraction that followed shortly after was more uncomfortable and I knew I wouldn't be able to go back to sleep. I decided not to wake Mike and go have some breakfast to see if these contractions were the real deal.

After a bowl of Cheerios and a half hr of steady contractions, I decided to time them for another hr. They were 3-5mins apart and growing in intensity. At that point I decided to wake Mike up and let him know while I got ready for a shower. I didn't want to freak him out so I told him pretty nonchalantly that I was having contractions, it took him a second to take it in and then he promptly responded 'wait, shouldn't we be calling the Dr?' The info they give you says to call when your contractions are 3-5 mins apart, but I was paranoid about being stuck in the hospital for a long time and I had been coached up by my co-workers to wait until I couldn't stand because the pain was so bad. So I said I wanted to wait and took my shower. About the time I was climbing in, I was reaching the point where my contractions were too painful to stand up straight, but I was determined to be a model of good hygiene.

Forty minutes later, my contractions now 1.5-3 mins apart; so painful I could not speak, sit, stand, crouch, etc; and I was just getting out of the shower, gasping for Mike to call the midwife. I spoke to her and she said to head on over to labor and delivery, so we hustled to get out to the car (it was still a 40 min drive to the hospital). I called Dad and had just enough time to say 'we're going to the hospital, I can't talk anymore' and hang up. It was by far the most uncomfortable car ride Mike and I have ever experienced. Particularly when we came to a complete stop on part of the road that is one lane in each direction. Fortunately, it was just a bus turning left to pick up kids for school.

We arrived at the hospital at 8am and I couldn't make it 10ft before having to get down on all fours through a contraction in the parking lot. Thank goodness someone from the hospital saw and came with a wheelchair to get us up to L&D. I got changed, hooked up to the monitors and checked. To my surprise I was 9cm! Holy cow and thank God, because I wasn't sure how much longer I could hold out. Mike says the nurses started hustling about the room getting the delivery table set-up and getting orders in. My plan was to deliver naturally, without any medication. My midwife told us it was too late for anything anyway (especially because they did not offer epidurals) and I ended up not even getting an IV.

Labor was intense. Mike insists that my sense of humor actually improved during labor. I cracked jokes in between contractions about how labor was hard and that I now felt more sympathetic to my patients. I had been really worried I would be mean, apparently I'm funny. Who knew?

At 9:27 I felt like I needed to push, so we began. After just under an hr, at 10:24am, Evelyn Dorothy made her grand enterance into the world with a full head of hair and gave a forceful and wonderful cry. Life as we knew it changed forever.