It's Your Birthday!

Due date 5/20. Pre-term labor at 33 weeks stopped with medication. Medication stopped at 36 weeks.

The due date pretty much came and went. We talked with the doctor and scheduled an induction for 5/30 at 6 am. It was a lot later than I wanted, but it was the only opening for the doctor and hospital. You take what you can get.

On 5/23 I woke up sick and started having different contractions. I thought for sure it was labor, but was not. This was trip #2 to the hospital with no baby coming out.

So on Thursday 5/29 I took Peanut to my sisters house to stay while we had baby. I stayed for dinner and got him ready for bed. I hated leaving him there because he is a hot kid and her house was about a 1000 degrees. Anyway, that night husband and I were doing last minute preparations and I said it was a bummer we couldn't have just gone in that night to get it started. He replied that it was nice for us to get to sleep in our own beds one last time. So we went to bed around 11 or so.

I was asleep and dreaming when I felt something gush. I either said out loud or in the dream 'uh oh'. Then it gushed again and I said/dreamed 'uh oh' again. At that point I jumped up, grabbed a towel and ran for the bathroom. I flicked the light on and just sat there pondering what to do. I took off my wet clothes and went to get some dry ones. Husband asked what was happening and I calmly said "my water broke". He bolted upright and started mumbling hospital. I tried to explain we were supposed to call the doctor and/or hospital first before just showing up. He was very tired as it was just midnight and we'd only been asleep for about an hour.

At the time I wasn't having any contractions and felt a little weird heading to the hospital without them. No need to fear though, they started like clockwork on the way, coming about every 3 minutes. By the time we got to the hospital, in the room and situated they were pretty strong. By now it was about 1:30am. I was finally starting to dilate a little too. I think I was a solid 2, maybe 2 1/2.

I labored through the contractions for a while, but they started to be pretty intense. I was worried it was too early for drugs. I didn't want to slow labor down at all. No need to worry. About 4 am I called the nurse for an epidural. I was dilated about 4-5 so I was happy to go ahead and get one. The lady that did it was nice and explained everything, but talked so quiet I could barely hear her. Anyway, after a little while I didn't feel anything. She gave me a button to push if the pain got more intense and I needed more drugs. Woo hoo!

I tried to sleep at this point, but they took my blood pressure every 15 minutes and each time it was below the acceptable level so the alarm went off. I had to page the nurse every time. She asked if I was dizzy or anything and since I was mostly laying there trying to sleep I didn't really feel too different. After an hour of this she called the drug lady back in. They gave me something to elevate my blood pressure. It went from 90 over 40 to 166 over something. This made me pretty sick and I started to throw up. Lovely. After a few minutes of this it was back down to 90 over 40 and I felt better. I'm not sure why this wasn't a problem, but they didn't do anything else at this point.

Shift change happens at 7 am so I got a new nurse. She wasn't quite as friendly as the first girl, but ended up doing a great job. I finally rested for a while until around 8:30am. The contractions started being much more intense and I felt the pain again. I was breathing through them even with the epidural. I kept thinking maybe this meant I was getting close to having the baby. So I pushed my drug button and paged the nurse. The doctor came in around the same time too. At 9:11 am I was fully dilated and effaced. The doctor said I should start pushing. So we did.

After the first push I started to throw up again. I was so disappointed. I didn't want to be sick, I wanted to get the baby out. I was so mentally ready to do what I had to do to get it out. Fortunately, I wasn't sick long and she gave me oxygen to inhale while I pushed. I was surprised how much this helped me feel better. Anyway, I pushed as best I could for 40 minutes or so. Then she said we should try tug of war. It was a great position for me. She tied a blanket in a circle so I could hold one side and she held the other. I could pull in front of me instead of on the sides of the bed. Just a few minutes later and we were ready. The doctor came in and said to stop pushing and they got everything ready. Then it took one more push and he was out.

He was so big, slippery and wiggly that I though the doctor was going to drop him. The nurse next to her grabbed his lower body and they sort of shoved him onto my chest. He looked just like Peanut. It was like having him all over again. They sewed me up and wiped off the baby. We were so happy.