"It is said that women in labor leave their bodies...they travel to the stars to collect the souls of their babies, and return to this world together."
- anonymous
Baby's due date was Tuesday, May 7 but I had been measuring 2 weeks ahead since about 12 weeks. To make matters more exciting, I'd been having lots of Braxton Hicks contractions since about 36 weeks and my parents were going to be in Hawaii when I was 38 weeks and then in Pocatello 3 days before my actual due date. I was pretty certain this baby was going to come early and they were going to miss it. We also had decided not to find out the gender this time, so we were excited for that surprise. Nate and I were convinced it was a girl because it was such a different pregnancy than my others.
I had my last appointment with my midwife, Kristi, on Thursday, May 2 at 39+2. I was dilated to 3cm and 90% effaced. She stripped my membranes and told me not to even make another appointment for next week because she was sure I wouldn't make it to Monday. With both Spencer and Kade I was in labor 48 hours after having my membranes stripped, so I was pretty confident I'd have the baby Saturday. I went for a walk that afternoon and had some intense cramping, so Nate and I went for another walk that evening and the same thing happened. I thought for sure I'd wake up in the early morning hours in labor just like I had with Spencer and Kade.
Kristi :)
Friday morning was the same, I was still cramping but if anything it had subsided a bit. I tried to not think about labor, and just clean the house and run some last minute errands. I thought for sure Saturday would be the day since it would be 48 hours later, and since my parents were planning to drive across the state, for sure that would be when I had the baby. :)
Nate was really sad to say goodbye to this baby mustache.
NOT ME!
Friday night my mom told me she was keeping her phone next to her bed all night and if she didn't hear from me then she and my dad were getting up at 4:30am to drive to Pocatello. I got a text about then asking if I was in labor...no. So they made the drive. I was pretty bummed Saturday, I was still feeling extra crampy and uncomfortable but figured since I had no signs of labor that the membrane strip hadn't worked and I was going to be overdue (which would be a first).
Sunday morning I told Nate I wasn't going to church, I was too uncomfortable and mad that I was still pregnant. He took the boys and after sitting at home for half an hour I decided to get ready and go to church, I was just making myself crazy sitting at home waiting for labor to start. When I dropped Kade off to nursery I got some sympathetic looks and comments from people who knew I was hoping to have had the baby already. I broke down in front of them in the nursery, just crying because I was over being pregnant and I was really set on having a baby that weekend but I knew based on my track record that if I didn't wake up in labor, it wasn't going to spontaneously start during the day. I finally texted Kristi and told her, "I'm not in labor, do I need to call in the morning and make an appointment?" She was so sweet and apologized that it didn't work, she said it only works 15% of the time anyway and based on my dilation she was really surprised it hadn't done anything. She did mention though that it's known to shorten pregnancy by 3-5 days though. I told her I was shocked it hadn't worked either simply because of how I'd been feeling. Her last text said, "I expect labor is right around the corner :)"
I spent the afternoon making lots of cookies to eat my feelings, and some to freeze for later. Then our friends invited us over to hang out and let the kids play with their giant blow up unicorn sprinkler. I should have taken a picture, it was a 6' tall unicorn that sprayed water out its horn, pretty impressive. I needed more distraction so I took Spencer to go play and Nate and Kade came over after his nap. They then invited us to stay for burgers for dinner. Austin makes the best burgers so of course we accepted.
Kade and Opa made blue pancakes in honor of baby brother
I didn't mention this to Nate or anyone at the time because I'd convinced myself I was going to be overdue and end up being induced and on and on, but while hanging with the Jones' my cramping was occasionally more intense. Nothing consistent but enough for me to notice. We got home, got the boys bathed and ready for bed and then my cute friend Brenda came over with a plate of cookies and frozen cookie dough! She had witnessed my break down in the nursery about "still" being pregnant, (it seems so silly now, she was a week overdue with her last and there I was crying with 2 more days until my due date!) she was so sweet saying all she wanted to do every night she was still pregnant was eat cookies and cry. I totally get that.
We got the boys to bed about 9:30 and then watched an episode or 2 of Friends and went to bed about 10:30. I woke up at 11:23pm to use the bathroom and the cramping I had felt earlier was more intense again and consistently more intense. It still wasn't contractions but I had a little surge of excitement thinking this had to be the start of something. So I laid back down and tried to sleep in case labor was going to start soon. Of course I couldn't fall asleep though, and less than 10 minutes later I had my first contraction. I was ready to go as far as timing it, it lasted about 30 seconds and there was an 8 minute break before the next one. After that things intensified pretty quick, from there contractions were consistently 3 minutes apart or less and lasted between 30-45 seconds. About midnight Nate rolled over in a big sigh so I asked "are you awake?" I think he sleep replied "yes" but when I said "I'm in early labor" he jumped right up to start getting things ready.
While Nate packed up the car, I tried calling my mom, dad or sister. Between the 3 of them I probably tried calling more than 50 times. No one answered. Around 12:30 we were ready to go and packed the boys into the car and headed to my parents even though we hadn't got a hold of them yet. On the way there I told Nate I wasn't getting out of the car so just take the boys to the back door and go in, they never lock it.
We got to there house a little before 1am. Nate took Spencer and as much stuff as he could carry and headed for the back door. A minute later he was back saying the back door was locked. I had a key on my key ring that I luckily happened to grab so I hobbled out of the car to the back door, fighting through the contractions. Come to find out my key didn't work on the back door! I told them to stay there and I ran back to the side door and let myself in. I walked right passed the back door without unlocking it, straight to my parents room where I said, "Are you guys awake?! I'm in labor! And no one is answering their phone!" they immediately jumped up and we let Nate and the boys in and all sort of laughed at how no one answered their phones. I told my mom to get my sister and we'd let her know when we got settled at the hospital and how far along I was.
We had lots of hospital visitors. Grandma Lynne, Jourdan & Codi, Katie & Lincoln, Grandpa Bob
Nate and I headed for the hospital about 1:15am, I called Kristi who told me to meet her at the emergency room door and she'd have a wheelchair waiting for me. We timed it perfectly and got to the hospital right as she was walking in. Nate went to park the car and Kristi wheeled me up to triage to check my progress. I told her I was afraid I wasn't going to be as far along as I hoped because my contractions were still only about 45 seconds even though they were 2 min apart, and she said, "Oh, I think you'll be surprised."
I think triage is the worst part of the whole ordeal. They make you lay on your back while they monitor your contractions and see how progressed you are, its about the most uncomfortable position imaginable. Kristi checked me and I was 8cm, and I immediately asked, "is it too late for an epidural?" I was so scared I was going to end up pushing like I did with Kade which terrified me. At a previous appointment I had already told Kristi I would like to do a natural birth again so I think she knew I was just getting scared so she just sort of redirected me asking if my mom and sister were coming.
Nate made it up to triage shortly thereafter and called my mom to tell her it wouldn't be long before baby was here. She headed for my sisters to wake her up and then said she'd be on her way. In the meantime they had me walk over to the labor and delivery room where Kristi automatically started the tub for me which was such a relief to finally get in. Then she said she was going to call my sister and get her down there. Later she told me she just knew I needed the support of my mom and sister to get through this. I hadn't been in the tub long when they showed up which was a relief and we actually had some moments laughing in between contractions talking about me running into my parents room in labor, and my mom just going to my sisters and ringing the door bell at 2am. I still felt really good in between contractions, but they were starting to get longer and more intense.
At some point in the tub I again asked for an epidural, Nate told Kristi who was just waiting outside the bathroom door, he said she looked around like "oh shoot, how do we redirect this?" She came in and said it would probably be about 45 minutes before the anesthesiologist could get there and get it placed, and she thought we'd have a baby before then. I asked her to check me again and I was fully dilated.
I got out of the tub and laid on the bed to try to just relax while waiting for the baby to descend. At some point Kristi asked to break my water because I was bleeding a lot and she hoped this would help speed things up a little bit. She also mentioned something about me being constipated and if I could just poop that would let the baby move down. I sort of rolled my eyes to myself because with all my labors I have always just felt the need to poop but I never actually can or do, its just the pressure. At that point I stood up and leaned over the bed to try to let gravity move the baby down. Kristi asked if I wanted an IV with some kind of pain killer, I said sure and they tried my arm and exploded that vein and had to try again in my hand.
They eventually got it and I immediately needed to actually poop so I hobbled over to the bathroom at sat on the toilet. Surprisingly, I was actually able to poop! And the second it came out, I could feel the baby's head crowning. I yelled, "It's coming!" And people mobilized real quick. Kristi wanted me to get to the bed that was at least 25ft away, I could not walk as the baby just kept coming without me pushing. Kristi, my mom, and Nate basically drug me out of the bathroom until Katie had the bright idea to grab the birthing stool and bring it to me rather than making me go to it!
I sat down and Kristi told me I had to slow down or I was going to tear. I surprised myself by actually holding back and taking a couple of deep breaths. I pushed only once or twice was all and my baby was here! They immediately handed him up to me and when they did I got a little peek to learn he was a boy! A minute later my mom or sister asked, "well, what is it?" Because I had already got a peek I apparently made a statement like, "It's another boy!" which came out like I was disappointed but really I was just so surprised and I had already seen!
They got me moved into the bed to deliver the placenta and I guess I just kept bleeding and was on the verge of hemorrhaging so they gave me a shot in the thigh (Nate later asked, "Did you see the size of that needle?!" Thankfully no, though I sure felt it! I was too enamored with our new little boy though that I think I missed out on a lot of the craziness that was going on at that point. They were pushing all sorts of drugs in my IV and my wrist kept burning from them. Kristi later said she didn't really think I needed an IV when she first asked if I wanted one, but her intuition told her to do it anyway. I'm glad she listened and is so in tune with the labor process. It made the hemorrhaging easy to get under control.
After everything was under control, they let me just hold and snuggle my new baby for an hour before they checked him over. I got the shakes super bad at that point. It was the weirdest thing, never had that with either of my other boys. It was like the chills, only I wasn't cold. But my teeth were chattering and my whole body was just shaking. I wanted to laugh and cry but just kept shaking! I also commented that I couldn't believe I hadn't thrown up, with Kade we all knew I was in transition because I puked. Well as soon as we started getting ready to move upstairs to the postpartum floor, I got super nauseous and ended up throwing up. They thought I just needed some food so got me some snacks like cheese and yogurt and crackers. I was hungry and ate most of it. And then puked again. The nurse said, "let's just give you zofran and be done with this." :) After that I felt much better.
Nate and I kept commenting on how small he was, we thought for sure he was going to be our smallest baby, or that he for sure had the smallest head. Our boy weighed in at 9 lbs 3oz and 21 inches long and 14 in head. He was my second biggest baby but by far my easiest and fastest (4.5 hours) birth. He was also my first baby that I didn't immediately cry but did immediately fall in love with. The other 2 boys I just cried out of relief that it was over. This time I felt like I got to actually enjoy the birth process (as much as one can enjoy labor). Plus, it was just so fast there wasn't time to dwell on misery or pain. It was perfect. Our baby is perfect. And Nate and I are officially outnumbered as a family of 5!
