Memorial Day weekend begin like any other weekend with the exception of a little nausea. Didn’t think too much of it, just one of many pregnancy symptoms. Sunday morning, Andy was away at work and I decide to have breakfast with my sister, Ashley, (who by the way is also prego), at Cheesecake Factory. Well it wasn’t much of breakfast because I was afraid to stick anything in my mouth with the fear it would come back up. Not to mention that the waitress wouldn’t let me order the kids french toast. The nerve! So I stole bits and pieces of Ashley’s Eggs Benedict. Sooo good! Anyway, back to the reason why I’m writing this post. After breakfast, I ran a couple of errands and headed home. While sitting in traffic, I notice I’m having strong contractions and decide to time them. Well wouldn’t you know it they were 7 – 8 minutes apart. I picked up the phone and called Ashley, “I think I’m in labor!” is the first thing out of my mouth. She calms me down and tells me to call the doctor when I get home. Which I do and he tells me to call back when they are 5 minutes apart. I then call Andy and update him on “the situation,” as my dad likes to call it. I decide to take my mind off of the contractions and work on a nursery project that needed to finished. After an hour or so, the contractions gone; I had my first taste of false labor. Not fun. Talk about getting your hopes up and then nothing. The next few days were completely normal, no symptoms what so ever. I was beginning to think this baby was never going to come. We all know that’s not going to happen, Miss Caroline was just patiently waiting to make her debut.
Early Wednesday morning, and I mean early, we’re talking 2:45 am, I woke up with contractions. I was thinking no big deal, this happens quite often. For whatever reason, I decide to start timing them. Lo and behold, they were 7-8 minutes apart. I told myself if I still had them at 4:15, I would wake Andy and then take a shower. Why a shower? I don’t know, it just sounded like the right thing to do. Really, I wanted to do something out of the ordinary, to get my mind off the contractions. I was afraid I was experiencing false labor and didn’t want to get my hopes up. Anyway, after the shower wouldn’t you know it; the contractions were still there and getting stronger. We decide to call the doctor around 5 am and were told to come in. We were excited, I remember thinking “This could be it, we are having a baby!” Andy and I quickly, jumped out of bed and starting gathering all our stuff. I would have loved to be a fly on the wall watching two never-before-parents running around the house trying not to forget anything. We finally made it to the hospital around 6ish and were placed in triage. After being hooked me up to the machine that measured my contractions and the baby’s heart rate, the nurse checked to see how far along I was. I thought for sure, I was at least 3 or 4 cm along. Nope, I was wrong. The nurse said, in a very flat even toned voice “1 cm and 95% effaced.” What! That can’t be right, something is wrong. I’m having painful contractions!” She went on to say, “Since you’re not 39 weeks, we can’t help you. You will have to labor on your own.” I immediately looked at Andy and then back at the nurse. With tears forming in my eyes, I said “I don’t understand; you can’t help me?” She explained that they don’t help woman with their labor before 39 weeks and since I was 38 weeks and 7 days, there was nothing they could do. I would have to show them I was in true labor. She suggested that we walk the halls for an hour and then come back for more monitoring.
After about an hour of mindless walking, I entered the triage room with the thought of “they are going to send me home.” There was no way I could show enough improvement in an hour for them to admit me. The nurse came, checked me and said, with a smile on her face, “You’re 4cm.” Yay, I get to stay, we are having a baby!
After receiving the epidural, I was comfortable and relaxed. Around 5 pm, the doctor broke my water in the hope to speed things up a bit (I was stuck at 7 cm). That did the trick. By 7:40 pm, I had begun to push. The nurse had told me earlier that day, that first time mom’s usually push for 2 hours but since I was in good shape (all that running and walking paid off) she thought the process would go faster than that. So when the hour and half mark came around and no baby, I was getting frustrated. The doctor came in around that time to check my progress. He starts rambling about an old practice of using forceps and maybe the possibility of c-section. I looked at him and said, “I don’t understand, what you are saying?” I suddenly felt the urge to push and before I knew it, the doctor had disappeared. What doctor does that? He just left without telling me what was going on. I looked to the nurse for an explanation. She said he was worried about the baby because the heartbeat would dip with each contraction and that they would be wheeling me into the OR. Either the forceps would work or I was having a c-section. Before I could even think about what was going on, Andy was dressed in scrubs and I was being detached from machines. The rest is really a blur; it felt like a million people were surrounding me as I lay on a skinny board with my arms stretched straight out. I remember seeing the end of the forceps and then a nurse telling me to stop pushing. Seconds later, Caroline, is lying on my chest and Andy is leaning over me kissing my forehead. We’re now a family of three.
Stats:
7 lbs 2 oz
19 inches
