Our baby boy is here and he is the sweetest little thing! We're completely obsessed! He was born January 3rd at 3:11pm. I wanted to write down his birth story while it is still fresh in my mind, so here it is.
I was HOPING to give birth before the new year. You know, tax write off and all ;) Also, I had both of the girls at 39 weeks 1 day, so I was expecting my third to come earlier than that. Doug had a few extra days off for Christmas and the New Year, so we enjoyed these days as a family of four, anxiously awaiting the arrival of our new bundle at any moment.
On the night of the 2nd, we went to our friend, Joe's birthday party. I never thought I would still be pregnant at that point, but we made the most of it, and enjoyed the night celebrating our good friend. I was starting to feel a little bit off, not contractions, just general aches and a bit out of sorts.
The next morning, I woke up at around 4am which wasn't too abnormal at this point. I was often waking up in the middle of the night, wondering if my Braxton Hick's were actual contractions and timing them. I felt a few of what could have been an actual but very mild contraction, but nothing to write home about. Violet woke up at 5:15 as is usual these days, so we went out to the living room and watched cartoons. I was optimistic that the baby could come and felt a few more contractions that were maybe painful, so I set about cleaning, organizing, and generally getting ready to go to the hospital.
When Doug woke up, I told him that I thought I may be in very early labor. He asked if I wanted to stay home from church, but I didn't want to get my hopes up, so we all got ready and head out the door. We got to church, and I let my friend and neighbor, Whitney, know that I was feeling some contractions, and today might be the day. I timed my pains throughout church. They were getting somewhat painful at this point, but they weren't consistent at all and often felt more like lower back pain than a tightening of my entire stomach like I felt with Violet. I was unconvinced. After church, Whitney asked if she wanted us to take the girls then, but we decided to head home, have a big lunch of In n Out, and let Violet nap. By this point, I was having an occasional pretty painful contraction, but they still couldn't be timed so I wasn't sure what to do.
After lunch, I decided to try a walk. I texted Whitney that I wasn't sure what was going on, and I didn't want them to be waiting around for us all afternoon, so they should carry on with their day. I grabbed Kennedy, left my cell phone, and we went for a walk around the block. We ran into our other neighbors, Justin and Jen, who were taking down Christmas decorations in the front yard. Their girls had received a new swing set for Christmas, so we decided to stay and play for a bit. It was about 1:30 at this point. I asked Justin to text Doug and let him know that I wasn't giving birth on the sidewalk somewhere. After about 15 minutes of chatting and play, we decided to go home and wake up Violet. I lay down for a few minutes on the couch, and almost immediately began to feel ridiculously painful contractions.
"We need to go RIGHT NOW." I told Doug. I had already packed up the bags, so Doug grabbed Violet out of her bed, and I texted Whitney that we were coming over to drop the kids off. My contractions were between 1 and 3 minutes apart at this point and very painful. I was kicking myself for having waited so long after I had done the same thing with Violet. When we pulled up to the hospital. Doug decided to park on the 4th floor instead of letting me out at the curb. The same thing he did with Violet. This just makes me giggle. So, we walked through the parking structure, to the elevator, down the giant corridor, and made our way back up to the 3rd floor to Labor and Delivery.
Fortunately, when we got to L&D, there were no other patients, and the nurses were excited to see me. I explained that this was my third child and that my contractions were very close together. My nurse checked me right away, and I was already at 6 cm. I immediately requested my epidural and things were on their way!
Part 2 coming when I get another few minutes. Which are few and far between these days ;)
