Birth Story

I was exhausted on Wednesday November 14, 2012. I worked a full day, but I was very sluggish. I even shut my door and took a little nap during my lunch. I got off work and headed home to fix dinner. After eating a grilled hamburger, I went to bed at 8:00 PM. I usually don't go to sleep until 10:00 PM, but I couldn't keep my eyes open. Little did I know then that I would need those extra 2 hours of sleep. I think my body was preparing me for labor. Scott came to bed around 10:00 PM. I later found out that I was snoring, and he couldn't get to sleep. He stayed up watching TV until after midnight. At 2:00 AM, I woke up to contractions. I stayed in bed for a while but couldn't fall back to sleep. I was so excited and kept wondering if it was the beginning of labor. After about a hour, I decided to get on up. I took a bath just in case. I made sure to shave my legs and wash my hair. After my shower, I sat on the couch watching Steve Harvey's talk show and put on some make-up. I called my mom and told her what was going on. Mom thought I was in labor. She said to go to the hospital asap!! I thought she was overreacting. She convinced me to call the doctor and see what they thought. In our child birth class, they told us to download a timing contraction app and to wait until contractions were 5 minutes apart lasting for 1 minute for 1 hour (5-1-1). Some contractions were coming back to back, but some where 2-7 minutes apart. They were not regular and not painful, so I figured I would stay at home until the 5-1-1 rule was happening. I called the doctor anyways and talked to a woman at the answering service. Since I was 39 weeks, she said to go on to L & D and get checked out. I DID NOT want to have a false alarm and be sent home, but I had to go because the lady on the phone said they would be expecting me. I called my mom back at ~3:30 AM and asked if she would come get Junior like we had planned. I started a load of laundry and woke Scott up. He DID NOT think it was labor. I was not hurting/screaming like we both imagined. He was taking his precious time getting up and into the shower. I didn't say anything because I honestly thought we either a.) had plenty of time or b.) it was false labor. Bless his heart, he had only been asleep for a few hours when I woke him up. Once he was in the shower, I made the bed, finished the laundry, and got dressed. At 4:30 AM, my mom arrived at our house. Right when she walked in, I leaned up against the kitchen counter and told her I was having a contraction. During the contraction, my water broke!! According to Scott, we all went nuts. I was crying because I knew I was about to meet my baby. Scott jumped into high gear and started putting our bags in the trunk while mom was running around my house looking for dry pants. Mom took Junior to her house and said she would be up at the hospital later in the morning. The plan was to call people once we were in a room and checked to see how far along I was. I was admitted at 5:41 AM. My nurse Amy checked me shortly after and said that I was 4 cm. She predicted I would dialate 1 cm every hour and have a baby around lunch time. Although I wasn't hurting, she said I could go ahead and get an epidural. I got the epidural about a hour after arriving at the hospital. My mom and Scott's parents got to the hospital around 9:00 AM, and we all visited in my room. Scott was watching the monitor and let me know that the contractions were coming one after the other. I told Scott and the grandparents that I was feeling "different" around 9:30 AM, so Amy asked everybody to leave while she checked me. Amy had a funny look on her face and said you aren't going to believe what you are dialated to. I grinned and predicted that I was 8 cm. She said you are 10!! I started crying and she started getting the room ready for a delivery. She let the grandparents come in for a second, and I got to tell them I was about to push. They couldn't believe it (although my mom told me the whole 9 months that we have babies fast). At 10:00 AM, I started practice pushes with nurse Amy while we waited on the doctor. Pushing caused me to get nauseous. I vomited several times. I kept apologizing to Amy for getting sick. She told me that vomiting can help push the baby out. After pushing and vomiting through 2 contractions, the doctor came in. The doctor wanted to see me push. I pushed during a contraction, and the doctor immediately said that she was going to have to use forceps. I got very upset and started crying. I told her to give me another chance to push her out, so she had Amy hold one end of a towel and me the other. She told me to pull on the towel while I was pushing. I was pulling the towel, pushing, and vomiting in a bucket that Scott was holding when our baby girl shot out. She came out so fast that the doctor and nurses gave her the nickname Rocket. Our 6 lb 13 oz 19" baby girl was born on November 15, 2012 at 10:30 AM.