The day before his arrival was pretty typical, but maybe I knew the time was coming. I spent the morning with Weston while Rolland was working. We played in the garden, the water hose, and just outside in general, because it was the most beautiful Saturday we've had in a long time! Weston helped me clean, I put him to work with a sponge and he cleaned his kitchen while I did mine, he cleaned little potties while I did the real ones...probably more work than I needed to be doing, but it needed to get done. We had decided to go to Easter church service that night to leave space for Sunday service goers...and the thought of sleeping in Sunday was nice. We were going to host a little family BBQ after all and hunt some eggs.All day I had been having urinary frequency, not too unusual considering my state of pregnancy. My sacral pain was also the worst it has been in a while, and I had never had sciatica until that day, and holy smokes...what a weird sensation! Anyway, we went to church, dropped Weston off at the nursery as we always do, sat down in the service and low and behold, I had to pee. I left the service, did my business, came back to the sanctuary, and then sure enough, I felt like I had to go again...or maybe that I already had. I told Rolland, "either my water just broke or I am peeing on myself", and he gave me the "let's go" motion. After another stop at the bathroom, it was evident that indeed, my water had broke...at church...at the Easter service. At least we were in the same town as the hospital that we were to deliver at, so we drove on over. I called to OB triage and told them I was coming and they met me with a wheelchair and took me on up. The resident had to confirm that "my water had really broke" by doing a fern test, but really...the puddle on the floor was probably a dead give away. I was only 2 cm dilated at the time, so good news was that we weren't going to deliver a baby in triage, and I wasn't too late to get my epidural (my only birth plan was to get to hospital that's 40 minutes from home in time for epidural...check). Bad news...I had to wait 2 hours in triage until my room was cleaned, and we had to wait for Rolland's dad to come get Weston, who hadn't eaten dinner and it was almost 9pm. Guess we should have eaten before church, because by this time, I was starving too and now NPO.
Once I finally got back to my room, I was hooked up to IV fluids and my blood pressure was taken hourly...so far so good at least. I didn't feel too bad, but the contractions didn't really become uncomfortable until about midnight, so I asked if it was "too soon" to get my epidural? The nurse informed me that the OBs tried not to "check you" once you water broke too often, but I wanted to know if I was progressing further or not, because I was then starting to get miserable. Anesthesia poked his head in my room to go over my consent for epidural, but then he walked out to grab some paperwork and was called to an emergency C-section under general anesthesia (yikes...definitely more important). My OB finally came back and saw that I was "really uncomfortable", as I breathed through another super painful contraction. She checked me...4 cm - now I didn't feel so bad about wanting to make the pain go away. Another hour and a half later, I was about to die - or at least I thought, when my nurse told me that Anesthesia still wasn't out of the OR, but she would see what she could do. Five minutes later another Anesthesia resident walked in and said, "I heard you really want your epidural?" ...um, yeah! He was apparently not on OB service, but came up from the main OR to help out...thank you Lord! Finally after trusting this guy to put a needle in my back while contracting away, I was able to rest (but not sleep). Two hours later, my resident came back in and checked me again and sure enough, I was complete! She asked me if I felt like I could push and quite frankly, I didn't really care, I felt pretty good. So after a "practice push", she decided that indeed I could move this baby out pretty easily at this point. As the OBs and nurses were setting up the delivery room stuff, I heard it...baby heart rate that had been kind of variable with some decels had a big one that was seemingly a slower heart rate than my own. . . . . Those few seconds seemed like forever, but my OB assured me that I could just go ahead an push him out. Amazing, two contractions and a nuchal cord later and baby Grant was out!!
He was perfect. I was well enough to be able to do skin-to-skin/kangaroo care for hours before anyone tried to take him away from me. Not to mention, I wasn't going anywhere because I couldn't feel my legs (my epidural worked a little too well). Grant, unlike Weston, was immediately able to latch at the breast...also a little too well, as I am still paying for that nipple trauma a week later. My IV was unhooked 2 hours after delivery, as soon as I had legs, I was moved to my post-partum room where my baby stayed with me until we went home.
Compared to three-and-a-half years ago, this experience was a complete 180...if you're ever bored, you can read about Weston's birth experience - one of my first posts. Now that we've been home for a week today, I'm mostly having trouble getting used to chasing a rebellious toddler while trying to nurse an infant (constantly) while having various family members in and out. I'm hoping this gets easier and that Weston will once again start to listen to me...if not, I'm off to the loony bin. Either that, or I'm going to ask our nanny to move in with us, because sometimes I'm rendered useless by crying, nursing baby while toddler wants a snack, a drink, a show, to climb the walls, to go outside, and no nap...awesome!
All-in-all, our growing family is fabulous. Husband has yet to change 5 diapers since we got home and even though he may not feel like it, he has had double the sleep he ever had when Weston was born. Unfortunately, from 5:00pm until bedtime, he's on toddler duty because I can't do both things well at all.
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