From 0 to 10 in 5.5 hours...

To commemorate my due date of August 30, I decided it was time to document my labor story before the details start to blurr.  Its hard to believe it was only 2 weeks ago that I had my sweet little angel.  What a blessing these past 2 weeks have been!  We are so in love with Weston and can't remember life without him. 

So I've been know to pop out babies pretty quickly -- Jackson was here in 6 hours of mild labor & 2 pushes.  Weston was not much different and I was not prepared for an even quicker labor & delivery.

I had an intuition that I may go into labor that Wednesday, August 17....or that at my 38 weeks OB appointment that day, my doctor would check me and send me on to the hospital.  Don't ask, it was just a feeling.  Enough of a feeling to put my hospital bags in the car & go ahead and install the infant carseat....

It all started when I woke up around 3am on August 17 with major back pain.  I was hoping to go into labor prior to my August 30 due date so any signs of labor were quite welcome.  I hopped in a warm bath but the back pain didn't go away and I was also having some "cramps" (I was in denial it was actual contractions).  After about an hour & a half, I decided I maybe should start timing my "cramps" just in case it was true labor, plus it was a great excuse to use this new contraction monitoring app I got for my iPad.  Well, after about 30 minutes of timing them, I realized that I better wake of Ben because they were 4 to 5 minutes apart and getting stronger.  It was around 5am, and we called our parents to alert them, then called our close friend Lovee (Jackson's "Greenville Grandmother") to come over to stay with Jackson.  I took a leisurely shower, shaved my legs, dried my hair for the first time in 3 months, ate a banana and took a few pictures of us leaving the house.

By the time we arrived at St. Francis, things were going downhill fast.  It was 6:30 am and my contractions were about 3 minutes apart (thanks iPad) and my chattiness was quickly replaced with bitchiness.  And of course, they had to put me in a triage room to "make sure" I was in labor before they could completely admit me.  4 centimeters & 100% effaced confirmed it.  By the time I was in the labor & delivery suite and hooked up to the contraction monitor & IV, I was miserable.  As in screaming-so-loud-that-it-looks-like-a-movie-scene miserable.  As in worst-pain-of-my-life miserable. 

The anesthesiologist mosied on in around 7:45 and gave me an epidural that did not work.  Apparently, I was progressing so quickly that the meds could not "catch up", whatever that means.  I got partially numb on my right side but could still feel my contractions and my left side was not numb at all.  As in I'm-being-stabbed-in-my-kidney not numb.  And not only did the epidural not take but the doctor was not there yet either so I had to not push for about 10 minutes.  And the only thing worse than pushing is not pushing.

The doctor finally made his way into our room around 8:10 and decided to give me a "topical" since my epidural didn't work.  I told them that a cream was not going to improve my condition -- to me, "topical" means neosporin.  Well, apparently "topical" in the OB world means a 6" long needle and a Robitussin-sized bottle of something.  All I know is that he stuck that needle somewhere and I didn't feel any "topical" pain after that...contractions, yes, "topical", no.

Regardless, I was finally given the thumbs up to push, which I did through approximately 4 contractions.  The baby was eager to be born and I was very fortunate to be spared a brutal final phase of delivery.  I'm not sure who exactly called the gender, but all I remember is that I could clearly see that our baby was a boy by the way the doctor had him dangled upside down over my stomach.  I was not as surprised as I expected to be -- deep down, I had a gut feeling it was a boy.  The anticipation of the big reveal was amazing for the past 9 months, but the actual moment of truth was somewhat of a letdown for me.  Not because I was not thrilled to have a healthy baby boy, but because my level of pain overshadowed the surprise factor.  It was so caught up in the absolutely awful pain that I didn't get to enjoy the last few hours of anticipation.

All in all, I am very thankful the labor was super quick, but I do know that next time we have a baby I will head to the hospital at the first inkling of labor . And yes, there will be a next time....gotta try for baby girl one more time.  As far as finding out the gender, we are still talking through whether or not we'll wait.