We were all very excited about welcoming this little girl into the world. It was a totally different pregnancy from the boys and pretty rough on me so toward the end I was more then ready to have the baby. Although I was nervous to go through the whole labor process again I was to the point I was looking forward to either my water breaking or the real contractions.
Because with Sup I couldn't get an epidural I was going into this one knowing this time around it would be a drug free birth. But unlike Sup I was hoping pitocin didn't have to be used. I did not want to be induced, and thankfully my Dr isn't a big fan of it either, I did talk to him a little bit when I went into my routine check-up. At that point I was 4 days from my due date. After talking the possibility of induction, he said to think about it and if I didn't have the baby by the next week we could look doing it.
When he checked me that morning, around 9:30, I was dilated to a 2. I was not so excited about this number, because I knew I could easily be at a 2 for days. After leaving the post office Kris (who had come to help us out for the baby) and I headed home. We were home about 10:30, and when we walked in the door I started feeling some mild contractions. Because I had been having the braxton hicks on and off for weeks I really didn't think anything of them.
The boys had a snow day, so we got them something to eat and I sat and had a snack. While I was eating I still had the tightness on and off so I thought if I layer down for a little bit, they would go away. Kris and the boys were playing games in our front room so I sat in the recliner, so I could still rest. At this point it seemed they were becoming stronger, but I still didn't think that they were the real thing.
Kris who had been watching me, noticed they were getting consistent and started to time them. She suggested trying to walk to see if I could walk through them. I can say that I could to a point, but it didn't really make them go away. When I went back to the front room to sit she informed me that I was about 2-3 mins apart. Because I was just at the Dr. like 2 hrs ago I still though I was okay. I had her warm me up the flax bag to put on my back which did help. Around 12:30 she asked if she should wake Eric up, I thought at this point maybe this was something. We got to the hospital a little before one. They checked me and I was already dilated to a 7. I asked the Dr. who checked me if she was kidding. She kinda laughed and said 'no' and they were going to call my OB, so he could get here.
I think I took my Dr. by surprise, when he came to my room he was out of breath asking me how I was doing. After he broke my water, our baby girl was born just after 2 pm. Yup... I was in labor for just a short 3 1/2 hours! It weird to say the labor was great, but it really was…all things considered.
The nurse was really excited to see all the hair she had and offered to give her bath in the room with me rather than down in the nursery. She wasn't all that excited about her bath but here she is all nice and cleaned up :) She was pretty worn out after the excitement of the day :)
