2:00 am- Woke up with mild contractions and started timing them. They were about 3-4 minutes apart and were lasting about 30-45 seconds.
3:00 am- Contractions were still consistant so I decided to wake up Aaron. I did not want to wake him up unless I was for sure it was real. Once I woke him up he was like a tazmanian devil making sure everything was ready...car seat installed, cats fed, bags packed, yada yada.
4:00 am- Contractions were 2:30-3 min apart and lasting a minute long. Aaron called the hospital and they told him we could come in any time. We decided to wait one more hour just to make sure. I did not want to get to the hospital and be sent home.
5:00 am- Left for the hospital. I had to tell Aaron about 500 times to slow down. "She's not going to come out in the car, I promise!!!"
5:30 am- Arrived to the hospital and was given a hideous gown to put on and assigned to a bed in what looked like a large closet with a bed. I was told that the night before was a full moon which mean that all the rooms were currently full.
6:30 am- Contractions were now about 1:30 min apart and much stronger but I was only dialated to 2cm. I was given some equally hideous socks to match my gown and was told to walk around for a while. I was a little nervous about this considering my water hadnt broken yet and the halls were carpeted...but I did what I was told.
8:00 am- I had transitioned into what they call hard labor. Contractions were only a minute apart and I was ready to murder anyone brave enough to deny me drugs. Of course, I hadn't dialated any more than I was when I came in, so I was denied drugs. It was a scene out of a movie. I was cursing mother nature, screaming "ooooh God, ooooh God" and telling my husband not to touch me or talk to me. The nurse suggested I get into the jacuzzi tub to see if it would ease the pain.
8:30-10:30 am- I transferred into a dark room with a huge jacuzzi tub with candles lit all around. It would have been really relaxing and romantic had I not felt like I was being sawed in half. Aaron put on some reggae music on his iphone and sat in a chair next to the tub. At first the jets on my back really helped when the contractions came but by the end of 2 hours I was screaming bloody murder again and insisted they check me to see if I was dialated enough for an epidural. In order to do that I had to get out of the tub, dry myself off and walk back to my room, all while having the worst contractions ever...not easy!
10:30-11:30am- The nurse checked me and I was about 4cm, just enough to finally get something for the pain. At this point my contractions were right on top of each other and I wasnt feeling any relief in between them. Because of this, they had to give me some pain meds through an IV just for me to be able to sit still through the contractions in order to get an epidural. I had a nurse on one side putting in an IV and a nurse on the other side drawing blood, all while screaming more and trying to sit still. I kept telling myself drugs are coming, drugs are coming, drugs are coming. Before I knew it I was feeling less pain and a little goofy and wanted to kiss everyone in the room on the lips. The anesthesiologist came in within a few minutes and started to explain to me what he was about to do. I didnt give a rat's arse what he was going to do as long as it ended with me being numb from the waist down. He did his thing and within 15 minutes I was in my happy place. I had been waiting for that epidural for 9 long months.
11:30-3:00pm- I was finally moved into a regular room (thank God, who wants to deliver a baby in a closet?). The next few hours flew by since I no longer had any pain. Aaron and I watched TV and played crossword on my iphone. It wasnt long before I was feeling some like I needed to push, but nobody had checked my progress for a while and I wasn't feeling any pain so I let it go for a while. At 3:00pm my midwife finally came in with the intention to break my water to get things progressing, but when she checked me I was fully dialated and ready to go. Within 5 minutes there were several nurses in the room and I was pushing. I didnt even get a chance to call my mom and tell her it was happening.
3:15-3:55pm- Ouuuuucccchhhhh!!!!!!!!
3:55pm- The little peanut finally came out and was placed on my stomach for maybe 5 seconds before she was wisked away from me because she wasn't crying. A few nurses crowded around her while rubbing her with a blanket and trying to get her to cry...but nothing. The next hour was the scariest of my life. They took her to the nursery where some doctors and a specialist did a chest xray and tried to figure out why she wasn't taking any breaths. Thankfully I was mostly in shock which kept me from freaking out too much and I had amazing nurses that would come back into my room every couple of minutes to tell me everything was going to be ok.
5:00pm- Cora was finally stable and breathing on her own and they rolled me into the nursery in a wheelchair so I could finally see her. Other than being hooked up to an IV, she looked perfectly healthy and happy and was looking around like nothing had happened. They finally told me that she weighed 6 lbs and 2 oz and was 19 inches long. The nurses were already in love with her and had nicknamed her "the peanut". They kept her in the nursery for observation for a couple of hours and then brought her to us all bundled up and she hasn't left my side since.
Aaron and I feel like the luckiest people in the world to be blessed with a healthy pregnancy and a healthy baby. She is our little sugar coated peanut.
