Special Delivery

My wonderful friend LeeAnn is going to be having sweet baby Paige tomorrow. Her name is actually Emily Paige and I will always claim she is named after me even though she is not : ) I will have to do a post sometime about our little girls names. We are just so excited. It has been a long road for Brad and LeeAnn and tomorrow their sweet baby will be here!! I am so anxious for her. I can't wait to hear how her day goes tomorrow. I hate we won't be there for Paige's arrival but we will be there in spirit. We are excited to go down and see them in a month or so!! Brad and LeeAnn got to be in the delivery room right after Ben was born. I think this is one of the sweetest pictures.

Thinking about her made me think back to when Kate was born. Since things got crazy right after she was born I didn't get a chance to write about her delivery. I thought I would take the time today to write about what happened November 15-16th as a list of things for LeeAnn (or any of my other wonderful pregnant friends) to remember when they go into labor.

1. Don't try to go to church when you are in labor. I started having contractions about 3 am on the 15th and didn't think too much about it. I was up from that time on. They were about 5 minutes apart and very steady so I figured it was the real thing. We decided to go onto church because they weren't bad and there was no point in going to the hospital. Not the best of ideas. They got to be 2-3 minutes apart and it is not like I was paying attention at church anyways. Then we just had to figure out what to do with Ben since all our family was at church and we hadn't told anyone. Good thought though!

2. Be patient. Little did we know when we went to the hospital around 2 in the afternoon what a long night we would be in for. When we got to the hospital I was having pretty good contractions every 2-3 minutes but I was only 1 cm dilated and not effaced at all. We knew it was going to be a slow process. I made good slow progress. About 1 cm each hour. But it seemed like forever! I was induced with Ben and it was much quicker and easier so I recommend that highly!! Overall I was in labor for about 23 hours. And I ended up going about 44 hours without sleeping. Wow what a crazy few days!

3. Enjoy some fun time with your family and friends. It was fun to have Ben come and visit while I was in labor. All our family was there as well. And I was texting all my friends the whole time. That made it so much fun. Enjoy the time if you can. We had a fun time guessing what time we thought Kate was going to be born and how much she was going to weigh. Aunt Joanna won the prize! I really appreciate our family who stayed through the whole thing. I still bad for Matt's brother Brett and his wife who were there with us until 5 am or so and never got to see Kate.

4. Drugs are your friend!!!! With Ben I thought I would try to see how it went not having drugs. That didn't work out so well. So this time I decided that I would get an epidural before my water broke. So I finally got one around 9 pm. Didn't work. Got another one at 9:30. It was ok not great. The doctor went ahead and broke my water around 10 pm. Yea the epidural didn't work. Lots and lots of pain!!! It took them forever to get me something that would work. Finally around 1 am or so I was not in pain. Oh yea by that point I was 9 cm. I should have just gone with no drugs instead of having a giant needle stuck in my back 3 times. The anesthesiologist claimed I have a funny spine with a high apex. I think he was making that up. Plus I was left with no feeling in my left leg for about 20 hours. But still drugs are your friend!!!

5. Find something fun to watch on TV. But know that you will never look at that show again in the same way. I watched The Wizard of Oz and it will forever be associated with labor!

6. Sometimes only mama will do. Matt is great during labor. He is very supportive and helpful and just what I needed. And he doesn't say stupid things which is key. But I was in some rough pain at one point around 12 am. So I told Matt "I want my mama!!" She came in and helped me through the worst of it! Thanks mom!

7. Watch what you eat. I really don't know what to say about this. With Ben I didn't eat but I did drink and have popsicles. I got really sick and that all came back up. So this time around I didn't eat at all once I started having contractions. I still got really really sick. But there was nothing to throw up. Not fun at all. So I don't know which was better. The jury is still out. All I know is I didn't eat for 36 hours and I was hungry!

8. Make sure your doctor stays awake. My doctor came in for a visit around 11:30 and then went to get some rest. When the nurse called him around 1:45 and told him to come on up. He didn't come and he didn't come. She called again and he had fallen back asleep. He looked very out of it when he came up to deliver Kate. It was actually a very quick delivery. I probably pushed for about 10 minutes or so and she was born. Matt and I still think he slept through most of it. He didn't say a word for about the first 20 minutes. It was rather funny. He did a great job and I think he was just really concentrating on what he was doing because he was so tired.

9. Enjoy it!! At 2:16 am when our sweet Kate made her arrival it was absolutely wonderful.

10. Be prepared for the unexpected. Kate came out crying and looking great. Her apgar at 1 minute was 9 and all was well. At about 4 minutes she started grunting and not doing well. They had the NICU nurses up there within a minute and she was gone in about in about 5 minutes. I really do think that was the scariest moments of my life. Matt left with Kate so I was all alone in the delivery room wondering what in the world was going on. As we have been told over and over what happened was a fluke but it is part of the Kate story so it has to be told.

11. Paint your toenails. I thought I would throw in one funny one for the last one. Just because it is a story I don't want to forget. I had gotten a pedicure the week before Kate was born so my toes looked all cute. As I was being wheeled down to the NICU to see Kate we were riding in the elevator with the NICU doctor who was going to tell us what all was going on. It was a very awkward ride because he didn't want to talk to us until we got downstairs so he said "Your toenails look nice." For some reason that just cracked me up. We were on edge at that point and it just made me laugh. Still does.

Thanks for indulging me in my long list. I just needed a fun way to tell about our super special delivery with Kate! Here are some pictures from that day.

All smiles at around 3 pm or so.

Walking around trying to get this thing going around 6 pm. Pardon the really ugly robe. Buying a new one was on my list of things to do that week but didn't happen because she came!
Chilling with my main man! He was not a big fan of mommy in the bed so whenever I could I would get up.

Not doing so hot around 10 pm or so.
Sweet Baby Kate right after her grand entry!