When Jason walked in the
door around 3:30 I nearly cried tears of joy. He went downstairs to watch the
movie with Norah and Clayton and Ian (who had woken up the second I got in the
tub) and I continued to rest. I texted Jason at 4:02 and asked him to come
upstairs. He didn’t reply. I texted him again at 4:15 again asking him to come
upstairs. Jason came upstairs to find a very distraught wife sitting on the
bed.
I always laughed when
people said “Oh, I could never not find out the gender when pregnant. I’m too
much of a planner.” I’m about as much of a type A planner as it gets. Not
knowing the gender doesn’t make it any harder to plan, but you know what really
makes things hard to plan? Babies being born 3 ½ weeks early.
Jason convinced me we
should maybe start packing the hospital bag. I texted my former labor and
delivery nurse and second mom Rachel asking her if she thought I would still be
able to get an epidural, because apparently, having the flu disqualifies you
from being eligible for an epidural. Which is all fine and dandy if you’ve
prepared to go natural, but I had not. My birthplan goes like this: Epidural
ASAP. And, that’s it.
We started throwing
stuff into the bag. Jason packed his things, I was too distracted with
contractions to do much other than say “yes” or “no” to what Jason was packing
for me. I still wasn’t convinced this could be it, mostly because it wasn’t the
plan. I wasn’t ready. I had hair appointments scheduled, I had plans to get a
pedicure, a massage, and a brazilian wax. I needed to schedule sitters for my
kids and someone to clean my house while I was at the hospital. We didn’t have
a name picked. I hadn’t yet purchased a coming home outfit. We had no idea
where this baby was going to sleep. This wasn’t the plan. Or rather, this
wasn’t MY plan. But as the contractions kept coming, I knew this was it. I
turned to Jason and asked him to give me a blessing. It was the most perfect
blessing, blessing me with strength and courage and letting me know how much
Heavenly Father loves me and this baby.
I gave my mom a call and
let her know that we were heading to the hospital to get checked. My mom had a
house full of people because the next day was the start of a two-day extended
family reunion for her side of the family, so the timing wasn’t ideal for her
either, but she headed over to watch the kids.
At this point, my
contractions were coming every five minutes and lasting about a minute each.
And they hurt. The short drive to the hospital seemed forever and the walk from
the parking lot to the entrance was my personal gauntlet. We arrived at the
hospital at 6:20. The nurses at the front desk started asking me questions and
after the first question or two, I was in too much pain to answer. A
nurse appeared with a wheelchair, and took me back to a room to be checked
while Jason finished checking me in. I quickly changed into my hospital gown,
the nurse hooked up the heart and contraction monitors, and checked to see how
dilated I was. I was measuring at a 4+. My labors are extremely fast once they
get going, and I knew a 4+ meant this baby was coming, and coming fast. This
was my third pregnancy testing positive for Group Beta Strep, which is treated
with two rounds of antibiotics during labor. The antibiotics take around 4
hours for both doses, which was not going to happen for me. We quickly informed
the nurse that I was Group B positive and that we needed to start the
antibiotics asap. Of course, she needed to call my doctor and get his
permission to admit me, so she left Jason and me waiting. My contractions were
becoming more and more painful and more and more frequent and I was begging
Jason to make it stop. When the nurse came back (after what felt like an
eternity) she said she had talked to Dr Judd and he had said, “but she’s not
due yet!” I know, Dr Judd, I know. My thoughts exactly. But, because I was very
clearly in active labor, I was admitted and they put me back in the wheelchair
to take me to my room.
One major perk of going
into labor over being induced is, placing my IV is no big deal. I have a HUGE
needle-phobia, but when I’m too busy trying to cope through contractions, I
don’t even notice needles and IV’s. So, in goes the IV to get the antibiotics
started and all I can think about is, “where is my best friend the epidural
man?” And in he walks! Ryan informs me that he sped the whole way to the
hospital, and even sped past a cop but didn’t get pulled over. “Jesus must
really love you,” he said. With my epidural placed, I could finally relax and
embrace that this was really happening.
At my last doctor’s
appointment, I told Dr Judd my biggest fear was not having him deliver my baby.
It’s really my fault for saying it out loud and jinxing myself. On call for Dr
Judd was Sue, a nurse midwife who was actually perfect for the situation. I was
a nervous wreck. This baby was 3 ½ weeks early, and I was Group B positive and
wasn’t going to be able to get the full antibiotics dosage. Sue was so motherly
and calming.
I quickly progressed to
almost complete and Sue asked if she could break my water. As she was checking
me before she planned on breaking my water, my water broke and there was
meconium in the fluid, which is not a good sign. Sue quickly assembled the team
saying this baby needed to come now, and that for my sake she hoped it was a
girl because they do so much better with potential respiratory issues.
The delivery team
quickly got into position, and so did I. Because of all the potential health
risks this baby faced, I wasn’t going to be able to hold my baby right away,
but the plan was to place the baby on my stomach for a second while the cord
was clamped and cut. I pushed through two contractions, and at 9:20 baby was
born! I was so focused on the health of the baby, I forgot for the moment that
we didn’t know the gender. “It’s a boy!” Jason said in surprise, I couldn’t
believe it. This pregnancy had been much more similar to my pregnancy with
Norah that I was thinking we were going to have a girl. After a brief moment of
admiring him while Jason cut the cord, he was whisked away by the respiratory
therapist. Sue immediately distracted me from the situation as she stitched me
up. As much as I wasn’t thrilled about going into labor 3 ½ weeks early, on St
Patrick’s Day, Sue kept reassuring me that this baby came now for a reason.
Given the meconium in the amniotic fluid and the condition of the placenta (It
looked like it had been shredded and was starting to detach), my sweet little
baby may not have done well for much longer.
Because I still had to
be stitched up and taken care of, and couldn’t really move, and my baby boy had
to be on a CPAP machine and all sorts of IV’s and monitors, I wasn’t able to
see him for about an hour. Jason went into the level 2 nursery with him and the
nurses and (praise modern technology!) I was able to facetime with them and see
everything that was going on. One of my favorite moments was seeing my little
guy immediately respond to hearing my voice over the phone. Our little guy is a
fighter, and despite all the potential health risks he faced, was completely
100 percent perfectly fine. We didn’t have a name picked out, and didn’t really
even have a list of names, but as we threw out name ideas over the next day and
a half, Jason looked up the meaning of Owen, which means little warrior, and we
immediately knew it was perfect for him.
