And Baby Makes 5!

If you didn’t notice the incredibly large ticker at the top of my blog, we are expecting our third child!! I am approximately 13 weeks and due the first week of September. My official due date is September 9th, but I’m going to assume that this little one will come several days early just like Dylan and Ava Grace.

We went to the doctor's office today to see our fabulous sonographer Dr. Rinehart for our first trimester screening. While just the thought of going is never fun, Dr. Rinehart screened both Dylan and Ava in utero, and got us through some pretty emotional times. The testing looks good so far, and nothing to report on the sonogram. In fact, at 13 weeks, he is 98% certain that we are having a little girl!



To reminisce about my previous pregnancies....

Dylan’s Labor – It was several days before my due date. I picked Angel my precious cat (who has since passed) up from the veterinarian’s office on my way home from work. She was having a hard time lately and they were doing bloodwork and running tests. I also picked up the always-satisfying Taco Bueno for dinner for Michael and I-mmmm. We did the usual eat in front of the television (something that would be impossible today), and I felt a little funky but wasn’t worried. We got into bed that night as usual. Any kind of abdominal issues I was having after that I blamed my bean burrito :-)

I’m not sure what time I woke up the first time, but I decided not to wake Michael and went into the guest bedroom to lay down. It started getting worse over the next several hours, and that’s when I decided, “okay, this isn’t a test run, this is the real thing.” I went and woke up Michael and we started timing my contractions. After holding out for the contractions to be 4-5 minutes apart, we called the doctor’s office who told us to go to the hospital. By this time it was around 3:15 in the morning.

I got admitted into Presbyterian’s triage (yuk), where they monitored my progress to make sure I was going to have a baby. After being in triage for about 2 hours, I called my mom and dad who sensed immediately what was going on. Yep, I told them, they are admitting me and moving me up to a delivery room. I really don’t want to get into the story about the doctor who admitted me, but I’ll just say Michael calls him Dr. Love with reason. I just hope he isn’t the one delivering this baby!

Anyhow, I get admitted and moved into the delivery room, and I was ecstatic to find out that my doctor was on-call for the day-WOO-HOO! Dr. Nokleberg’s shift was over at 7:00 that night, and I told her not a problem-we will have him before she leaves for the day :-) I held out until I was 6-7 dilated and I was so tired from being up all night, I just wanted to rest! So I got an epidural and fell fast asleep. That was the best sleep I had in a loooong time. I woke up a couple of times during the day, and by 6:00 that night we were ready to start pushing. How nice, the best sleep of my life, and I had to be woken up to start pushing-never pictured that during labor!

I was pushing for about 30 minutes, and Dylan’s heart rate went down and I started to have a fever. The next 10 minutes I could not even tell you how many people rushed into the room, but they called people and a nurse showed up with forceps—NOOOOO!!! My doctor looked at me and told me we had to get the baby out immediately, and we might need to use the forceps. HECK NO!! That’s pretty much all it took for me to push my darnedest, and our first child was born at 6:28 PM. A health, sweet little boy weighing in at 6 pounds, 14 ounces.

Ava's Labor—Ava’s labor was just like her little personality today. Still and calm, then all of a sudden-WHAM, you didn’t see it coming! I was again several days from my due date. I got home from work and went to bed early while Michael stayed up playing video games. I kept getting up and going to the bathroom because my abdomen hurt and I felt like I had to pee every other minute—I felt like I was peeing myself a little (sorry to be graphic guys and gals). I did this for a while and finally went to sleep.

I woke up around 2:00 in the morning and Michael was still playing video games. I told him, I think I’m in labor, I kind of peed myself earlier and I’m having contractions now. He told all of his gaming buddies the news and signed off. We started timing my contractions and I was already at around 4-5 minutes! I called my parents who were at the lake house an hour and a half away. Again, my mom knew right when she answered, and they drove to the hospital immediately. We also called my brother-in-law who rushed over to stay with Dylan. As I’m pacing and feeling all sorts of uncomfortable, Michael calmly takes a shower. By this time, I’m telling him “You better hurry up, this isn’t about your hygiene for goodness sake!!” (I’m not sure, but I can pretty much guarantee there were some curse words thrown in the mix). He’s finally ready when I realize that I’m way past the point I was when we left for the hospital during Dylan’s labor. By this time it’s around 3 in the morning and we are finally getting to the car....when Michael decides to light a cigarette. “Are you F@#$*^! kidding me?!?!?!?” I stand there, stewing in pain and anger. I’m happy to say Michael has kicked that nasty habit, so a repeat of that will not happen this go-round. But take note, sweet hubbie, your warm shower is the last of our worries-LOL!

Okay, where was I...as we drive to Presby, which is at least a 30 minute ride from our house, it’s getting intense. So intense that halfway there I told him to pull over, then changed my mind, several times. I do a funny pain dance while sitting in the passenger seat the whole drive there, and we are laughing about it! We get to admissions and I start pacing the hallway in front of the waiting room where there was probably 10 people staring, but at that point all I saw was stars. Michael goes to do the paperwork check. After a brief period of time, the nurse comes and takes me to a delivery room. “Aren’t we going to triage?” I ask. “No dear, we can tell you are definitely having this baby!!”

I go up to the labor where a nurse checks me – 7 dilated. Huh, so I wasn’t peeing myself earlier that night, my water was leaking-oh, that makes sense! This wasn’t my first rodeo, but I guess I just assumed through all of the dramatic reenactments on television and movies that a gush of water would come out-not necessarily the case apparently. That might have been a useful tip in all those pregnancy books! When the nurse leaves to get the anesthesiologist, I looked at Michael, twisting in pain. “There’s no way I’m 7...this feels nothing like when I got my epidural with Dylan at 7...compared to that, this feels like a 14!!!” They come back to the room in about 15 minutes. At this point, I can pretty much guarantee I look like a mad woman, my movements more like some bizarre tribal dance, and I just keep saying, “This is worse than Dylan’s 7.” So I get my epidural and the nurse checked me right after. OOPS. There’s a reason I felt much different. Within a period of 10 or so minutes, I was fully dilated.

This of course freaked everyone out, because I just got the epidural. I haven’t fully looked into the “whys” or “what happens”, but they don’t administer epidurals past a certain point. And DEFINITELY not when you are ready to push. So, we had to wait another 30 minutes or so for the epidural to go into effect before we do anything. During the wait (and during the pushing), I had the honor of being monitored by several nurses, and the anesthesiologist who I’m sure was a little worried about his behind if anything should go wrong. Dr. Thurston delivered Ava and he was fantastic. After 15 minutes of pushing, I got to help pull Ava up and into my arms. What an amazing feeling. My beautiful daughter was born at 5:52 am, weighing in at 6 pounds, 14 ounces—exactly like her big brother.

Both labors I remember so vividly—even the smallest of details. It’s funny how certain moments in time are engrained in your mind forever. I cannot wait to see how the labor for this baby goes...because as we all know each and every child is different. I can’t wait for the wonderful rollercoaster of it!