Two weeks later...the looong story of Daniel's Arrival

Baby D's Arrival

Background:

The past three weeks were filled with sporadic painful contractions. Tuesday early morning was the same as many recent nights, minimal sleep between the contractions. If I get a two hour stent of sleep that is good. I spent the night tossing and turning but refusing to look at the clock. Aidan had Christmas Chapel in the morning and we were really excited to go see it. The contractions were still coming sporadic(but other signs of labor were brewing however, it still could mean labor was a few days away). We made breakfast and got ready to head to preschool. I was so happy I could go. Afterwards I had errands ot run but asked Andrew to come with Logan and me. I was STILL having the sporadic contractoins and we thought this might be one of the last times we both had time with Logan while he was the Baby of the Family.

By naptime the contractions had stopped for a while. They would come anywhere from 10-45 minutes apart. I decided to try to nap just in case this was the start of the real thing. My Mom called to "see how I was feeling" and after that Kate called to check in too. I tried to get a little rest but the Boys were up 10-15 minutes later (Aidan with hives..AGAIN!).

After naps, I packed up their travel bag "just in case." I did not want to be too hopeful that this was going to be "the day/night" but I wanted to be prepared. I also needed to figure out what to do for dinner I had plans to get out some chicken to thaw but as lame as it sounds it was too cold in the garage and I did not want to go out there. I folded laundry and pondered why on earth Aidan had hives again. I decided on Breakfast for dinner because the Boys usually ALWAYS eat bacon. I thought we had some open but I couldn't find it (turns out in was right in front of my face) and a frozen pack which wouldn't thaw in time. I texted Andrew and asked him if he could pick some up on the way home. Turns out he never responded because he was super busy/things at work were falling apart and he ended up coming home SUPER SUPER SUPER late. Needless to say the Boys and us had dinner at 8 pm. Yeah...right at bedtime AND they needed baths. I was STILL having sporadic contractions of the same intensity I had for weeks and I would say they hurt but I felt like I was just being a Baby. I haven't slept well in weeks. Andrew did bathtime with the Boys (like he always does) and I got laundry put away and moved around. I was moving slow and pretty tired. We got Logan in bed and Andrew told him, "Goodnight, you may be a Big Brother soon!"

It was 9 pm now and we moved onto the nightly ritual with Aidan which finishes with one of us having to lay with him for "just a few minutes." Tonight he requested for "Mommy lay with you" so he did his potty break and I layed with him. We talked about Baby Daniel (which Aidan patted my Belly) and went through telling him he and Logan would have a sleep over with Grandma and Grandpa just like when Logan was born and they would come visit Mom and Dad at the hopsital to meet Baby Daniel and he would go back to their house and we all would meet back home to live together in a few days. He like normal asked to go sleep at Grandma's right away. Meanwhile, I had a pretty painful contraction and I decided that I needed to get out of his bed because I did not want to lay there with him wiggling anymore. I said, "Good night" and went downstairs with Andrew.

We cleaned up the kitchen and watched TV. The contractions were still all over the place but still hurt like they had been maybe a little more, I wasn't really sure and was looking for a "for sure" sign. We headed up to our room with the intent of folding laundry and maybe present wrapping if we felt up to it. I sat on my exercise ball and tried to help fold laundry. The contractions were still pretty darn sporadic. I tried to sit next to Andrew but it was super uncomfortable to sit on the bed and back on the ball I went.

Around 11:30p we decided to try and get some sleep but it seemed like another sleepless night for me. I couldn't get comfortable to lie down and paced a bit, tried to sleep while sitting on the ball and resting my head on the bed. Andrew was snoring in minutes. I tossed and turned and finally went downstairs to get my iPod to fidget with. I hopped on Facebook, played solitare and started playing with the contraction timer. I was having a hard time concentrating but thought it was sleep deprivation and some distraction with the pain. I watched the next two hours roll by.

1:45 am I woke Andrew up because I needed to squeeze his hand. It was hurting enough that just my hands resting on my legs increased the pain. Andrew let me squeeze his hand and then got out of bed and looked at me and said, " I think we need ot make some phone calls." I apologized for acting like a baby and complaining how it hurt. I called my Parents and did not have a contraction the entire phone call, I told them if they needed to take their time and wake up (It was 1:59a..as later noted by my Dad) just so long they were here in the hour. I hung up and had a contraction that I couldn't talk through ( a sign the doctors say you need to call at...) Andrew paged the Doctor and spoke to her and called his Parents to let them know what was going on. We changed clothes and Andrew took our bags downstairs, we got things as ready as we could and a loooooooong 15 minutes later my Parents pulled up(2:20a). I told Mom and Dad, "I WANT DRUGS..THIS HURTS!" Mom said, "I don't think it will be long after you get to the hospital that Daniel will be born." Andrew and I walked out the door and had to wait getting in the car because of another contraction.

We started the adventure. We hit a big intersection and the light turned green. A minute or so down that road I started squeezing Andrew's hand. Turns out my squeezing made him drive faster. Not much later I thought I was about to use the bathroom on my self. Hmm...next thing we know there are blue and white strobe lights flashing in our mirror. Andrew pulled over in a right hand turn lane. We sat there for what felt like forever and I started to panic that I was going to be "one of those ladies" you hear about on the news who has their baby in their car and the fear that the may Officer not believe us.

Then someone knocks on the back passenger side of the car and Andrew rolled down my window. Andrew and I both start babbling to the officer. Andrew was apologizing for speeding and explaining that I was in labor. I was rambling about my third Baby and he is coming really fast and tears were welling up in my eyes from the panic. The officers eyes grew large and he told us to go. (We were still 7.5 miles from the hospital. Later we found out the traffic stop was recorded at 2:36am) We pulled away from the officer and I grabbed my cell to update my parents.

Mom tried to calm me down because at this point she and I were realizing that the baby would be here soon. It was a long fast ride down a curvy road. I began making a horrible grunting noise and this was no help for poor Andrew. We turned onto the road the hopsital is on and Mom was saying to go to the ER. (You have to drive around the hospital in order to get to the birth center and she knew we wouldn't make it.) I hung up with Mom and told Andrew, "ER, GO TO THE ER!" Well, they were no help! We pulled into the ambulance bay and Andrew went to the first doors he saw in which he was stared at by everyone at the nursing statio and no one came to see. He ran to another entrance and the security guard told him to get back in his car and drive around the hospital. Andrew explained that the Baby was coming NOW! No help. A women with a badge in plain clothes came running to help. She opened the set of doors we were parked in front of. She ran inside and came out with a wheel chair. FINALLY a security guard came running over to us. I thought, "OH THANK GOD HELP!" As it turns out he was running over to YELL at Andrew to move his car. Andrew said he peeled a wheel out of the ambulance bay and went and parked. He came back to the security desk at the ER and asked, "where can I go to be with my wife?" The stellar guard was trying to get him to fill out paperwork for ER admittance. The lady who helped us yelled at the guard and told him, 'NO HE WILL NOT!" and told Andrew to run as fast as he could down the hallway to the birth center.

MEANWHILE, I am in the wheel chair entering the ER they are asking me my doctors name, how far a long I am and if my water has broken. I answer and finsh with, "No." and with impecable timing is the SPLASH of my water breaking like a balloon all over the ER floor right in front of all the patients in the beds. In the chaos I could see big eyes staring at me from all the beds. Two people were with me a girl pushing the chair and a man by her side and we started RUNNING. I was rigid in the chair, had one hand underneath me and was almost standing in the foot plates of the chair. I kept saying, "OH GOD" and " I am SO SORRY." We were running down a long corridor with windows to my right and I start informing them that the Baby was crowning (we sped up) and not long later telling them his head was out. I see a hand coming down in front of me to confirm and they start running even faster. We blew through the birth center triage and someone said, "HERE IS A BED!" Somone yelled, "NO!" and wheeled me straight into a delivery room. I was swarmed by people they pulled my pants to my knees and someone bare handed grabbed Daniel. In this instant the umbilical cord snapped and they are yelling for clamps and there is a gory blood bath from the cord. The took Daniel who was definitely not pink by any means and within seconds he was screaming. My body was shaking uncontrollably they helped me to the bed and the OB walks in. A few seconds later Andrew comes running into the room. I had not even realized that he was not with me the whole way. As it turns out we had only the camera on Andrew's cell. The OB instructed drop jaw Andrew to take a picture and if he did not have his phone she would take one and send it to us. We stayed in the recovery room with wonderful nurses and the OB while I continued to shake and ask a thousand questions. They said the shakes were from adrenaline. The shakes eventually subsided and about and hour later I realized I could unclench my fists and relax my legs. The nurses decided that Daniel's time of birth was 2:50am.

So, yes, that is the long drawn out story. Very sitcom/movie like in every way. Our pretty little plan went out the window (like normal) and I was most definitely flying by the seat of my pants...