Eli's Birth Story, Part I

Like I said, this whole having a newborn in the house thing has made it pretty difficult to get things done. Today's post is the first of what will probably be a 3 part story. I planned on doing it in one, but I want to capture all of the minutia while I can remember it. In blue I'm inserting the email updates Kenny sent to some family and friends along the way.

Saturday (the 20^th) Kenny and I were both pretty grumpy and sad about not having the munchkin here yet. We tried everything we’d heard might help bring labor along for the second or third time. We went to Home Depot and walked laps. We ate pineapple, spicy food, and leftover eggplant parmagiana. Sunday morning I woke up around 7:00. I was feeling some pain. I’d been getting excited about pain for several weeks at this point. I started timing this pain and poked Kenny when I realized the pain was happening about every 10 minutes. He mumbled something and then rolled over and went back to sleep. About an hour later we got up and sprang into action. Kenny began vacuuming and dusting. He froze bananas, and boiled beets. I bathed and shaved my legs. We found a program online to time contractions, and I parked myself in front of some HGTV. We called our parents. Contractions were getting to be about 7 minutes apart by midday. Kenny made some macaroni, hotdogs, and applesauce for me. He made the unfortunate choice of macaroni and chili for himself. That meal ended up being the last food I would willingly eat. Kenny took a nap and changed the sheets. I watched several more hours of HGTV.

By 5:00 contractions were about 5 minutes apart. We were supposed to go to the hospital when contractions were 3-4 minutes apart for an hour. I called the midwife to let her know we’d be coming in later. We decided to go for a walk to help things along. The contractions started to get closer together and more intense. They required counter-pressure on my back from Kenny. I would grab a wall and ask for help then yell at Kenny until he was pressing in the right spot.

date Sun, Feb 21, 2010 at 8:21 PM

subject This is not a test!

So we are in labor and going to the hospital in the next half hour.

Wish us luck!

More info to come!

Love,

Kenny and Emily

We were of course having a bit of a snowstorm. Kenny made arrangements for the neighbor to walk the dogs before bed, cleared the car of snow, grabbed our millions of bags and we were on our way! It was exciting and a big relief to be going to the hospital. Because of swine flu restrictions we’d never been able to tour the birthing facility, and I was looking forward to finally seeing the place (among other things ;-).

Our midwife met us at the front desk. They put me on the monitors for 20 minutes, made me answer lots of questions, and checked me. I was not dilated enough—only 2 cm (though that was up from the .5 I was at my appointment a few days before). Sooo, we got sent home with instructions to take a warm bath, maybe take some Tylenol PM or Benadryl and try to get some sleep. That was super discouraging. The thought of taking my contractions back into the car knowing that I’d have to come back later through the snow was a bummer.

date Sun, Feb 21, 2010 at 10:17 PM

subject Update 01: The Drive Back Home

So we went and did the hospital thing. As it turns out we are back home and confused. Emily is 2cm dilated, so they sent us home. I think we will be back in 4-18 hours, but we will see.

Time to TRY to get some sleep and maybe have a snack.

Love you all,

Kenny and Emily

We got home, and I took the bath. The contractions continued to be pretty strong. I’d shout for help from Kenny each time they came on and he’d either press on my lower back or for some reason raising my leg at a 90 degree angle seemed to help so he’d do that. We got into bed and tried to give the whole sleeping thing a shot. I listened to a guided relaxation CD from my Hypnobirth CD. Sleep did not occur. Finally around 3 or 4:00 Kenny had our midwife, Libby, paged. I felt like if we waited any longer I wouldn’t be able to handle the time in the car without the counterpressure. And back to the hospital we went!