I have told this story so many times I am under the delusion that I will never forget the details of it, but I know from experience that that is not the case. I will, in fact, forget some of the facts, feelings and faces if I do not write it down.
Contractions suck. Pure and simple. And I had them for days. And only made it to 2 cm dilated for it. Totally not worth it. There was the night when I was contracting for about 4 hours. They were perfectly timed at 4 mins apart. When I finally said, "yeah, call dad in the middle of the night and tell him to come hang with the kids so we can go to the hospital". About 4 minutes after my dad showed up, the contractions stopped completely. haha. very funny, kid. That was the day that we wanted the baby to make an appearance because we thought the birthday of 11-22-11 would be cool. And we were deluded enough to think we got a vote on the date...so much for thinking. After that I wanted (and was told very frankly) that I could not deliver for days because then it would just be inconvenient. You see, we were in the midst of Thanksgiving week. So I did as I was told and only contracted a little here and there for the next few days.
There were a few doozies on Thanksgiving Day where Joe simply turned to me and said "if this kid makes me burn the turkey there will be issues." So I crossed my legs and sat like a nice young lady that was not in pain. We had a lovely Thanksgiving. Joe is still an incredible cook and showed off his brining abilities with a fantastic bird, scrumptious cranberry dressing and his always fabulous cheesy mashed potatoes. I made stuffing from a box, steamed some green beans and stayed out of the way. My mom made rolls, sweet potatoes and pies. We had way too much food, but it was good eatin!
Since this child was obviously not on board with it's fathers and my idea of the ideal birthday I figured I'd try to wait it out until December anyway (much cooler birthstone). But again, my vote didn't count. On Saturday night, actually Sunday the 27th early morning about 1am I started having really hard contractions. I didn't wake Joe because he needed his sleep. They stopped by about 3:30 anyway and I was able to go back to sleep. Once again, just a few hours reminder of how much I do not have control over my own body.
There is also an important side note here. About a week previous to this Joe had completely thrown his back out. I mean out. Like he was on the floor. out. couldn't move. It was bad. 3 Trips a chiropractor and finally to our doc who prescribed steroids! for a week finally resolved the issue. But it was bad. I was more worried about how I would get Joe to hospital if labor actually came. There was a time that I was sure that he would wrestle me for the epidural once we got there too. It wasn't pretty, but luckily the kid stayed put through the worst of it. And for that, we thank you, little one.
Anyway, I had hard contractions, but they stopped. I got up Sunday morning needing to pee and thinking that I had already somewhat peed myself. Awesomeness of pregnancy. I waddled into the bathroom and more gushed. I had experienced this before with Kiya. My water had broken. I called back to Joe in the bedroom that my water had broken and he needed to call dad. I knew I had a few minutes while we waited so I jumped in the shower. This was a good idea. The water felt good and I got to feel like I was somewhat cleaned. The problem was that my contractions were super hard and really close together. After I had stood for as long as I could I got out and we headed to the hospital. The ride was not pretty. I had leaned my chair back and just braced my arms and legs against whatever was there and had hard contractions about every 2 mins. I was yelling the whole time. I'm sure it was hell on Joe who sped the whole way. We made it there and I told Joe to get a wheelchair because I could not walk. We got into the hospital about 7:30. It was no secret that I was in hard labor. I begged for an epidural and they said I needed an IV first. Fine, I thought. Not so fine, it turns out.
Since my water broke at 6:30 am. I didn't eat or drink a thing so I was REALLY dehydrated. So much so that 2 nurses took about 6-8 shots and finding a vein that wouldn't "roll". I was close to killing. Contractions were about a minute apart and honestly the urge to push was getting to real. I didn't want a natural birth. I'm not that much of a woman. I like medical advancement. Joe was trying to fill out paperwork too and I wouldn't let him because I needed him everyone of those minutes to get me through the pain. After both wrists, hands and elbow joints had been tried and bruised to the point that I looked like a heroin addict they asked the anesthesiologist to try. Thankfully, he got my vein then promptly told me to sit up and rushed my body with drugs. God bless this man.
Once I had my epi my doc checked me. As he was checking me he was telling me that he still had to prep me for a c-section since I had had one with Garrin. That made me mad and I just started pushing. The doc kept saying how low the baby was and I was bound and determined to not hear anymore about the possibility of surgery. It worked. When the doc checked to see how dilated I was he said "well, you're a 7, no 8...well 9! ok, you can push, but give us a second!". The nurses all scattered to get equipment that was needed and my doc hurriedly threw on his protective gown and gloves. The epidural that was given to me had worked and had worked so thoroughly that I was completely numb from the waist down. All my others had allowed me to still feel the pressure of the contractions but I think the anesthesiologist had taken pity on my and just dosed me to the highest degree. It was weird to not feel anything but since I had done this all before I just tried to squeeze what I thought were the right muscles. Turns out they were. About 4 or 5 pushes later a little boy was placed on my tummy. It was 8:35 am. He was perfect and I had such a flood of relief and joy.
He was 7 pounds 6 ounces and 21 inches long. My biggest baby. As they cleaned and checked him Joe told me that under the light his hair was almost a reddish brown. His vitals were great, he was doing fabulously. I had torn a little bit and was getting some stitches as the nurse told me that he had some "road rash" on his face from his fast entrance too.
When everyone had left and it was just Joe and I we looked at our beautiful baby boy and both knew that of the list of names that we had, he would be Calton. We actually did take some time and spell out all the ways this name could be and mutually decided that we liked it best this way. His middle name is Floyd which is both Joe's middle name and his fathers.
He is a very sweet boy who loves to be cuddled and swaddled which is a first for my kids. He took to nursing automatically and has adapted to outside life so seamlessly that it's almost unfair.
I was worried most specifically about how Kiya would react but she has taken on the mother role so well that I have never been more pleased to be wrong. The boys love him too. It's so great to have him here. We are beyond blessed and I am totally in love.
