I wanted to write down Bryce's birth story while it was still fresh in my mind, although I doubt I'll ever forget it! I can't believe it's already been a week.
On Friday, April 8th Chris woke up at about 6 a.m. and I was feeling a little funny. As I sat with Chris eating breakfast I noticed I was feeling tightening in my stomach every few minutes. I was on high alert towards the end of the pregnancy since Chris' labor happened so quickly. I called Conan right away to give him the heads up (and make sure he was sufficiently nervous all day). I remembered Chevy was coming into town for the weekend so I called her (and texted and emailed... sorry for the overload Chev!). I called the doctor at 9 a.m. to see what to do, and then waited. For 3 hours. During that time I started trying to think of everything that needed to be done before the baby got here. I paid bills, packed a hospital bag, did laundry, moved furniture. Let's not tell the OB about that one. Chris took advantage of my rather scattered state and pulled out literally every toy he owned. We had all of his stuffed animals in a fort. Books all over his bed. Games on the couch. I would have taken a picture, but if Conan saw it I think he'd make us do some serious toy purging. At any rate, the OB didn't call after 3 hours so I called back. I talked to the nurse, who was relaying my messages to the doctor and she said to go to the hospital. At this point I was in very little pain, I had just moved a table for goodness sake, so I told her no thank you. The OB got on the phone, and after we chatted for a bit and she heard how close we are to the hospital (a 5 minute walk) she told me I could wait at home.
In the meantime, Chevy and I had chatted and she said she'd be able to get here in the early afternoon. I put Chris down for a nap and waited. I stopped having any regular contractions, so I thought I might have just been going crazy. Chevy got to our place and we made dinner plans. We met up with Conan and Tom (Chevy's boyfriend) at a place a few blocks from our apartment. On our walk over I started to feel the little baby contractions again, but nothing too bad and I certainly still enjoyed my Friend of a Farmer dinner. I fell asleep pretty easily that night, but woke up at about 3 a.m. with some contractions. I went back to sleep, but by 5 am they were more regular. I laid in bed until Chris woke up. I still wasn't in lots of pain, and I decided we needed to get this going because I didn't want to be in labor for the next 2 weeks. We took a walk to get some apple juice (that's what I felt like at first, of course I ended up also needing a chocolate croissant). The walk helped some, but I realized if I laid on my side I started feeling contractions 3 minutes apart. I started to get nervous and called the doctor. She said to come on into the hospital. Our walk to hospital was fine and I barely felt any contractions. When we got there they put me in triage. The OB at the hospital checked me and said he still wasn't able to see if I was dilated (it's been that way through my whole pregnancy). My contractions weren't coming very often when they hooked me up to the machine, so he said I should go home and take some Tylenol PM and get some rest. I was disappointed. I had gotten it in my head that we were going to meet the baby that day. He left to go talk to the OB from my office that was on call. She came back to do one last check and said, "You're not going home, you're 6 cm dilated". I may have done a fist pump.
I'm not sure about the time frame on anything once we got to the hospital. I know we got there at 9 a.m. and everything after that is a blur. They put us in a room and hooked me up to all of the monitors. I was feeling stronger contractions, but they were manageable. I had decided I didn't want an epidural before and at this point my nurse and doctor decided to tell me how excruciating it was about to be and that I should get one. I decided against it and they broke my water. Ouch. Within a minute my minor contractions turned into the worst pain ever. The contractions were about a minute apart, and like the nurse said, excruciating. Conan was an amazing coach. He helped me try to breathe calmly and get as comfortable as possible. Before long I felt like I needed to push and the OB said I was 10 cm dilated. A whole new type of pain. It seemed like an eternity, but Conan said I did about 10 pushes and he was out at 12:20 p.m. He had the sweetest little cry. They gave him right to me, all vernix-y and let me hold him for quite a while. It was the best feeling! He had lots of dark hair, the sweetest little lips, and the exact same chin as the LG. Even though he was 2 1/2 weeks early, he seemed to be ready. He even got a 9/9 on the Apgar! He wouldn't open his eyes for us until they took him to the nursery, but they are almost navy blue. He didn't have any eye brows or eye lashes yet, but he's been working on growing them this week. Right after it was over I said I would never deliver naturally again, but it's amazing what holding a sweet little newborn will make you forget. My recovery was really fast, and I can't help but think not having an epidural helped. We went home from the hospital the next day and Conan's been home all week. Even though we have a tiny newborn, I still feel like it's been a vacation. It's been great to have so much family time with our new addition. Chris loves being a big brother, and only occasionally (Ha!) has to be reminded to be gentle. We love Bryce to pieces and feel so blessed to have him in our family.
