I hope you're ready....I've been waiting almost 4 months for this post...
I woke up at around 7am Saturday morning after a good restful nights sleep. I look over at my wife and smile.
She does not smile back. The sporadic cramping she was having late Friday had continued through the night, limiting her ability to get any quality sleep.
So she made me pancakes. It's what she does.
At about 9am, she decides to start calling these cramps 'contractions', and we start logging what time it is when each starts. They seem pretty regular at that time, 10-11 minutes apart.
I look at my list of things I still thought I had a week to do. It was a good list. Off I went to finish off all those little nursery things I had been putting off....
Just after lunch the contractions were 7 minutes apart. I was put on notice, get my stuff done, cause we'll be at the Hospital tonight.
I finish hanging a Bambi picture and go post on 2+2.
Just after 3pm, she thinks her water broke. She felt a light trickle down her leg. She calls her doc and is told to head on in to the Hospital, doc will meet us there.
Contractions are 5 minutes apart. I post an update here, and start packing the car.
We're in the car no more than 30 seconds when her water really breaks, and by 'breaks' I mean 'gushes'. She freaks out. I turn the car around and go back home so she can change her now soaked clothes. Good thing she brought a towel to sit on.
Get to the hospital somewhere around 4pm, in birhing room somewhere around 5 or 5:30. She's starting to get some really painful ones now, so our focus is getting her some drugs. They can't do an epidural until her doc examines her, but doc hasn't arrived yet. This is bad, and unfortunately, a precursor of things to come. I really don't like seeing my wife in pain and having no ability to ease it. It is hard on both of us.
Doc arrives, examines, OKs, and in come the anesthesia guys. Wife has started crying during some of the contractions, I do my best to console her and insist it will all be better soon. The needle goes in her back, everyone agrees it's in a good spot, and in go the drugs. They say it could take 10-15 minutes to kick in.
So for the next 15 minutes, we wait through 3 or 4 increasingly powerful contractions, just waiting for the pain to ease up. Wife's contractions are now 2 minutes apart and over 1 minute long.
It doesn't. The epidural isn't working. When asked to rate this pain on a 1-10 scale, wife calls it a 9.
TO add some reference to that comment, I'll point out that my wife has passed gallstones before. She called gallstones a 7 compared to where she was at that moment.
So another span of agony while they pull out the catheter and try to put it in another spot. This one seems to take, and my wife starts to be relieved. I think this is a good time for me to grab some food from the hospital caf. Her mom and sister come in and relieve me.
3 piece chicken tenders with BBQ sauce and a large cup of coffee. I'm heading back up within 30 minutes.
When I walked back in, the look on wife's face crushed me, she was in hysterical pain. Epidural #2 wasn't working. The hospital's Head of Anesthesiology (HoA) was on his way over from another area. Another 20 or so minutes of my wife begging for relief. There was nothing we could do. I have never seen someone in so much pain.
HoA arrived and was going to try a 3rd, but also offered a spinal somethin-or-other which would eliminate all sensation below the waist for about 90 minutes. I told him to get option #2 in gear as fast as he could move. He moved fast. SHe was pain free within 2 contractions. HoA is now on our Christmas Card List. Wife relaxes. Must have been around 8pm now.
At 9:30, they are expectig the drug to start wearing off, so HoA does a 3rd epidural. He uses a different spot and earns his money by getting it on the first try. Wife still pain free.
At 10:20 wife's body decides it's time to start pushing.
At 10:42 on January 27th, 2007, we catch the first glimpse of our baby girl. It as only a nickel sized piece of her gray, hairy head, but it was absolutely amazing.
Leah finally made her way out six minutes after midnight. She is the most beautiful thing I have ever seen. I cannot believe just how much she means to me.
Yes, I have a large melon, and thankfully she's got her mother's nose.