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Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Mack's Birth Story


The monumental day that forever changed Red's life...

Yes, the day his little brother Mack was born; or at least the day we thought he was going to be born.

On July 31, 2015, I woke up and had something quite embarrassing happen--well, that's what I thought.  I thought I had peed the bed.  I was slightly dazed since sleeping soundly is only for the very lucky when you are 39 weeks pregnant.  There was some umm, "pee" on the bed sheets.  Great.  How sexy.  So I discreetly got out of bed and went to the bathroom.  Josh was already getting ready for work, so I didn't say anything.  You know, trying to keep the magic alive.  I laid back down in bed and tried to rest a little bit longer.  Again, sleep was quite near impossible.  So the "pee" incident happened again right before Josh left for work.  Still. Not. Saying. Anything.  Oh yeah, to make it better, I was supposed to work that day at my waitressing job.  


Right before we left for the hospital.  Possibly worst picture ever except
my one school ID.
So, I decided I should probably start the day.  I got up and wasn't feeling too hot (we do have central air after all to keep our house daisy fresh).  I tried to get my day underway.  Then the thought occurred; "is this my water breaking"?  Like the true millennial I am, I had researched tons on what it was like to go into labor.  I had read good birth stories, horrific birth stories, attended prenatal class (which was a waste of time and $65), but was this actually it?  I didn't know.  Again, I had made no mention of these things to my husband before he left for work.  Somewhere around this time, I called my husband, the doctor, and work to call off.  I tried to be real discreet with work since I wasn't sure if I was in labor.  Thankfully I spoke with a male manager who wasn't really reading into things and just told him that I was having back pain (which I WAS) and wouldn't be in to work today.  The doctor told me to go to the hospital, and they would do a test to see if my water had actually broken, and my husband, of course was FREAKING OUT that I didn't mention anything to him before he went to work.  Hey, I wasn't sure if it was labor and didn't want him to waste a personal day if it wasn't.  Clearly, I was only thinking of him.  So I got a shower, packed the last few things in the hospital bags, and the husband came home.  Off we went.

We pulled into the parking lot around 10 am and park just about as far away as possible : / and head in.  We didn't take our bags because I was scared to death of being those people that have to take the walk of shame home without a baby.  We went to maternity, and they started running their tests.  Guess what?  Indeed my water had broke.  So we started the admission process.  During this time, my husband had to be somewhat sneaky because he and my mom work at the same place.  Again, we didn't want to sound the alarms that the first grandchild was coming to either family in case he was in fact not-but he was, so it was time to make the call or text-who really remembers?  I looked at my phone once we got into the room and had about 5 text messages from my female co-workers who were all asking if I was in labor.  I had the pleasure of letting them know that I was.  I also promptly text my boss and let her know I would not be at work the next 2 days.  She was ok with that!  Then the wait started.

You know how they always encourage people to walk the halls?  That would be better if it didn't take 2 minutes to make a full lap.  I mean how many times can you walk around the same halls while trying not to disturb the tired mamas?  Josh decided that they should have a sort of outdoor walkway or something like that connected to the maternity ward to make it better.  I agreed whole heartedly. Yeah, we walked the halls maybe 10 minutes at the most.  But I wanted to do my part to get this party started, so I walked circles in the room.  Even more constricting and boring.  I should mention that during this time I didn't really feel any contractions.  My back hurt, but that was it.  

Around 11 am, I started feeling contractions.  So we waited.  I tried to walk around the room or do anything that would make this process speed up.  It didn't.  Around 2 pm, the contractions were starting to be quite painful, so when the nurse, who coincidentally we knew her brother, came in around 3, she gave me some medication-Nubain.  Ah, much better, for a while.  She told me I couldn't have anything for another 3 hours.  So the Nubain worked it's magic for about 2 hours, then it stopped.  That 3rd hour was difficult and breathing doesn't work, or what I suspect more is that I'm mentally weak.  So she came back in at 6 pm, and, praise the Lord, I could get an epidural-known as the nectar of the anesthesiologist gods.  They gave me some other drug to help with the pain until the doctor could get there, but it did squat.  

So at 6 pm I was declared ready for the epidural; any guesses on what time the process started? 8:30 pm.  Yeah, not the happiest of campers.  Remember, my water broke sometime before 5:30 am, so it's already been a long day.  But he came and worked his magic.

Josh came back in the room, and my cousin Emily was with him.  At this point, the nurse shift change had occurred, and I had a new nurse.  

Shortly after my epidural, all heck broke lose.

Well Mr. Mack had decided that he was tired of waiting, kind of, and started moving down.  However, my body wasn't going to let him go without a fight.  The umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck, and his heart rate immediately started dropping.  The nurse hit a button and 15 people were in the room within seconds.  Well, they got that all squared away, and I ended up resting on all fours for about the next 3 hours.  Meanwhile, I had the shakes like crazy.  I wasn't scared though.  Throughout the whole situation, I had a sense of calm that God bestowed upon me.  Before the nurse and midwife left the room, they told me for sure that this would be a July baby.  Ha.

So I "slept," lets call it semi-resting, on my hands and knees for about the next 3 hours.  When I decided to turn over, the epidural had totally taken affect, and I felt nothing from the waist down.  I started to turn, and Josh immediately caught me and hit the call button for the nurse.  They helped me turn over, but the little Mr. was still having heart rate troubles.  So they decided to have the on call OBGYN look at my scans and see if I should have a C-section.  Let me say, I didn't care how I gave birth, well I wanted it to be as painless as possible, I just wanted the baby.  At this point it was about 2 am, and we were ready for a baby.  So we waited and waited.  About an hour later, they came to check on us and gave us the news that the doctor didn't think a C-section was necessary yet.  Couldn't they have given us that news like an hour ago so we weren't getting our hopes up?!  Oh well.

Time progressed and finally we started the delivery process.  Mack was a little trickster, so it took a while.  To spare all the gory details, he was delivered with a vacuum assist, and the doctor cut the cord around his neck as soon as his head was out.  Then my sweet boy had arrived.


Remember, 4:30 am, in labor almost a day.

Mack Elliot was born on Saturday, August 1, 2015 around 4:20 am.  He was 6 pounds 5 ounces and 19.25 inches long.  Perfection.

During our stay, some of the most wonderful visitors (my mom and sister) brought me good coffee, Trader Joe's Unexpected Cheddar (Ah-MAZE-ing), and Coke!  My mother-in-law also brought cookies that everyone enjoyed!

Since I was in labor almost 24 hours since my water broke, we had to spend an extra day in the hospital.  We came home Monday afternoon to start this new round of our life.

Red has loved his little brother ever since except for when he goes on long crying jags.



Coming home outfit!
Not thrilled about the car seat...





So that was the day Olivia truly made a life. Haha, you see what I did there?

1 comment:

  1. I really enjoyed your story! Such a wonderful
    and interesting experience! Your baby is adorable!!!

    www.lesleyandeve.com

    ReplyDelete

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