Catching up on the new addition

So many people have asked me how labor and the delivery went. So here's my story:
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I had worked Saturday afternoon from 8:30am to about 1:00pm. The usual, giving vaccines, treating basic skin infections, typical quick appointments for a Saturday. However, as always, even at 9 months pregnant I'm still very active. On my feet all day shuffling from exam room to exam room. Bending over to look in large dog ears, sitting on the floor while a technician is restraining a mildly aggressive dog as I draw blood from his leg, getting out of breath while simply trying to explain what skin allergies are, etc. Doing the smallest tasks at 9 months was effort. But this is probably a good reason I only gained about 28 lbs.

I made it through the day, which was 2 weeks before my due date. Now, Allison's birthday is July 25th and my due date was July 24th. So we wanted to make sure she had a great 3rd birthday party so we planned to have it 2 weeks before my due date...we thought that should be plenty of time.

Allison was originally due on July 30th 2007. I was on summer break in between 3rd and 4th year of vet school (yes we planned it). She ended up being due toward the end of break and my next rotation started 3 weeks after my due date. We hoped to go early but never did, so we scheduled an induction 5 days before she was due. We checked in to the hospital at 9pm the night before and they got us all settled in. At 6 am they started the pitocin drip. She wasn't born until about 8:30pm. So we figured this time around would be similar, but we would just wait for me to go into labor.

So that Saturday late afternoon was Allison's 3rd birthday party. It was really great and she got to enjoy the party to the end. We joked how I made it and didn't go into labor during her birthday party. I then said, "Ok I'm ready now. I made it through the last thing I wanted to do."

Then Monday (my day off) during the day I kinda felt weird all day long. I got a few goosebump chill episodes, felt really tired all day even though I slept, and my Braxton Hicks contractions were becoming more noticeable, but still about one an hour or so. I took a long bubble bath and just relaxed for a while then went to bed early.

Sometime in the middle of the night I got another contraction that felt no stronger than the ones I had been having but it woke me up. I thought that was odd. I looked at the clock and it was 3:55am. I rolled over and went back to sleep. Then it happened again....4:15am....ok this was annoying...and I went back to sleep. Then a 3rd time....4:35am. Ok they were both 20 minutes apart. Is that a pattern? So I laid there WIDE AWAKE and stared at the clock. 4:55am and here it comes...another contraction. That's when I patted Greg to wake up. I told him I've had 4 contractions and they were all 20 minutes apart, I didn't know if it was anything because they didn't feel stronger than what I've been feeling for 2 months. So he said tell me your next one. And it was 16 minutes later. He said, "I'm getting in the shower now. Call Katie to come over." He then got a notepad and told me to tell him each one.

So I called the doctor's office and at this point I think it was 5:30am. She said it sounds like active labor and to call back when they are 5 to 6 minutes apart but get ready to go to the hospital. I still was in denial bc they didn't feel that strong and I was 11 days early. But I got ready and packed up my stuff and Allison's overnight bag for going to Grandma's for a few days.

At one point I said to Greg, "I don't think this is really labor because these contractions don't hurt that much". I then opened the refrigerator to get a drink of water. Now we've had a bottle of Mumm's Champagne in the door of the refrigerator for 2 weeks to take to the hospital with us. And as soon as I said that and opened the door the shelf that the champagne was sitting in pops out and the bottle comes clanking down on the floor and rolls and stops at my feet. --Ok. The refrigerator is telling me...Get your champagne and go to the hospital! And then the last 3 contractions were about 7 minutes apart. So I call the dr back and said, "Either we cant count very well or my contractions just jumped to 7 minutes apart." She said, you better go the hospital now if you are progressing that fast.

So Katie (my technician from work/babysitter/neighbor) comes over at 6:00am and crashes on our couch until my parents (who live almost an hour away) could come and get Allison and we wouldn't have to wake her up then. And we are off to the hospital!

We arrive at about 6:30am and get triaged in. They strap me to all the machines and verify that my contractions are 5 minutes apart. Then she does an exam and I'm already 3-4 cm dilated! She says, "Let's get you in the birthing suite...looks like we are having a baby here this morning.".

Woohoo! I was SO excited. So they get me checked in and I'm waiting on the dr to arrive. She gets there for my exam about 9am. She checks me and I'm now almost 6 cm! Still 5 minute contractions. She says let's get this moving along and she breaks my water. She tells me if I want an epidural I better do it now or I might lose my window of opportunity. Well what are we waiting for then! Get the anesthesiologist in here! So then my contractions were 2 minutes apart and were HELL. They were like 4 times stronger than before. I then got to briefly experience true labor. No thank you. The anesthesiologist arrived and explained the whole epidural thing to me. Being as how I've had one before with Allison and I've actually placed epidurals in dogs before I was comfortable and said let's do it. She placed it and at first I wasn't completely numb on my right side. So I told her that I thought it was a little too low in my dural space bc I wasn't feeling full coverage in my right leg. So she retracted it just a tad and it was perfect.

The nurse then checked me again and at this point it was about 11:00am. She said I was fully dilated and ready to go and she could feel her head. She said it was time to push and called the entourage in. Now everyone arrives but the doctor. I guess she went back across the street to her office to see a few appointments. !! Arg !! So we wait for her to come back with was like 20 minutes or so. I'm just hanging out with 4 nurses waiting to push. Then somehow that I'm a vet comes up. Then they ask me all these questions about dogs and C-sections and labor which actually distracted me so it worked out ok. I told them that I only pushed for 20 minutes with Allison. This gave them something to heckle me about.

Then in walks the doctor. "Next contraction you are going to start pushing!" She says. And so we did. And with each contraction the nurses told me how long I had been pushing and my time left to beat to push less than Allison. It actually gave me a goal and you know how competitive I can be! Well, after about the 6th contraction at 14 minutes of pushing Kennedy was born at 11:49am. I actually got to watch it in a mirror, which I never got to see it from that perspective with Allison. It was a little disturbing but quit amazing at the same time. I actually got to see her little face before she took her first breath. She was immediately placed on my belly and she was screaming and clenching my gown.
It was just as amazing as Allison being born. After about 20 minutes and she had done her first good feeding they let the family back in. Allison was there at the hospital by that point with my parents. She runs in the room and meets her baby sister for the first time. She said, "Her ears are so tiny mommy. Was this baby in your belly? She's not in your belly anymore? Did she come out your belly button? Let me see your belly. Can I pet her? I lub my baby sister kennedy so much mommy." And she petted her head, and touched her little ears, and kissed her cheek. It was perfect. Kennedy checked out great and healthy and by the afternoon I was just relaxing in the room only on some Motrin for mild discomfort. We couldn't believe it happened so fast. By the next afternoon we were going to be transferred to the smaller room unless we just wanted to go home. We opted to go home and by 5pm the next day we were relaxing in our own home.

And that's the story of how Kennedy entered the world.