First up: The Little Miss. She is pretty dang awesome. And she came into our lives on November 5, 2014. Remember, remember the 5th of November. I know some people really don't care to read other people's birth experiences, but I never did write this down anywhere. I really want to have it recorded though. So even though she turns 9 months old tomorrow (!) I'm going to try and write out as much as my mind will let me remember about actually giving birth to her.
I remember waking up on November 4th feeling different. Nothing was actually different from the day before (I was still extremely large and ready to pop) but I just felt different. It's hard to explain much more than that. I went to work teaching Kindergarten. We got through the day. I had after school tutoring with some of my kiddos. I remember as I was leaving school joking with some other teachers that they wouldn't see me the next day. That night for dinner I made a spicy corn chowder soup that was delicious. I made it a little extra spicy hoping that it might get some labor going or something. Jarom had a class at ASU that night and to save money on parking I would drop him off and then go hang out at my grandparent's house and then go back to pick him up. While I was at my grandparent's house I started having contractions. Nothing too intense, but definitely consistent contractions that were about 7-9 minutes apart. This was at about 6:30pm. When I picked Jarom up from class at about 7:30pm I made him drive the rest of the way home because it was starting to get uncomfortable during the contractions. I didn't feel like it was time to go to the hospital though. So we headed home to wait.
On the way to the hospital I texted my coworkers and let them know that I am headed to the hospital. I wasn't sure if this was it, but I knew it would be a late night and would want a substitute the next day. We got all checked in and I was dilated to about a 3 which is what I had been at my doctor's appointment earlier in the week. They told me to walk the halls for an hour and then they would check me again. So we started walking. Pretty soon we found a stairwell. I went up and down those stairs more times than I could count. But I could still walk through my contractions and I knew that wasn't a good sign. Our hour was up and I went back to get checked again. Still a 3. They told me the contractions were close enough together, just not strong enough. At this point though I thought the contractions were pretty dang strong. I also knew there was no way in heck I would be able to get any sleep with this going on. Thankfully (but apparently also surprisingly) they gave me a sleeping pill before sending us on our way.
We got home at about 2am and I was able to sleep for about 2 hours. I woke up at about 4am having pretty intense contractions. I tried soaking in the tub, laying in different positions, having Jarom rub my back (I had pretty bad back labor) but every 5-7 minutes I was in near tears. Jarom suggested a couple of times to maybe go back to the hospital, but I had this huge fear that they were going to send me home again and say that the contractions still weren't intense enough. And at this point the contractions were so intense that I didn't think I could take them getting any worse so I didn't want anyone telling me that they needed to get worse (super rational pregnancy brain right there).
At about 9:30am I told Jarom that I wanted to go on a walk to get the labor going (I was still in denial that I was actually in labor). This time I had to stop every time a contraction hit so our walk was pretty slow going. When we got to the end of the street my mom called to see how things were progressing (I had texted her earlier that morning). I couldn't even talk through the contractions and I was like crying at this point. She suggested that I go to the hospital. But I still had this irrational fear. But my doctor had said that if I ever thought I might have something going on but wasn't sure, I could go to the office and just get checked out. So I agreed to go to the doctor's office.
Jarom and I headed over there and when I told the lady why I was at the office without an appointment, she said that they would be able to squeeze me in in about 45 minutes. I said okay, then walked over by Jarom and then a contraction hit. I started crying through the contraction and the receptionist said, "Why don't you just head back right now." Ha! I think she realized I was in actual labor. So I go back to the room to get checked and I am at a 5-6! And the doctor asks if my water broke because she feels hair! That was the main thing I heard because I had been convinced that I would never give birth to a child with hair! If you've seen any pictures of me before the age of 5, you would understand why.
This is it! We are having a baby! The doctor sent us to the hospital and called ahead so they would be ready for me. On our way there I think Jarom hit about 90mph on the freeway! When we got to the hospital there was of course no parking. So Jarom dropped me at the Labor and Delivery entrance while he found a parking spot. I went in and gave them my name and had to wait just a minute to go back to triage. In the minute I was waiting, Jarom comes flying down the hall and says that he did valet parking because he had no patience to find a parking spot. He was a little excited :) So as soon as they take me back to triage they pretty much get a room for me because I am at a 7 now! We headed to the room, they got me all hooked up and almost immediately I got the epidural. Although not before having a 6 minute long contraction that I thought was going to kill me.
The epidural was great. That happened at about 11:30am-12pm. Then all we had to do was wait. The epidural majorly slowed down the progress of the labor. But that was okay. We watched a couple of movies together and just kind of chilled. I was extremely grateful for our nurse though. Molly's heart rate was dropping during contractions so they put me on oxygen. The nurse never made me feel nervous or scared about this though. She just had me keep trying to lay in different positions to help Molly out. At about 6:15pm, I was ready to start pushing. My doctor came in and at 6:32pm, our healthy 8lb 12 oz, 21 inches long little girl was born! The cord was around her neck and instead of being face down, she was turned side ways. It was because of these things that her heart rate was dropping and that I was having such terrible back labor. But seeing her for the first time just made it all worth it! And to be perfectly honest, labor wasn't too bad. That night when all of our family came to see her, some of them asked if I would ever do it again and I could totally do it again! I definitely got lucky with my first birth experience.
Wow, that was long. But I am happy to have this written down. Hopefully it wasn't too detailed. I tried not to be gross. But that is the overall story of how Molly was born.
Also a side note about her name: Molly is Morgan and Holly (my mom) put together. And Kay is both mine and Valarie's (my mother in law) middle name. So Molly Kay is named after both her grandmas and her mom!
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