I want to write this all down while its fresh in my mind. I apologize in advance if its long and detailed but I don't want to forget my second little miracles arrival!
I had my 38 week appointment on Wednesday April 29 and was just one cm dilated and 40% effaced. I was still feeling great and told the doctor I fully expected to be back next week for my 39 week appointment. He laughed and just told me to at least pack my bag and be ready.
On Thursday we took Hudson to the zoo. Chris had a free day in terms of work and the weather was perfect. We knew it would be our last chance to go as a family of 3. We walked about 5 miles and, although I felt good still, I did have increasing Braxton Hicks-nothing uncomfortable, just knew they were there.
I worked on Friday from 7-5. I had some uncomfortable contractions throughout the day and started showing some other "signs" that labor might be starting soon. I just prayed I would make it through the work day! When I left and got home things settled down a bit so I just attributed the contractions to a busy day and not drinking enough water. False alarm I thought. But the contractions came back that night, not painful but just annoyingly uncomfortable that I didn't get hardly any sleep.
On Saturday the contractions turned a bit more painful but I was only having them every 15-30 minutes. We tried to run some errands but I was just too uncomfortable so we came home. We started to get the feeling that maybe this baby was coming sooner rather than later. We actually had a babysitter lined up for that night so we could go on one last date but I texted her and told her not to worry about it. The contractions stayed far apart all day so while I was pretty uncomfortable, I was beginning to think again maybe this was false labor.
We put Hudson to bed and I was going to try to go to bed myself since I hadn't slept much the night before. I laid down at about 9pm but with every contraction I had to get out of bed because standing was much more comfortable than lying down. We started timing contractions around midnight and they were anywhere from 8-15 minutes apart, closer together if I was standing and farther apart if I let myself lay down. I tried to stand as much as possible but needed relief occasionally. At about 1am I went downstairs so Chris could try to get some sleep. By 3am the contractions were consistently 7-8 minutes apart no matter what position I was in but they were so painful when they came that I couldn't stand up through them anymore. I woke Chris up and told him that I needed to at least go and get checked because the pain was getting more than I wanted to handle by myself at home. He called his mom to come stay with Hudson and we were on the way to the hospital by 3:45am. At that point the contractions were about 5 minutes apart. We parked in the deck and walked in. By the time we got to a triage room it was a little after 4am. The nurse checked me and, to my surprise, I was already dilated to a 7. Looking back, I was probably in active labor a lot of the day on Saturday but just didn't realize. They immediately got me set up in a room and asked if I wanted an epidural. I thought for about .2 seconds trying to go without one but then a contraction would come and all I could think about was how sweet that relief would feel! The anesthesiologist came in about 5am and by about 5:30 I was pain free and able to get some sleep.
About an hour later Chris asked the nurse if I would be checked anytime soon and she said "well, honestly I haven't seen your doctor here yet this morning". But at 7am he came in and apologized because he had been taking a quick nap in the on call room. He checked me and I was dilated to 8 cm. He decided to break my water and unfortunately there was a trace of meconium. I could tell he wanted to get the baby out sooner rather than later so he immediately checked me again and said I was fully dilated and we should start pushing. So at 7:13am I started pushing and pushed through 2 contractions. Baby was almost out so the doctor just had me keep pushing even without a contraction and at 7:16 Weston Prescott Wrights was born! He came out screaming, Chris cut the umbilical cord, and was immediately taken over to the NICU nurses who had been called to the room. They checked him over for about 30 seconds before saying he was just fine. Weston weighed in at 7 lbs 4 oz. He was given back to me for an hour of skin to skin where he immediately latched and I was able to nurse.
We went home Monday afternoon and started our life as a family of 4! We know the transition may be difficult but we are excited for the journey ahead! I feel so blessed to have two healthy sons and pray they grow up to be the best of friends!
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