7pm I headed off to Target to pick up a few things so I could continue to organize the next day while Joel was at work. With a full cart...including a newborn dress for the potential baby girl...I browse the home decor section and then much to my surprise I feel like I am losing bladder control. I have to pinch my legs together to keep from peeing my pants. With every step I take the more control I lose.
8pm At this point I figure that my water is breaking. I stand still for a moment deciding what to do. There is a woman following me down the isle and I wonder if it is showing through my pants. Does she know my water broke or is she thinking I peed my pants? By now it is running down my legs. I decided to quickly check out with what I have and leave. That plan quickly changed when I saw the long line at the check out. I abandoned my cart and waddled out of the store trying to keep my legs pinched as much as possible! I called Joel when I got to the car to prepare him for my arrival at home!
8:30pm At home Joel confirmed that it was my water that broke...it didn't smell like pee (I know this because Joel checked!)...and we confirmed that the lady behind me in the store for sure could tell that my water broke!
9pm We called the on-call dr and they advised us to head on in to the hospital. We took showers, called family and friends, packed our bags (of course I haven't done this yet!), ate some food, stopped by ZCS, and then headed to the ER (still no contractions really).
10pm We checked in to our enourmous room (thanks Kim!), met our super sweet nurse, got hooked up to all of the monitors and continued to tend to all of the water that continued to gush out of me! I still was only dilated to about 3 cm so we walked the hallways trying to get things to progress. It was the middle of the night so the nursury was packed with babies for the night. It was hard to imagine that soon we would have a little one like that with us!
1am The walking didn't really help with the dilation but it did help bring on some contractions. They hooked me up to Pitocin to try to get things moving more quickly! Joel is excited because it is now April 22nd...his favorite number...he is ready for the baby to come now!
3am The contractions have definitely gotten more intense! It was hard for me to know on a scale of 1-10 how bad they were because I didn't have a reference point to know what a 10 felt like. The contractions were definitely not comfortable and poor Joel was struggling to stay awake at this point! With every contraction I would have to wake him up! At that point we decided an epidural would be great so we could get some much needed rest! Almost immediately after getting the epidural I felt 100% better...thank you Dr. Robert Hingson (inventor of the epidural)! I don't know why any woman would choose to not get one! Sleepy Joel and pain free Stacey drift off to sleep!
10:30am I have only progressed to 6 cm. They have me lie on my back to give me a straight catherter to empty my bladder (my legs are very numb and I can't get up to go to the bathroom). While I am on my back I start to feel intensely light headed. At the same time the baby's heart rate begins to fluctuate greatly with each contraction...at times dropping to 40 bpm! Quickly our room is full of nurses and our doctor with concerned glances being given to each other. Joel is being instructed to get in full scrubs and they begin to prep me for an immediate C-section! Everything happened so fast and I just kept thinking that this was not how I had invisioned this all going and I really didn't want to have a C-Section because I knew the chances of me having a vaginal delivery in the future was more than likely not going to happen! Due to me feeling so nauscous they allowed me to roll back over on my side while they monitored the baby's heart rate for one more contraction. After rolling over the baby appeared to be doing much better and within a few contractions it's heart rate had leveled back out to normal. Praise the Lord! They explained to us that if this happened again we would need to have an Emergency C-Section where I would be put completely under and Joel would not be allowed in the room...the thought of that made us both feel a little emotional, but we decided to take our chances and hope that the baby would remain stable until delivery. Needless to say I laid on my side for the rest of the day hardly daring to move for fear that the baby would react negatively. They took me off of Pitocin to give the baby a break from the contractions...at this point we are wondering if the baby will make it out on the 22nd!
2pm They started the Pitocin back up and the baby is reacting better to it. I am dilated to 6-7cm...at this point we realize that this baby might be a little pistol and this could be a glimpse into the rest of our lives (no control!). Family and friends are calling and texting very often wondering what is going on! We laughed every time the phone rang...it at least helped pass the time and made us feel very loved!
5:30pm I am beginning to feel a lot of pressure with each contraction and the nurse verifies that we are at 10 cm and we are ready to push!!!! The baby should be here soon (less than 1 hour says the nurse!) because she can feel the head is very low! The nurse prepares everything and we start to push! It isn't as bad as I thought it would be. You take such a long rest between pushes while you wait for the next contraction so we just chatted with our nurse to pass the time. She was an interesting character telling us stories about her kids and other random stuff (like her cats!)! 1 hour passed of pushing and still no baby...this nurse did not know what she was talking about! I am so excited to meet our baby, know it's gender, call it by name and hold it in my arms! I have waited 9 months and have been in labor for almost 24 hours so I am ready!
7:30pm Dr. Strong was not on call so we had Dr. Zimmerman help with the delivery. At this point the nurse can tell the baby is coming soon so Dr. Zimmerman comes in to do the delivery! With every push the doctor and Joel could see the baby's head! Joel is getting very excited and is encouraging me more and more to push harder...we are almost there! I can tell by Joel's reactions what is happening...tears in his eyes when the head came out (I have tears in my eyes re-living this moment in my mind!). The doctor put the baby's hair in a mini mo-hawk while I was pushing which Joel thought was very funny!
8:02pm Our precious baby boy, Parker Miles Nagelkirk, made his way into the world weighing 9lbs 7oz 22in long! He had a nice head of hair, big hands, big feet, a great little cry, the perfect little round nose and juicy little red lips...he was perfect in every way! Joel and I immediately felt more love for this little boy whom we had just met than we ever thought could be possible! What I felt when he was laid in my arms for the 1st time is indescribable...I felt proud to be a mom to this perfect little boy, overwhelmed by what had just happened, amazed that Joel and I had made him together (obviously God did most of the work), in awe of his tiny little features, happy that his cry was not too loud, hopeful of what a great future he would have, grateful that he was in good health, thankful for an amazing husband to share this special moment with and excited for our family to grow!
10pm Both of our parents came out to visit Parker! It was so much fun to share this special moment with them! Parker is blessed to have 4 supportive and excited grandparents who will shed him with lots of love and provide support to him throughout his life! While they were visiting I ate my 1st meal in 24 hours...I was hungry! It is so crazy how they expect women to not eat for hours and hours and then go through labor! We also called friends and family to share the fabulous news!
1am Parker got his 1st bath (given by Aunt Kim!) and I attempted my 1st time breast feeding...not great! After being awake for over 36 hours, just given birth to a baby, being emotionally drained and not having the most helpful breast feeding nurse I was brought to tears! Even though we were so sad to send Parker to the nursery only a few hours after he came into the world we decided it would be best to just get some sleep because we knew tomorrow would be a busy day showing him off to visitors! I remember closing my eyes and saying a quick prayer of thanks before drifting off to sleep in only a few seconds.
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| Our baby burrito! |
Saturday was a flurry of visitors, learning how to breast feed and soaking in the reality of our new family!
