So, way back in 2013, I had my last Dr. appointment on Friday March 8th. We decided that since this was my 4th kid, and my labors were fast AND my sister was getting married in a few weeks and I wanted to make sure that the baby would be at least 2 weeks old in order to fly- that I would go the hospital at 8:00am (when my Dr was on-call) and she would break my water. I was a little nervous about doing this... what if nothing happened when they broke my water? Which would be unlikely since that is essentially what happened with my last two babies... the labors were progressing slowly so they broke my water and BAM, baby born! :)
Well, all that night I was feeling nervous about it and hoping that I would just go into labor on my own. But at the same time, I was hoping that I wouldn't go into labor in the middle of the night, because I felt bad about making my Dr come in before her 8:00am call. I know, ridiculous. Well, as if on cue, right before I went to bed around 11:00pm, I started noticing regular contractions. Having experienced this for the last 4 weeks of my pregnancy, I wasn't too concerned. I can't even count how many times I was up all night timing contractions to see if they turned into something. So annoying! I had crazy amounts of false labor with this pregnancy. I hear it gets worse with each baby. Anyway, so of course I can't get to sleep. These are actually starting to feel a little more intense than normal (still not painful at all) but seeing as how I'd already gone to the hospital once before, sure that I was in labor only to be sent home, I was not about to go again unless I knew FOR SURE that it was the real thing. So I timed contractions. I've never really timed contractions super closely, but with my handy dandy app, it made it very easy to see if they were getting closer, longer, etc. Well, there really wasn't any rhyme or reason to them. Sometimes they were super close together (like 2 minutes) but they would be really short. Or they would be really long but farther apart. A few times I went like 5-10 minutes without having one, so I thought for sure these weren't real. Everyone always says, they will be consistent and start getting longer and more intense. Well, they were starting to get more intense (still not painful), but the patterns were throwing me off, so I still wasn't SURE. So dumb. Well around 3:00 am I finally had THE contraction that told me this was the real thing. It was super intense and the first one that I would call "painful". So, I finally went and woke Nate up and told him we needed to go to the hospital. We got everything together and went to wake up my mom to tell her that we were going to the hospital. I think the clock said 3:20am when we did that. As we walked out the building and down to Columbus to catch a cab, contractions were getting super intense and consistent. I could tell that I was heading into transition because I was feeling the slight urge push during my contractions, but when the contractions were over I felt fine, so I felt pretty confident that we would make it to the hospital in time. Of course, when we got to the hospital, I didn't realize that we had to enter through the ER entrance, so we had the cab driver pass that and go to the front only to find it locked, and we couldn't just go back because it was a one way street. :/ So I had to waddle my way back to the ER entrance.
We made our way up to labor and delivery and checked in at the triage desk. There happened to be one other lady waiting. I told the lady behind the desk that this was my 4th baby and that my labors go really fast and I felt like I was pretty far along. She told me I still needed to wait for the nurse. Geez. So since I couldn't sit I walked back and forth dealing with the contractions that were getting closer and closer. The other pregnant lady was calmly sitting in her seat. The nurse finally came out and asked which one she was taking back, the lady behind the desk told her that the other lady got there first but that I looked like I was further along in labor and that it was my 4th baby. The nurse asked the other mom which baby this was for her and she of course said, 4th. Come on! So they took her to a delivery room and took me into triage and told me to get dressed and give them a urine sample. I couldn't believe it. I was starting to get nervous that I was going to deliver in the nasty, dingy triage area. I managed to get dressed and give a urine sample, which I guess means I wasn't about to push the baby out right then, so that was good. I still had to wait a bit for the nurse to come check me. I kept pacing back and forth, and finally called out for the nurse to please hurry. In situations like this, I wish I were more forceful and vocal in labor. Then maybe they would take me seriously. She finally came and checked me and what do you know, I was at a 9. I told her that I go really fast and she said ok, we're taking you seriously now. Awesome, thanks. They hurried me to delivery where another nurse then proceeded to take her sweet time getting me hooked up and asking all sorts of ridiculous questions. After a few minutes I told her I needed to push and she said, "no , don't push, let me finish getting you checked in." Um, wow. After a couple more minutes, I started getting a little more vocal so she finally decided to check me and said "oh yeah, the head is right there. Ok, go ahead a push when you need to." Oh ok. Thanks lady. At this point the Dr and other nurses came in and a few minutes later, little baby Joshua was born. His time of birth was 4:03am. 43 minutes from when we woke up my mom.
I was so so grateful that despite it being a little frantic, we made it to a delivery room in time. I had nightmares about having to deliver a baby in a cab or on the subway. I knew that I had a hard time telling the difference between braxton hicks and my real labors, and I knew that once I could tell the difference, it meant I didn't have much time. So I barely made it, but I DID make it. AND I was able to go into labor on my own. It really worked out quite nicely. :)
After Joshie was born, he cried and cried. I nursed him on both sides but after like 15 minutes on each side, I took him off and he freaked out. I asked them if they had a pacifier I could give him, because he obviously just needed to suck on something, and they told me they don't have pacifiers because they don't encourage them. Oh my gosh. Give me a break people!! That was most definitely not the case the last time I had a baby at that hospital. So the poor thing just cried. I finally got him swaddled and calmed down after a bit. But this basically set the tone for the first few weeks of his life. He was a fussy little guy. He never did learn to take a binky. But once I stopped swaddling him, around 6 months, he used his thumb to soothe himself. By the time he was two months, he had turned into a happy little guy-just in time for our cross country adventures. He was a little fussy in the car rides, but he slept in the hotels like a champ. Once he started sleeping through the night around 2 months, he never turned back! He seriously NEVER wakes up in the middle of the night anymore. He is a dream sleeper.
We love this little guy so much. He is such a sweetheart, loves to watch his brothers and try to get involved in what they are doing. He loves to crawl around and touch everything, and pull himself up to see what's going on in the higher-up places. He loves to play with toys and eat real people food. He hates getting his diaper changed and getting dressed. He loves baths and water in general. He also loves to chew on things. I can't believe that he is one already! This year really has flown by, but I can't imagine our family without our little Joshie.
