Delivery Story (3 months later)

Going to the hospital to have a baby!

Holy moly!  An update is truly needed at this time!  Apparently being a mom takes up all of my time!  I feel like I need to update everyone on my delivery.  I'm not sure how many gruesome details everyone wants, but labor was a very long process.
   I got there at 6:30 in the morning.  While I was walking to the delivery room I literally froze.  I was scared silly, Derek had to give me a little pep talk.  I got all hooked up to my IV, BP cuff, baby HR monitor, my contraction monitor, and my pitosin.  This made going to the bathroom one heck of a time!!

 
  The Dr came in and tried to break my water at either 8 or 9 am (I can't remember).  After about 10 minutes of the worst pain someone has put me through, the Dr said he was going to try a different approach. They used some medicine to soften my cervix, and I had to lay there for 4 hours until he came back.
   Finally the Dr came back at either 12 or 1 (I can't remember), to try and break my water again.  I don't know how I didn't swear, cry, scream, or kick the Dr in the face.  I have never experienced so much pain in my life!! Having the Dr try to break my water was seriously the worst thing ever.  The nurse told me that she had never seen someone go through as much as I did to get their water to break as she did with me in over 6 years.  This made me feel a little better, and that I wasn't being a wuss.  After about 10 minutes my water finally broke.  This made going to the bathroom even more fun.  It was sad, but I had only progressed from a 1 to a 2.5 at this point.

   The Dr came back in at about 5 and I was only at a 4.  I was so discouraged.  The nurse suggested I get an epidural because the Nurse Anesthetist was leaving at 6.  So rather than waiting as long as I possibly could to get an epidural I said heck with it.  Give me the shot now.  My body is obviously not progressing and I'm going to be in pain for a long time.
   I was so scared to get the epidural, but the N.A. was amazing!  It was like night and day from how I had felt before the epidural.  I would talk right through my contractions once I had the epidural.  Derek kept asking me if I even knew that I was having a contraction when my monitor would show that I was.  Luckily my family came to visit AFTER I had my epidural.  I was much more pleasant to be around after the epidural was given.  I ate my ice chips and enjoyed having some company to distract me with how long of a day it had been.
   Now for the even more discouraging part.  The Dr. came back at 11 pm to check on my progress.  I was only at a 6.  My Dr. told me that I wouldn't be giving birth until early morning so I needed to try and get some rest.  Before he left, he inserted internal monitors for my contractions and the baby's heart rate so they could better monitor what was going on.  The nurse saw my contractions on the monitor and decided to crank the pitosin all the way up to a 7.
    When the Dr. left, Derek set up his bed and we were both very discouraged.  An hour later I felt the urge to push.  We called the nurse in and she told me that I was at a 9.5.  She told me to try to push and see what happens.  Well I gave one big push and I was dilated to a 10 and ready to deliver.  I asked her if she was going to call the Dr and she said not yet.  I FREAKED out!! I did not want to deliver this baby without my Dr.  Especially because my nurse was not the best nurse in the world.  I pushed for 20 minutes, and Derek told me that he could see the head.  FINALLY she went and called the Dr.  He was there within 8 minutes.  He got all set up, and 3 pushes later I experienced the happiest moment of my life.  At 12:59 am on March 20, my little angel entered this world.

   They placed the sweetest baby I had ever seen on my chest.  He wasn't crying so I said, "Cry baby cry!", and we all started rubbing him to stimulate him.  I didn't expect tears to roll down my cheeks the moment I met this sweet baby, but I honestly can't even describe the emotions that I experienced.  Meeting that baby was the most spiritual and pure moment of my life.  I couldn't think of my life without him and I had just barely met him.

   They took my baby to a warm bed to check his vitals.  He sprawled out and put his hands behind his head while he let them do their thing.  None of us could get over how mellow he was.  None of us had expected him to weigh 7lbs 14 oz either.  We all laughed at the fact that he was almost 8 pounds and I had just delivered that chubby boy.

 
  When I held that little boy in my arms his name immediately came to my head.  I knew that his name was Levi Derek Dawson.  I was so grateful to experience this because I was panicking that we still didn't have a set name for him.

   Levi has been the greatest blessing to us.  He is mellow, content, and has the cutest little chubby cheeks on the block.  Being a mom is the greatest gift I have ever been given.  I was scared about what if I didn't have the maternal instincts, what if I missed my freedom, and what if I didn't know what to do.  I have surprised myself with the fact that I DO have maternal instincts, and I wouldn't change my life for a second.  It's hard to believe we even lived without Levi.  We adore this sweet boy so much.  He melts our heart each day, and he makes me want to be a better person.

   That is a very condensed version of my labor, but all the little details would take too long to share.  I left out the part where I could only eat ice chips for almost 24 hours and I was starving, so right after delivery my nurse ran and grabbed me a sandwich. I left out how the first time I tried walking after the epidural wore off that my legs gave out and I fell on the bed. I left out the part where they didn't have enough rooms for us to go into the mommy and baby dept so we were stuck in the

labor and delivery section and were at the bottom of their priority list for a day. Hahaha.  Labor is not glamorous!! I am proud to say I did not poop while delivering!!  That was one of my biggest fears.  Recovery sucks after delivering, and no one explained to me exactly how unglamorous it truly is.  But as crazy as it sounds, going through all of it was completely worth it.  In the middle of it, I wasn't so sure I would come out in the end being able to say that, but guess what?  I'm at the end of it, and it definitely is all worth it!