Dane Michael is here!

On July 20, 2010 at 12:42 AM, Dane joined us...finally! Below is his birth story.

   On Monday July 19th, I had my 40 week appointment with Dr. Collins. The week before she had sent me home with inconsistent contractions, so I was a little worried that she would have me wait an extra week to make any plans for inducing. Thank goodness I was wrong. Luckily I had started to thin out and was dilated between 3 and 4cm, so the irregular contractions were now called "early labor" and after hearing me talk about the woes of no sleep and being uncomfortable, she asked me if I wanted to head over to the hospital now. Even though it is what I wanted, I was in shock and asked her if not now what would be our plan. She said that I would likely not get into the hospital for an induction until Thursday, Friday or Monday. I could not imagine waiting that long, so I accepted her invitation to head over to the hospital after going home to get my bags, leave notes for my Dad and the girls, and meet Scott so we could drive over in the same car. We were actually going to have a baby. I was the last of the four women (due within the same two weeks) on my street to have their baby.

   We gathered our things, left instructions for the girls, sent out an email and jumped back in the car. Yes, I drove. Ha! Control freak me needed to be in charge of something before the events of the day started. When we arrived at the hospital at around 2pm time seemed to stop and crawl by. The following hours became the hours of Eileen, the pro-natural nurse. Luckily, after having two babies I knew that the shift changes around 7pm so she would not be the nurse to help me deliver the baby...and thank my lucky stars I only had to deal with her for a few hours. From five to seven o'clock this woman had me walking for at least two of those hours and not one other pregnant woman was in the halls pushing an IV pole in a hospital gown. What a sight I was. I did not complain because it did keep me busy and passed the time. She was doing everything she could think of to keep me from having pitocin and especially the epidural she claimed may halt my labor. I quickly found out her daughter had recently birthed a 10 pound baby without meds.

   Needless to say, I swear an angel with light all around her appeared when the shift changed and Cindy, the night nurse, walked in the room having gotten the low down from Eileen about my afternoon. Within minutes of her arrival, Dr. Clark broke my water and soon after pitocin was running through my veins stabilizing my contractions. Cindy told me that the head anesthesiologist was on duty who gave the best epidurals. Soon the contractions were strong enough that I requested his services and while I did have a contraction while he was working within millimeters of my spinal cord, the procedure went fine. The only downfall was that we had to turn off the TV during the last ten minutes of The Bachelorette so I didn't get to see the end. Ha! I was so glad to get that over with. I swear I had more anxiety about the epidural than having the baby.

   The epidural always seems to speed my labor up, so the contractions started coming much faster. This would have been OK, but I had what the nurse called a hot spot, an area where the epidural did not take, so there was this searing pain on my right hip each time I had a contraction. She put me on my side and let gravity move the medicine down and thankfully that worked after thirty minutes or so. The final hurdle was my blood pressure issue. I have low blood pressure and the epidural can make your blood pressure go even lower. I told the nurse and anesthesiologist that I had to have two shots of adrenaline during Paige's birth because my blood pressure got dangerously low. Thank goodness this got everyone prepared because it happened again this time. At this point my mom was watching the monitors because I started to feel clammy and light headed. Mom pointed and the nurse quickly put the meds in my IV. My blood pressure had dropped to 66 over 30. Wowsers! After that I was fine. No more BP issues. Soon I was ready to push.

   After having two babies at 4 in the afternoon, it was weird having one right after midnight. As we waited for Dr. Collins to arrive, I told the nurse I had two babies while Oprah was on the TV and now I felt like Jimmy Kimmel was seeing way too much of me on the TV screen. Weird the things you remember from having babies. Dr. Collins arrived once again in her protective garb. She also delivered Tate and I remember being a little freaked out because she looked like she was going into battle with a splatter mask and gown over her scrubs. Dr. Littleton delivered Paige and he was in his scrubs and spider man cap. Very different docs for sure but I like both.

   It took around thirty minutes for Dane to join us. The big difference with him was that the contractions had big gaps between them. With the girls I felt like I was pushing the whole time. With Dane I had these breaks where we waited for another contraction to come. He arrived wiggling his head full of dark hair. They placed him on my chest and I just marveled that he was inside of me moments before. Scott says I have gotten the same look on my face at that moment with each child. I said it is a moment of amazement and relief. I was so excited that he was safe and healthy. Scott cut his umbilical cord and they did the first exam and bath right in the room with us. It was a great experience. I would rank it as the second best delivery with Tate's being the easiest. So, today he is two weeks old and life if different but wonderful. I'll update soon on life with his sisters.