The rest of the story…
Thanks for all of your sweet comments (and thanks to Dawn for keeping everyone up to date!). We’re home and thrilled and having so much fun getting to know Dorrie (tip#1 - she’s not a fan of stethoscopes).
Here’s the nice long (long) story you’ve all been waiting for:
On Tuesday, I woke up at 5am with contractions. Not regular ones, or really severe ones, but noticable ones that put me in a really bad mood. I mean, we ask that she be one of the 95% of babies that do not come on their due dates - one wouldn’t think it would be too much. So, with Russ at a staying at a hotel and taking the first day of the bar exam, I spent most of the day in severe denial. “What contractions? I’m not having contractions. Hold on, I just need to take a couple deep breaths here.”
They stayed between 15 and 30 minutes apart most of the day, until around 2 when I decided I had to come out of denial and see what the doula would say about the situation. Her theory was that I could be dealing with that for plenty longer, so to just go about my business and try to think about other things.
My sister-in-law and Andy had planned to come over and bring me dinner and keep me company while my husband was at the hotel, so they stopped by at about 4 or so. At that point, stuff was starting to speed up a little, though I wasn’t timing anything really. If I had to guess, they would be intermittently between 7 and 10 minutes apart. Not that bad, handleable, kinda like extra-specially bad menstrual cramps. Definitely not bad enough to inhibit my meal of a Portillo’s italian beef with giardinera. Mmmmm…
My husband called at about 4:30 to let me know that he had finished the first day of the bar and I had to break the news that it wasn’t looking good - she was not looking like she was going to hold off until Wednesday evening.
Andy had to head to his school to do his band director thing for a few hours at about 5:30, but my sister-in-law and very adorable nephew (on his 6 weeks birthday!) were there to keep me company. Because, you know, first labors are long. (Ha.) (Look! Foreshadowing!)
At about 7 (Andy was due back at 8:30), I wasn’t feeling so happy. Called the doula, who suggested a bath, which sounded like an awesome idea. I was lying in there being highly amused by the fact that my belly was nearly as tall as the edges of the tub, but I also started feeling like the contractions were more painful and had stopped kidding around.
I called the doctor at about 7:45. She also said that my voice sounded like I was doing okay at the moment, but since I was going to be travelling from Beverly to downtown, I should probably head in. I mentioned that it would be a little while since my driver wasn’t back yet, and she went, “Okay, but don’t wait too long.”
Then Andy got stuck at a long-ass freight train coming home, and we had to let various dogs out from each house before we left, and we got the show on the road right as contractions were starting to be about 2 minutes apart. My sister-in-law called my husband to let him know we were heading in, and I spent a little time feeling bad about the fact that he really should have been heading to bed to get ready for the second day of the bar exam, but was distracted.
Just in case you’re wondering — contractions that are 2 minutes apart don’t feel very good when driving on the heavily torn-up Dan Ryan Expressway.
We got to Prentice at around 10pm (I think - I wasn’t paying particularly close attention to time at that point) and headed up to triage. Where the chick handed me a little clipboard and asked me to fill out a bunch of information. With no chairs. I asked for a chair, and she looked kinda confused and went, “well, you could sit in that wheelchair over there…” Um… What the hell? Shouldn’t they be prepared for people to be less than comfortable when they’re checking into the Labor & Delivery unit? Luckily a nurse came out and took a look at me and ushered me through the door to a lovely, lovely chair.
They were a little confused as to why I didn’t want Andy to come back with me (”Dad doesn’t want to come?” “He’s not the dad! Not the dad! She’ll come instead.”), and I nearly beat someone when they told me I wasn’t allowed any more of my water (also, fuckers. Seriously. It’s hard to breathe through the contractions when no one will let you have anything for the thirst). But then they got me hooked up and checked my dilation and the nurse goes, “Wow. You’re at 7cm.” My response: “Holy shit.” That got some laughs, but not from me, oh no!
We headed up to the nice little room and I decided to give a big “hell yes” to getting the epidural. I had been hesitant before, since I really didn’t want to have to deal with getting Pitocin (the two things I really emphatically didn’t want during labor were Pitocin and narcotics) and epidurals can slow labor substantially, but at that point everything was going so fast I decided to take it and deal with any issues if they came up. The anesthesiologist came and I don’t even remember much of actually getting the epidural except that I was at the point where I couldn’t be silent anymore during the contractions and I was just whimpering like a lost puppy of some sort. Then that shit kicked in and I suddenly got my personality back! It was like a lovely, cuddly, painless lightswitch! I was talking to people and not hating them anymore!
The doctor came in and I had gotten to nearly 9cm during the time it took to get the epidural (No wonder I was whimpering!), but the baby was still fairly high so she said she’d let me labor down for a while and get her lower to keep me from having to do so much pushing.
Now that I was in such a good mood though, we spent a lot of time talking and laughing with my sister-in-law and the doula. She also took over watching my nephew for a while so Andy could join in the fun for a while. They traded back when it was pushing time. My doctor, the resident, and the nurses were all great - cheering me on and generally making me feel really good about everything. Even though the epidural had worn down a bit by then (you’re supposed to be able to feel yourself push), I was still able to deal. Obviously it was difficult, but not miserable.
After less than 1/2 hour of pushing, Dorothy Rose made her entrance, at 2:08am on her due date. Right smack dab between days 1 and 2 of the bar exam. Her aunt cut the cord (I said “At least the person cutting the cord has the right DNA!”). And yes, she was 9 lbs. 1 oz. I don’t know how she fit in there either - especially since I had extra amniotic fluid and the doctor was shocked at how huge the placenta was. She was one well-nourished little baby.
I needed a few stitches (nothing too crazy, but it did not feel good at all what with the epidural being about gone), and so my sister-in-law took pictures while the doula let me sqeeze her poor hand off. The only good thing about that part was when I looked over and could see the baby’s adorable little elbow dimples.
When they brought her to me, I realized that she looks exactly like her dad. Exactly. I think my exact words were “Well, we’ll never have to go on Maury find out who the daddy is!” I do think she has my mouth though. If it’s not mine, at least it’s very girly and prevents her from looking like my husband’s mini-me.
Her dad got to come see her at about 6:30am when she was only about 4 hours old. We were sad he had to miss it, but as he said, “This will make for a great story later…”
As usual, we don’t want names and whatnot to be Googleable, but if you want to know the flickr account with all the baby pictures just send me an email or leave a comment.
