Theo

Theo turned 2 months on Wednesday. It already feels like he's been a part of family forever. He is an ounce shy of 13 pounds and is 60th percentile all across the board. Everything is checking out normal. Now that you are up-to-date with how he is doing currently let me step back in time, all of two months ago and give you the birth story.

After having contractions for three weeks, yes, you read that right, THREE WEEKS, I was getting less and less easy to fool into believing labor was actually going to start. Sometimes the contractions were painful enough to make me stop doing what I was doing. I had Braxton Hicks contractions with Gavin and these definitely did not feel the same.

When you combine the stress of not knowing when your baby is coming - aside from a rough idea of the month - with the stress of needing to find intermediate care for your toddler when labor does start and the stress of knowing it was a very real possibility that my labor could be lightening fast (I came 45 minutes after my mom's water broke and my mom was born so fast that her parents didn't make it to the hospital - she arrived IN the car) I was going a little nuts. I think Ryan put out an SOS call to his mom after he woke up to find me crying, "Why won't he come out already?"

Later that week my wonderful mother-in-law arrived. I believe we were at 10 or so days before the baby was due when she came. Every day I had contractions. Every day they were painful and every day they stopped as soon as I laid down.

We went on family walks at night where I looked like the resident loon as I marched ahead of everyone else, stamping my feet, jumping off the curbs, hopping up and down... No exaggeration, folks.

I ate super spicy foods. Super. Spicy. Super duper. Hot.

I ingested special oils.

I drank special teas.

I had acupuncture.

I had my membranes stripped THREE times. (Not an entirely pleasant experience. What do you mean, membranes stripped? Google it).

None of it worked.

The only thing that worked was time.

Well, that and giving up. One day I was talking to my friend, also my midwife, who asked how my potions and diets and walks were going - I told her they weren't.

It was a Thursday night when I saw a group of my girlfriends at our weekly meeting. I sat there with a pad of paper as we chatted, marking down the intervals of the contractions. They ranged from 5 minutes to 10 minutes apart. Some were convinced it was the night. I would not be fooled. Part of me wanted to drive to SODO (South Downtown) and drive over railroad tracks before going home to run up and down the stairs but I knew it would give me more painful contractions that would just go away when I went to sleep.

Sure enough, I went to sleep and the contractions died down but that was ok. The next morning I went about my morning business but noted I was having contractions... in the a.m. All of my other contractions were at night. I started to look at the clock to time them and thought I should take a shower since that is a relaxing activity. Before I hopped in the shower I poked my head into the living room and said to Mary Jo (MIL), "I may regret saying this but I think today's the day."

Yep. It was the day. As they got stronger and closer together I called my midwife and told her what was going on. She called the hospital to tell them I was on my way. I kept asking her what was going to happened if I showed up and the contractions stopped; I was so afraid of getting there, getting checked in and being sent home when the contractions stopped because I knew they were going stop - they did every other time.

I called Ryan and told him it was time to come home. He arrived home and Mary Jo sent us off with a lunch she had packed. It was so sweet of her. I devoured my food in the car on the way to the hospital; I don't remember if I was hungry or not but I knew I wouldn't get anything to eat once I was admitted.

The labor was pretty easy. I waited a while to get the epidural because I was so afraid of the labor stopping even though Heather assured me if labor slowed down they would give me something to make it pick back up. Still, I couldn't risk being sent home (even though I knew they wouldn't).

We didn't take any labor classes this go around because we took them all with Gavin and I didn't use the techniques learned because I had a fantastic epidural. FANTASTIC.

Well, this time it wasn't so fantastic. I had what is called a "window". I think it should be called a "window to Hell". The anesthesiologist..

wait - if you don't like needles this next part may not be something you want to read...

You've been warned.

So, the good doctor was asking me about my first epidural and I made the mistake of being honest. "Well, it was great but my blood pressure kind of bottomed out. It was like 40 something over 30 something, but I was fine." Oh, and yeah, I have a small heart condition, PVCs (preventricular contractions) but it's not uncommon in women and its totally benign.

Well, there here is, holder of the goods. The goods that will keep me from being in agony. In that moment he was my knight in shining armor - or at least my knight with a shiny needle and a white lab coat. But he was looking at me as someone who had a bad heart and was going to die from a lack of blood flowing through my blood vessels. He started me out with a small dose of drugs. It was like he didn't want me to die or something. Sheesh.

But before we get to the lack of medicine, lets talk about the insertion of the epidural. Yowza. You know how you are supposed to be still like a stone while he jams a needle in the epidural space around your spine cord? I knew how still I was supposed to be. I didn't so much as bat an eye when I had it done 2 years ago. But two years ago it didn't feel like lightening hit a nerve shooting down my left leg.

It felt like someone plugged my left leg into a light socket when he put the needle in.

There was a bit of movement.

There was even a little scream.

There were many people who probably peed themselves (I don't think I was one of them but I wouldn't know - giving birth is that gross).

Good news: my jumping and screaming didn't ruin my spinal cord! Woo-hoo!

Before I get too far I want to tell one story about a nurse before I forget. One of the nurses came in the room to check on me and I was having a contraction. Ryan came to my bedside and played with my hair - my coping mechanism - make him pet my head. The nurse asked me what my coping strategies were for labor pains so I took that as an opportunity to ask her if she used guided imagery. Well, yes, she did. So I said, "Please don't. I don't like it."

Nurse: "Well, what do you like?"
Me: "Silence."
Nurse (with confused look on her face): what about (I don't remember what she offered up here).
Me: "No. Just silence."
Nurse: "What about this..."
Me. "No. Nothing. Just silence. No talking. No laughing. Just silence."

A few minutes later a contraction started and the nurse was talking to someone and I think Ryan was talking. I looked up with eyes full of pain trying to get someones attention. I started shushing everyone and Ryan looked over so I said, "Shh" again. The nurse tried to finish what she was telling the other nurse which kind of peeved me so I put my hand up and waived it while saying, "PSHHHH!!!!" while giving dirty looks when I could bear to bring my head up out of my chest.

It worked. Everyone shut it.

We also learned one technique that does NOT work. Joke telling - because it leads to laughing.

Right before this shushing incident Ryan came up to me as I was obviously having a contraction and said to me in a nice calm tone, "Picture sandy beaches." I started laughing. Then crying while laughing and trying to tell Ryan to not make me laugh but I couldn't because I was laughing and crying.

Once the contraction was over is when the nurse asked me if I liked guided imagery. I told her no and asked if she did it. It was right about then that I realized she was Sandy Beaches! She was one of my nurses when Gavin was born. She kept trying to use the imagery of water washing over a sandy beach with me. It was driving me nuts. I wanted silence but didn't know how to politely tell someone to shut up so I asked Heather how to tell her I didn't like it. Heather told me her shift was over in 15 minutes so I figured I could last 15 minutes with the sandy beaches because the nurse wasn't picking up on the talk-to-the-hand hands I was shoving in her face when she started talking about the water and sandy beaches.

From then on I referred to that nurse as Sandy Beaches.

So it dawned on me Sandy Beaches was once again my nurse so I motioned for Ryan to come over and managed to hiss in his ear, "She's Sandy Beaches!" before he could regale her with the story of the nurse who annoyed me with the sandy beaches imagery. Ryan's eyes bugged out of his head and he laughed. Whew. Close call.

So this story is getting longer and longer.

Let me shorten it....

The epidural was not providing, um, even coverage. They repositioned me which helped a little. They gave me more medicine which helped a lot more but then a window opened where it felt like there was no medicine. It was a small spot but oh, boy. What a spot! One of the nurses, when I started complaining about it, convinced me to tough it out since I was at a 9. There I was toughing it out (and by toughing it out and I mean whimpering and sobbing and crying with each contraction) with Ryan telling me, "Why don't you ask for more medicine?" I think for his kindness I sniped at him. Then my midwife came in and saw I was in a lot of pain and asked why I didn't get more medicine. Heather knew I wasn't down with the pain.

In hind sight if someone told me that I was going to be stabbed with a knife, but only for about 45 minutes or so, and that I should be able to handle it I would tell them they were crazy.

So I got more medicine and life was good again.

Shortly after that Theo Frederick Jahns was born. 8 pounds 13 ounces.

It was amazing. I looked at him and found that I loved him like I loved Gavin when he was born. Instantly, completely.

Stay tuned for part two...