February 28, 2011

We checked into the hospital Monday morning at 7:00am. My labor nurse happened to be a girl that I used to twirl against when I was in grade school/junior high :) It was fun chatting with her & we loved her as our nurse!

This is the birth story of Sophie Maxine, according to the notes that Aaron took. He's done this for every labor/delivery & it's been fun for me to go back and read :)

At 7:30ish - they started me on Pitocin. I was 2cm & 80% effaced. At 8:05 my Dr came to check on me, said I was a 3 & decided to break my water. At 8:30, my contractions were 2-3 minutes apart & were pretty strong.

The anesthesiologist came at 9:15 and got my epidural in place. At 9:45, I was still not feeling the effects of the epidural. The anesthesiologist bumped up the meds & also gave me some meds to keep my blood pressure up. The nurse checked me again and I was 5-6cm, so the pitocin & contractions were definitely doing what they were suppose to, but the epidural was not!

Aaron thought he was going to get off easy this delivery (and me too), but he had to do some work to help me through the contractions...and they were obviously work for me :) At 10:20, they decided to try to insert a new catheter in a different spot for the epidural. At this point, I probably should have just sucked it up, but they offered, so I took it...and if I had known we were only 20 minutes away from delivery...I may have persevered, but who knows :) This one did provide relief! At 10:29, I was at 8-9 cm, so they called my doctor! At 10:35 my doctor arrived & decided that I could push on the next contraction! After 2 contractions, and about 5 pushes, Sophie Maxine was born at 10:40am, weighing 7lbs 3oz & measuring 20.5 inches long.

It was my quickest labor by far - loved that for sure! We are so blessed. I am overwhelmed with emotion when I think about our journey - 9 years ago, February 1st, 2002, we miscarried our first pregnancy. On February 28, 2005, we were scheduled to discuss IVF with our fertility specialist, after having gone through 2 surgeries, clomid & IUI, without success. However, 2 weeks before that appointment, we discovered we were pregnant with Brecken! And now - we are blessed with our 4th little miracle on February 28th, just 6 years later :) What an amazing journey those 9 years have been for us, our relationship & our faith!