Baby Story

Anxious. Why did I feel so anxious about having this baby? Of all people I should know that I can handle pain. I've had 4 babies with no pain meds before this one. Heck, i've had my teeth drilled with no anesthetic before, so what was my problem?? Friday morning, my doctor stripped my membranes, so that kicked things up a notch and I started to have some contractions that were actually pretty uncomfortable. Then on Saturday at about 4 AM i started to have pretty regular, pretty painful contractions, and my husband had rubbed my feet with Clary Sage oil and we had tried some other methods to get things moving and so when the contractions got a little more intense and closer together (from 3 to 7 minutes), I decided it was time. After we got loaded in the car, stopped off at Inkley's to get a memory card for the camera, and then back at the house to get Mike's wallet, I only had 3 contractions on the way to the hospital. I said a little prayer, asking for help, and then asked Mike to find a nice little cliff to drive me over. No luck.
When i got here to the hospital, they hooked me up to the monitors, and checked me. I was dilated to 5 cm. and my cervix was completely soft, but not too thin. The baby was still floating, because as Dr. Voss loves to say to me, "When you've had this many babies..." there isn't really anywhere for the baby's head to engage. Everything's just kinda loose and floaty, I guess. So I'm thinking, they'll never send me home if i'm at a 5, but the resident doc comes in and says, "the partners don't want to start you this early so if you don't progress in the next hour, i guess you'll be going home to labor." Well, that actually, that sounded pretty good to me because, remember, i didn't really want to do this birth thing and a nap seemed just the right thing at that moment.
But Marilee (my doula) and Mike both insisted that I get up and at least walk around, then I went to the bathroom and after sitting on the toilet for a few minutes, and a few contractions, my water broke! aaaa!! and after one or two reeeeeallly painful contractions I got back to bed and started screaming for an epidural. The nurse said she had called the needle guy, and i said(well, yelled), "can you call him faster?" She asked, do you just want the epidural or should I check you? Well at that point, since i thought he was on his way and i was between contractions, I told her to go ahead and check me.
"You're complete!"
"What does that mean?"
"Well, when the dr. tells you to push, just take a deep breath, hold it and push as hard as you can."
"I can't do this!"
"Yes, you can."(Jinx on Marilee and the nurse).
So three contractions (9 pushes) later we have this gorgeous thing:

A Dr. from my Dr.'s practice just happened to be at the hospital delivering another baby, but he delivered mine first and then he and the nurse kneaded my stomach for 30 more minutes while I nursed my baby and let my placenta deliver itself(more details on the benefits of that later... maybe). Then the adorable nurse from the nursery gave Michael and my dad and Wade a tattoo of the baby's foot:

Next time: Does this baby have a name?