It's a girl!!

So Thursday (the 23rd) I had a Dr. appt in the morning.  Nic was at work - he had duty the day and night before so he had been up since Wed. morning.  He came home in the morning to pick up Maximus to take him to school since my Dr. appt was at the same time and then headed back to work.  Lt. Smith (my Dr.) said I was almost 6cm and at 100%...she laughed and asked how I'm still pregnant??  I guess my babies just like my uterus too much!  Anyway, she made a phone call and cleared it with the Dr. on call at the hospital (they only have 5 rooms) for me to come in and start my 2 doses of anitbiotics.  I had tested GBS+ (as I was with Colton, it can pass to the baby as they are coming through the birth canal and can cause a LOT of problems for the baby) and since I was already so far advanced my Dr. and I were afraid once I go into labor that I wouldn't have enough time to get the doses (which takes a couple hours at least).  So this way in a controlled environment, they could make sure I got the doses and then break my water to have the baby.  So I called Nic and told him to come home :)

We dropped the kids off at my neighbor's house, Susan got beautiful, my Mom put on a sweater and I scrambled around to get last minute items put into my suitcase.  Poor Nic was soooo tired.  He made a quick sandwich and off we went to drop me, Susan and Mom off at the hospital.  Nic still had to get Maximus from school and bring him to my neighbor's.  He got back to the hospital before I was even set up in a delivery room - I was still in a triage room answering repetitive questions....

I finally got into a room - it was huge by the way - and proceeded to have a corpsman try to stick me with an IV....well needless to say, after a few VERY painful minutes (you should have seen the faces I was making...I'm sure they were all thinking, Yeah right like she'll go natural! lol) he ended up pushing the IV too far and a different corpsman did it for me in the other arm.  The penicillin hurt like the dickens! Oh it burned!! It was necessary but I let everyone know I didn't like it!

Time? It was probably around noonish?  Maybe 1?  I was starving.  I hadn't eaten anything since 7:30AM!  Nic gave me bites of his energy bar.  I was so hungry it was painful!  Stupid hospital rules! :-)  During this time I actually experienced some contractions (although Susan would say they were fake - I'd been experiencing contractions like that all week, but she said my stomach wasn't tight enough, but now we're pretty sure they were "real."  We performed an experiment later on when I was in painful labor - she felt my stomach - and it felt the same as when we were running around Justco - a Japanese store - and I was timing contractions that eventually stopped).

Anyway, Lt. Smith came at 4ish and at 4:45 they broke my water.  There was some meconium (baby poop) in it, which is a sign of fetal distress and if the baby inhales it, it could lead to problems.  So they had to call NICU to let them know so they could be there when I delivered, to check her out when she was born.

At some point they come in and put me on oxygen because of her heart rate.

At around 6:15 I started having one contraction that wouldn't stop... at this point I can sometimes talk through them and they are coming sparadic - sometimes 3 minutes apart, sometimes 10.... Anyway, Elora is going CRAZY.  I mean, every part of her body is moving all over the place.  The nurse rushes in with a storm of people, she has me lay down, checks me and says I'm at 9cm and almost ready to push.  A Dr. comes in and says I can start pushing...and I'm like, "What? It's only been an hour and half!! Are you serious???"  In between contractions, I feel good.  Nothing like the other labors.  Moments later, Lt. Smith comes in and decides that we still need to wait, that I'm not quite ready to push...

So we wait and I endure these "nothing-like-my-last-labors" contractions, of course they were still painful!  I cried during some of them...but still I didn't feel the urge to push like the last two kids... Eventually Ellie (my friend and one of my labor coaches :) ) asked if I wanted to get checked and I said yes, thinking it wouldn't be time yet.... It was maybe little till 7? I'm not exactly sure...

Well Lt. Smith comes in and says I can start pushing...but the wierd thing was that I couldn't remember what to do!  Colton shot out like a bullet - there was barely any pushing at all.  Push? What?! And of course, & I'm sure this is the same with every woman, I felt like each push was doing nothing and I felt like I was going to push for FOREVER.  My nurse was great though - she actually knew was she was doing! And the support from my Mom, Susan and Ellie were great - but Nic was awesome! So much more involved than with Maximus or Colton - I think the excitement of not knowing what we were going to have really got him more involved! I remember his encouragement with this one much more and am very grateful to him for it!  It's something I'll never forget :-)

But anyway, back to the pain and trying to figure out how I was going to get this kid to come out... I finally got her out - and I'm pretty sure I screamed bloody-murder, lol.  Good grief!  But luckily that pain is over so quickly... and then.... ITS OVER! And I feel like a new person!! And then.... what is it? Couldn't tell - apparently her legs were crossed and it took a while for the doctor to untangle them, lol....but when we found out it's a girl, Nic was sooooo happy and I was just relieved that I wouldn't have to feel guilty for wishing my 3rd boy was a girl :-)

After 2.5 hours of labor we had our girl - our final touch to our perfect family ... and I couldn't be happier :-)