First day in the hospital . . . Cam and Mom . . .
Dad and Cam, showing off the view from our room at UNC hospital . . .
the story . . . soooo, I'd been having contractions since Saturday night, but nothing too regular or frequent, and they would disappear during the day (only to reappear at night - Sunday night and then again early Monday evening). I worked until 3 pm on Monday. When I went to bed Monday night (6/28), the intensity of the contractions increased, but unfortunately, not the frequency. At 10 pm, I called the on-call nurse midwife to see if I should come in . . . no, no, just wait until the contractions are 5 min apart. Well, at 1 am, they were coming about every 10 min (and sooooo painful), and I told Matt to call Stephanie (our nanny) to come over because we were going to the hospital! (Stephanie had had her bag packed for a week and was on call for us 24-7. She's a dream nanny!)
By the time I actually got to the hospital, it was close to 2am. The contractions were now about 5-7 min apart and just about unbearable. All I could think about was the epidural. Matt pulled up outside the hospital lobby. Just as I stepped out of the (new) car, I was greeted with the strongest contraction yet. There were people sitting on the benches outside the hospital, and I know they thought I was a lunatic! Anyway, I thought, if I don't get on the ground, I'm going to fall to the ground. So there I was, on all fours on the concrete pavement outside the hospital lobby . . . and that's when my water broke! A NICU nurse came running over to me, yelling at me - are you OK? are you OK? I was crying that my water broke. She told me to hang on, and she went inside and called a "stork code" on me - I guess she thought I was going to deliver right then and there! By this time, Matt had finally located a wheelchair and had brought it over. He and the nurse both helped me into it. When they wheeled me in, I could hear the overhead hospital paging system, "Stork code, ground floor, children's hospital; Stork code, etc."
I had another contraction in the elevator, and another one at the check in desk. (and the check-in lady was really rude!) Anyway, by the time I got to my room, they were coming every 2-3 min and I was feeling like I needed to push (which really panicked me, because I still didn't have my epidural!). My nurse, Bo, was great (although, I know I was behaving badly!). However, when she checked me, she told me I was fully dilated and there would not be enough time for an epidural. Now, this is when I would say that I lost it. I really started crying. But when I turned around, Megan (anesthesia resident) was setting up for the block. (Never have I been so happy in my life!) I asked her for a spinal, and she said that's what she was planning. Within 10 min of being in the room, the spinal (or CSE actually) was in! Matt said I became a different person after that! Suddenly, the pain was gone. I really do love anesthesia!!
Now the nurse and nurse midwife were in no hurry to deliver the baby.
We did admission paper work, got charting caught up, got my epidural hooked up, administered a dose of pencillin, etc, etc. See? Anesthesia also helps the hospital staff, not just the patient!
At 4 am, I started pushing, and by 4:32am, Cam was born! Full head of dark hair; dark green-blue eyes, squinting in the bright lights. Apgars 8 and 9 (he was pretty purply-blue when he first came out!).
Again, I couldn't believe how quickly I fell in love with him! Once again, he was the most beautiful baby I'd ever seen!
And, once again, I couldn't believe how exhausting all this was!
And, now a week later, I'm still in complete love with him, and still surprised on how little sleep you can actually function on!
