The Trip to The Delivery Room

There was a rainbow over the hospital on the day Nathan was born!

This was quite an eventful day.

It started with Samantha's water breaking. At about 7am Samantha had the urge to go potty. As she headed to the potty, something happend, something that has never happend before. Fluid started to pool on the floor.

I can remember being in bed and hearing "Honey, I think my water broke." My reply, "Are you sure? Maybe you just went to the bathroom"

And thus began our long journey into labor and delivery. Now we figured we had a while to go since Samantha was not having any contractions at the time. So we casually gathered our get ready bags, and called our moms.

By the time we were all loaded it was about 8:30 am and we drove over to Samantha's moms and picked her up and made our 25 minute drive to the hospital.

Triage

Ah, yes the dreaded Labor and Delivery triage room. A room that we spent a couple of times in. Once for early contractions, once for Braxton hicks. 

Samantha was getting tired of thinking "this is it" only to find out it wasn't it. Except on this day, I knew we were getting past the triage and we were getting into our very own room.

Sure enough the nurse came in and did the test to see if the water had broke, and sure enough this time the stick was blue! (indicating amniotic fluid was present.)

The sweet sound of, "we will be moving you into your own room soon" brought joy to the faces of Samantha, her mom and myself!

Let the Games Begin!

It was such a good feeling to get into our room. We really made ourselves at home. The room was pretty big, which was nice because we knew that we would be there for a couple of days.

When Samantha was first checked she was right at 2cm. And as her contractions increased, so did the pain, but the dilation stayed at about 2-3 for about 10 hours.

It wasn't long until my mom showed up. She was so excited that Samantha invited her to be present. It was nice to have my mom there, she has a way of putting me at ease. I really liked having her there to ask her questions and seek her wisdom.

Both Samantha and I were thankful for our moms! Throughout the whole process they were so encouraging and helpful.

Epidural Time

It was pretty scary for Samantha.  No one likes a needle in their spine. God continued to bless this entire pregnancy by giving us great doctors. And the anesthesiologist was no different. She was a very patient lady. I was very blessed to be able to hold Samantha while they administered the epidural.

I was worried that I wouldn't be able to be in the room, I had heard of other situations where everyone had to leave the room. But it was so nice to be able to see what was happening and hold Samantha and let her know what was going on so she wouldn't be scared. (Although our moms were kicked out of the room, but still tired to sneak back in to see!)

Holding steady at 2cm

From this point on the pain was dulled and the contractions were pretty steady. But the dilation was almost at a stand still. Hours passed and still no real progress. The nursed kept telling us that it could be a few more hours. The gave Samantha Pitocin to help the contractions and dialation.

Tick Tock, Tick Tock

Time slowly passed....

Let's Just See

Nathan heart rate would drop periodically, and becasue he was moving alot the heart rate monitor would not keep a good reading.

So they decided they wanted to try an interanl heart rate monitor that would be attached to his head. Just before they were sceduled to place the internal heart rate monitor on Nathan, the doctor said let just take a look and see how far you are.

As the doctor checked, he scared us a bit. He said "We are not going to be able to place the internal monitor on Nathan, becasue.... .... ...Samantha is at 10cm, its time to push!

To our surprise she was at 10cm, we had waited hours for Samantha to make it to 2cm and then all of the sudden with one last check Samantha went from 2cm to 10cm.

Let the Pushing Begin!

Now this was a crazy time! As soon as she started pushing Samantha's grandma arrived. She had set out on an 8 hour drive from her home to us as soon as she heard we were in the hospital.

Since this was our first baby, Samantha wasn't really sure how to push. She would have everyone telling her to do something different  They would say "push like you are going to the restroom", or push from your tummy and diaphragm or push by holding your breath ect.

Each push was a hit or miss. Sometimes it would move the baby along, sometime it would do nothing. After almost an hour of pushing, something started to click. Samantha started to get into the rhythm of pushing and each push was a successful push. I was at Samantha's' side up by her head, It was my job to watch the TOCO meter (the thing that measures the contraction level) and as soon as it hit about 35-40 I would tell her to push. I would count to ten in sets of three. I was so glad that I was the one telling her when and how long to push. Sometimes I would count slower and sometimes faster based on how I felt she was doing. Boy did she do great!

PUSH! PUSH! PUSH!

"I can see the head!" was the call of the nurse. "You are almost there!" everyone shouted. By this time Samantha was very exhausted.  2 1/5 hours of pushing had left her tired, sore and ready to rest. But the pain wouldn't let her. She had to push! I just had to see, I looked and there it was the top of Nathan's head. I leaned into Samantha and said, "his head is right there honey, you can do this"

A few more pushes and his shoulders were out, and then before I knew it, there he was, out and being wiped, and moved around. I was like the paparazzi taking tons of pictures! It was beautiful! It was exciting! It was surreal!

Then I got to cut the umbilical cord. Now that was a surreal experience. This little guy was mine. I was so excited I cut it before anyone could take any pictures. So I said lets re-enact it! 

Nathan was placed on Samantha, but was not crying. And Samantha kept asking "Is he ok?! Is he ok?!" We all assured her, "Yes he is ok!"

Getting my hearing test!

After a while they took Nathan and cleaned him up and put clothes on him and took some other measurements. I could not believe Nathan was finally here!

Samantha and I would like to thank everyone for their prayers!