My Labor Story...

So it's about time I share my not so normal labor story. :) I think it's pretty unique and funny. Here it goes...

Sept. 5th at 2:00am, I woke up to a pretty gnarly, painful contraction. In my mind I'm thinking, "This could be the real thing!" Not so much... For the next 20 hours I had contractions varying from every 5-10 minutes apart. When people say back labor is the worst, believe them... back labor is the WORST! So every 5-10 minutes my uterus would contract in the front with some cramping down low, and then it felt like hundreds of burning knives were stabbing my lower back. I kept waiting for them to get closer together, you know, the 5-1-1 rule? I tried sleeping while I was waiting. That didn't happen. Mark helped by rubbing my lower back, but it was still pretty awful. A few warm baths, a lot of exercise ball bouncing, and a lot of moaning took place in the next 20 hours. Finally, Sept. 6th at around 8:30pm I had a few contractions that were pretty bad and were ranging from between 3 and 5 minutes apart. That lasted about 30 minutes so I was ready to go to the hospital.

About to leave for the hospital.

Assuming 20 hours of contractions had to have progressed me further than the 3 cm I was the week before, we checked in to OB Triage. They hooked me up to the monitor, and of course my contractions went back to about 6-7 minutes apart. :( They checked me and get this... I was still at 3 cm! I couldn't believe it. I was 90% effaced and at station 0. It could still be a while till I would be dilated more so they decided to send me home. But to help me get some sleep, they gave me 2 Ambien and told me to go directly to sleep when I get home because Ambien can give you some crazy hallucinations if you stay awake. We're driving the short 2 minute drive home, and as we turn onto our street, no joke, my water broke! Mark luckily covered the passenger seat with a garbage bag and towel earlier that day. He asked if I didn't just pee my pants, but when I got out and showed him he knew it was the real thing. I changed my clothes and went back to the hospital at around 10:00pm. As I was getting out of the car, I could hardly see anything or walk, I literally felt and looked like I was drunk. Almost everything from this point on is a blur. As we were checking in at the ER, the real contractions started. Man, were they terrible. I pretty much lost it. They got me a wheelchair and I was wailing around like a crazy person. Mark said it was quite a sight for everyone in the waiting room. I could hardly see, and my brain was hallucinating and going in a bunch of crazy directions. The next few hours I was tripping out and acting crazy. Mark has to tell this part of the story cause I literally don't remember most of it. (Ambien is crazy stuff). They hooked me up to the monitor, and checked me again. I was having crazy strong contractions and went from 3cm dilated to 6cm in about 15 minutes. One of those contractions lasted 3 and a half minutes, and the babies heart rate and oxygen dropped. All the nurses became frantic, threw some oxygen on me, gave me a shot of Terbutaline to calm down the contractions, and were yelling out to prep the OR. Mark tells me now how scary those few minutes were. Baby's heart rate got better and the room calmed down a bit. They quickly gave me the epidural and told me to sleep for a while. 

Thumbs up for Epidurals.

One hour later I was dilated to 9cm, 10 minutes later I was at 10cm. They woke me up and started explaining the pushing process. Ambien + Epidural = floating on a cloud... I felt pretty awesome, except I was being goofy and making dumb jokes and I couldn't really stay awake. I was falling asleep as Dr. Kingra was talking to me. I was even falling asleep between pushes! I pushed for about 45 minutes. 

About to start pushing.

Pretty sure I had just said something weird or a lame joke.

Towards the end the adrenaline luckily woke me up more, so that I could remember this part. They told me he was close and to give a really good push. The baby's head, shoulders and body all came out at once and they placed him on my chest. I was overcome with so many emotions as I looked down, saw my baby boy, and stroked his little cheek for the first time. 

They took him to the incubator, cleaned him up then handed him to his daddy. Seeing the look on Mark's face as he held him for the first time was incredible. While the doctor finished with the placenta and stitching, I got to hold my wide-eyed little boy again. Then he was passed around the room to Mark's mom and dad, my mom, and my 2 sisters. 

 I needed to hold him again, so they brought him to me. I laid there with my baby, surrounded by people that I love and was reminded by my mom that my dad was there with us. At that moment I felt it, I knew my dad was able to enjoy that moment with us and my baby gets to have his Grandpa protect him and watch over him from Heaven. Still when I think about that moment, I can picture what my dad would look like holding my brand new baby, the excitement and love on his face. Overall, it was a crazy experience, and one that I will cherish and remember forever. Deacon completes our family, the love and joy he has brought to mine and Mark's lives is incredible. 

Deacon Alexander Sheen - born at 2:37am on his due date September 7, 2011

Weighed 7 lb 5 oz, 20 inches long, light brown hair, skinny little legs, and big blue eyes.