Hayden's Birth Story *Warning, may have TMI!*

So it's been almost a year since Hayden was born and I have yet to post his birth story. So here we go and I am not sparing any details, so be warned. On Friday January 18th I had a doctor's appointment to talk about scheduling my induction. While I was there she asked if I wanted her to "strip my membrane" which is a "natural" way of inducing labor. Can we say "OUCH!"? It hurt so bad, I had to clamp my mouth shut to keep from crying out. She told me that if it does do anything, I should start feeling contractions within the next 24 hours. She also told me that the woman from her office that schedules the inductions will give me a call and let me know when I will be induced. So I went to work. About an hour after I had gotten to work I started feeling "crampy". Kind of sick to my tummy and getting mild cramps in my lower back. I didn't think anything of it though. I spoke to my mom on the phone and told her what the doctor did and she told me that my sister in law had the same thing done, and she thought that it put her into labor, so she suggested I talk to her. I called her and we chatted and I asked her if she got cramps afterwards. I described to her how I was feeling. She told me that they were probably contractions, judging by how far back I was carrying the baby, that would explain why I was feeling them in my back. She told me to start timing the cramps and if they were consistant then I could presume they were contractions. So I started timing them, sure enough, they were coming every 15 minutes. I talked to my coworker, Linda, who was the acting manager that day and told her I would like to go home and rest since I believed I was in early labor. She, of course was ok with that. I went to Charlene's house to take a nap and relax until Brian got off of work. While I napped, I could feel the contractions getting stronger. Sometimes they woke me up! When I went to pick Brian up from work the contractions were about 6-7 minutes apart! I realized I had never discussed when to go to the hospital with my doctor. So I called the after hours line (My doctor was on call that weekend) and she told me to wait until the contractions were 2-3 minutes apart. Since they weren't that close, we decided to go to Brian's brother, Sean's house as we had previously planned. They needed help shoveling rock. I stayed inside and hung out with my sister in law, Cassy. We chatted, watched TV a little, and I kept track of my contractions. They were even closer by the time evening rolled around, about 4-5 minutes apart. We left Sean and Cassy's around 9 and went home.When we got home we had a message from the Doctor's office saying to call and schedule my induction. They weren't open on the weekend, so I would have to wait until Monday to call. I played World of Warcraft for an hour or so before heading to bed. I slept pretty well, the contractions weren't as strong as they had been that afternoon. When I woke up they had gotten farther apart again, maybe 8-9 minutes apart, but they were strong! Not to the point that I had to focus on breathing to get through, but they were getting a little uncomfortable. I took a nice long shower...this really helped, especially when the water was hitting my lower back. This was Saturday, January 19th. My Dad's birthday. For some reason he REALLY wanted me to have the baby on his birthday. During the morning it looked like it was going to happen. I was talking to Brian in our bedroom when I felt a rush of something, when I went to the bathroom I realized I had lost my mucous plug (yeah I know that sounds pretty gross, but to me I thought it was really cool the way the body prepares to have a baby, and losing that plug was one step closer)After that exciting event the contractions kind of fizzled out. I would get one every 20-30 minutes. It was kind of disappointing. My dad would call me every now and then and ask how things were going and I had to tell them "they weren't going". My Aunt Patty and Uncle John had come into town from Missouri that weekend to see my Grandma, so I think they were secretly hoping I would have the baby while they were in town. I needed to get out of the house, So Brian and I took a long walk with the dog around our neighborhood. It was a beautiful day, and it felt great to be outside getting fresh air. The walking did help a little, the contractions came back and were about 15 minutes apart. When we got home, we went to Quizzno's for dinner, I played a little World of Warcraft and then went to sleep. Sunday the 20th rolled around and I had NO contractions, wait I take that back, I think I had ONE while we were sitting in Church. I had called the doctor that morning and asked her what I could do to jumpstart the labor again. She told me to walk, walk, walk, and she gave me one other piece of advice that I am not going to share. For those of you reading this who have had children and are familiar with natural ways to get labor going, I am sure you can figure out what she told me to do. Sunday evening we celebrated my Dad's birthday. I had called my sister Brenda, and told her to get to my parents house early so we could walk before dinner. The walking didn't do anything, no contractions whatsoever. I decided to just go with the flow. I wasn't going to worry about it anymore. I enjoyed hanging out with my Aunt and Uncle, enjoyed the good food and the good company. Monday the 21st was Martin Luther King day, and since I had the day off, and Brian didn't, he wanted me to hang out at his sister's house so I wasn't too far away and all by myself. So I spent the day with Charlene, and David and their girls. That morning I called the doctor's office to schedule my induction, they scheduled me for the next day, which happened to be my due date!!! I was supposed to call at 5am to make sure they had room for me and the induction was scheduled for 6am. Wow, I couldn't believe that I would be having the baby tomorrow. Doctor Johnson had told me when I called on Sunday that she didn't think they would end up inducing me, she was pretty sure I would have the baby before. I had been dealing with a minor cold since the previous week, and Monday it was pretty bad, Brian was also feeling pretty sick. When he got off work he came over to Charlene's for dinner. I asked him and David to give me a blessing, one, to help me feel better, and two, for comfort. Brian gave me the blessing. He got emotional talking about the birth of the baby. I think that's when it really hit him that soon we would be holding our little baby boy. For dinner we had tostadas. Normally even when not pregnant I can eat several, but I tried to eat lightly because I didn't want to make myself sick to my stomach, especially if I were to have the baby very soon. We went home around 8 and I made sure everything was ready for the hospital the next day, set the alarm for 5am and went to sleep. Oh, I forgot to mention that my contractions had started up again, I think they started shortly before we left Charlene and David's house. When I got home they were 2-3 minutes apart, but very faint. I called the doctor again, she said wait until they are stronger. So that's where I was at when I went to sleep. At about 2am I woke up, I thought I heard a "pop" and my clothes were all wet. My water had broke!! I woke Brian up and told him to get ready to go to the hospital. I went to the bathroom and then was ready to go. As soon as I had woken up my contractions HURT!!! I tried to concentrate and breath through them, but it wasn't working. They were all in my back and the pain was unbearable. The drive to the hospital was torture. I was getting these massive contractions exactly 2 minutes apart. I knew I wouldn't be able to go natural. We got to the hospital and checked in at the ER. They put me in a wheelchair and took me to Triage. Triage was pure torture. They took FOREVER! Asked me a bunch of questions, they had to test to see if my water indeed had broken (it had, and I had a "slow leak" LOL! It made me feel like they were talking about a car's tires!),and they checked to see how dilated I was. I was at a 3,and 100% effaced. The old lady in Triage felt it was her duty to lecture me for not taking a birthing class ($75 for a class was not in our budget at the time, so I read everything I could instead). I was not fond of this lady, all I wanted was my epidural and to be away from her. I was tested positive for Strep B, so they had to give me an IV. The Triage lady set up my IV and gave me demerol (sp?) to help take the edge off the pain until I could get the epi. I hate demerol, it's useless, I felt the pain just as much, and it made me feel all woozy and dizzy. It didn't help a bit. When I got to my L&D room, the nurses (Heather and Vanessa, very nice girls by the way) went to get the anesthesiologist for my epi. The epidural itself didn't hurt, it was the fact that they wanted me to sit still so they could put it in, and while they were doing this I was still having massive contractions. Almost immediately after I felt nothing, it was great. By this time I think it was close to 4 or 4:30 am. I had told the nurses that I was supposed to be induced at 6am, and they were saying it would be funny if I had the baby before that time. After the epi they checked my progress and I was at a 5. They told me to get some sleep. They set up a bed for Brian. I was able to sleep a little bit. Listening to Hayden's heart on the monitor was a comforting sound to me, and I was able to fall asleep for short intervals while listening to it. Sometimes when I had a contraction, the baby would move and I wouldn't be able to hear his heartbeat as well, then I would wake up. At around 5 or 5:30 the nurses came in to help me lay on my other side (So the epidural wouldn't numb one side only) and they checked my progress...I was at an 8!! I was almost done. They went to get Doctor Johnson and tell her that I would be ready to push soon. Over the next half an hour or so they brought in the baby warmer and got everything prepared. Then we tried pushing. I think I pushed for 10 minutes at the most and Dr. Johnson decided that it wasn't time, the baby wasn't moving much, she said either we let the contractions do their job or I can give you an episiotomy and you can have the baby now, and I said NO WAY to the episiotomy!! So they gave me this thing, it was like a peanut shaped exercise ball, to put between my legs, supposedly that helps bring the baby down more. They also put me on oxygen because Hayden's heart rate was slowing just a little during the contractions. So for about 20 minutes I lay on my side, with a huge peanut between my knees and an oxygen mask on. During this time was shift change, and I said goodbye to Heather and Vanessa, and hello to the new nurses (I can't remember their names for the life of me, but they too were really nice). After 20 minutes I could feel pressure even with the epi and they decided that it was REALLY time to push. This was about 7am. I pushed for about 25 minutes, and then I had Hayden in my arms, bloody and screaming. The doctor made Brian cut the cord, he tried to get out of it, but I am glad they made him do it. I couldn't believe that I was finally holding my little boy! I kept saying "oh my gosh, oh my gosh" and I got all teary eyed. It was amazing. I don't even remember what happened after this, I was too busy looking at my beautiful little boy to pay attention!