Joshua is 6!

And my, how the time has flown! I always think it's fun to reminisce with the kids on their birthdays, so I dug out Joshua's birth story and pictures last night. I think we may try and watch the video later on.

Joshua's birth was difficult for me both physically and mentally. It took a few years to convince myself that I hadn't failed and that not having a "perfect birth" was really ok. Those kinds of things are what build character and weave the fabric of our lives, right? Life experiences and all that jazz.

Ok, so here's his story and a link to the pictures from his birth day. (Warning... the pics aren't gory, but may lean a little toward the National Geographic side of things!)

Birth Pictures
More Birth Pictures

After the Thursday/Friday false labor episode, I spent most of Saturday morning moping around. I had a few big, painful contractions after I got out of bed but nothing to get excited about. I was supposed to go to a baby shower that morning, but decided to skip it... I could barely talk about what had happened without crying and just didn't feel up to socializing. Around 11am, a friend called from the baby shower to see where I was and how I was doing. Jay explained everything and the friend decided to invite me out to the mall for lunch. I thought it might be nice to get out of the house without the kids, so I went. Walking around the mall stirred things up and I started having painful contractions that I needed to breathe through. I headed out to Home Depot and the grocery store before heading home and the contractions continued.

After dinner, Jay and I decided to take the kids for a walk to see what the contractions would do. They were about 8 minutes apart at this point and very different from what I had experienced on Thursday. We walked for about 10 minutes and I had 4 hard contractions. We were trying not to get our hopes up, but things were looking promising. I decided to take a shower and then sat down at the computer to chat with a few friends and see what the contractions would do. By 8:30, the contractions were coming every 2-3 minutes and lasting about 45 to 60 seconds and I was having to breathe and focus to get through them. Jay called the neighbor at 9pm and took the kids over so we could head to the hospital.

We arrived at the hospital at 10pm or so and I was hooked up to the monitors. Our L&D nurse, Jill, from Thursday was our triage nurse and it was kind of nice to see some familiar faces! She checked me and said I was 5-6cm and 100% effaced, but she wanted another nurse to check as well since the OB had discharged me Friday morning saying I was maybe a 3-4cm when Jill had said I was 'a good 6'. The second nurse came in and said I was 7cm and 100%... I liked her numbers much better! They paged my OB, Dr. Pass, but he never called in (we found out later that he'd already left for his vacation) so they paged in the same OB that discharged me Friday morning. While waiting for a room assignment, my water broke. Jay and I were so excited... there was no turning back now!

We ended up in the same room we'd had on Thursday and both of us were amazed that I was so far along, but still able to handle the pain and smile and joke between contractions. Soon we were joined by my friend Terry, my sister, my BIL and my nephew. I labored along for a few hours and then the L&D nurse, Jenni, decided to check me. Lo and behold, I had a 2nd bag of water! No wonder labor was still manageable!! Jenni pronounced me 8-9cm. Things were starting to get more painful and at 4am, Dr. Goodman came in to break my water. I was still at 9cm but baby was still up pretty high (-1 station). Once he broke my water, things got really painful. I managed a few more hours of hard labor before deciding to get an epidural. I was terrified of a repeat of the experience I'd had with Kenna, but I knew that I wasn't letting my body relax enough to finish dilating and for baby to start moving down.

By 8am, I had my epidural in place and I was a new person! I decided to nap while I could and the OB decided to start Pitocin. At about 11am, I was fully dilated but baby was still at -1 station and posterior. He suggested getting me in the hands & knees position to try and turn baby and to even try some pushing if I felt like it. I tried hands & knees first, but it made me sick... plus it wasn't very comfortable with half a numb body! I got rolled over and tried some pushing. After 45 minutess of pushing and no real progress, Jay and I discussed a C-section. Neither one of us wanted me to go through hours of pushing only to end up with a section anyway and it was pretty apparent that the baby wasn't going to move down. The nurse informed the OB and things were set in motion.

The experience was very surreal. At my 36 week ultrasound, I had this odd feeling that I'd have to have a C-section with this baby, but never in a million years did I think that it would actually happen! Especially since I had two successful vaginal births... why would this labor/delivery be any different? I was a jumble of emotions in the OR - excited to finally meet my baby, scared about the C-section, and sad that I wasn't getting the birth I had envisioned.

The surgery went very smoothly. The OB said that as soon as they opened me up, they could see baby looking right at them. They pulled out his head and I remember hearing everyone commenting on how big his head was! Then they pulled the rest of him out and Jay exclaimed, "It's a boy! It *is* a boy, right?" The OB replied, "Most definitely a boy!" No one could believe how big Joshua was and the OB later told me that they could've let me 'push until Monday morning, but that baby was not coming out on his own.' They bundled him up and let me look for a few minutes and then took him to the nursery for evaluation. A few minutes later they called the OR to relay the stats... 9 pounds 13 ounces, 22.5 inches long and a 14.75 inch head! Jay told me that the nurses all gathered around to watch him get weighed and measured because most of them had never seen a baby so big!

They finished sewing me up and rolled me into recovery. Jay was able to bring Joshua in right away because he needed to nurse and try to get his sugar levels up. He latched on right away and happily nursed until they were ready to move me to a post-partum room. He was beautiful and big, but not the fat little baby I had expected! He was very long and had these skinny little legs... I was expecting a chubbo! We kept marveling over how he filled up the hospital bassinet!

All in all, my birth experience was nothing like I had planned or hoped for, but the end result was still the same. It's been almost 7 weeks since he was born and I've just about forgotten all of the pain... all those sweet smiles and coos sure make it easy :)