From the beginning

Well, not the beginning, but lots of people have been asking about how Tuesday progressed, so here goes.

Kevin and I went to bed about midnight on Monday night and I told him that it definitely wasn't happening that night. I wasn't feeling it at all. So I read, set my alarm for work the next morning and cursed the pregnancy gods for not letting me go into labor yet. I had an appointment that afternoon and had made arrangements to come back the following Monday to discuss inducement if I hadn't delivered yet....my nurse practictioner wasn't too convinced that I was really close. So I fell asleep wondering if it was ever going to happen.

I woke up about 3am, feeling a little cramping, but in the interest of full disclosure, I had no thoughts that I was in labor....I thought I was constipated. Something I'm sure you all want to think about. For about 90 minutes I was going between the bedroom and the bath about every 10-15 minutes, hoping to "relieve" myself and finally get some sleep. I kept cursing my life because I really wanted to be productive at work the next day and finish one last project up.

About 4:30, I had the thought that maybe I wasn't constipated, but was having some contractions....that was honestly the first time I thought about it. I decided to wake Kevin up and have him do some timing just in case. He timed the first 3 contractions and they were all between 4 and 6 minutes, so he called the hospital.

You'd think calling the hospital would be the easy part, but no....what a cluster. He called the number they gave us and they first sent us to the wrong hospital (our clinic group is associated with a couple hospitals). From the bathroom (I was brushing my teeth and getting my bathroom stuff packed), I heard him say our doctor's name, then spell it, then give them the clinic name, then the doctor's name again. Obviously things weren't going well for him and I was starting to have very strong contractions at this point and wasn't amused by the delay. Finally they sent him back to the operator and got us to the right hospital. Our doctor happened to be on call, so they hung up and got our doc to call us back....I'm sure he was pleased with having someone wake him up for that. I have my suspicions that the labor and delivery department is supposed to tell us when to come in.

Well, the doc told us to load up and head in, so within 10 minutes we had the dogs in the kennel, the suitcase in the car and were on our way. By this point it has only been about 45 minutes since Kevin woke up and I was really starting to regret waiting so long to get him up....the contractions were becoming unbearable. I wondered if the people driving around us would be able to piece together what was happening in our car if they looked over....Kevin with a scared shitless look on his face and me grimacing in severe pain. I don't know if I would've figured it out if I was them, but at least I was able to focus on something to try and not think about the pain....wondering if they were really up this early for work or if all those over-achievers were heading to workout.

Took us about 20 minutes to get to the hospital...of course, the stoplight gods made sure we stopped at every single light on the way. Kevin dropped me off at the door and while I'll save the hospital stuff for a later post, let me tell you my first experience in the hospital. I walked up to the information desk and told her what was happening and that labor/delivery was expecting us. All of a sudden I had one of those "stop you in your tracks, take your breath away" contractions. As I'm leaning over the desk trying to breath it out, the lady at the desk said (in a cheerful, chuckling voice), "Oh, ha ha ha, your body is working so hard right now!" If I would've had any ability to stand myself up straight or any energy to respond, it would've been with a right-hand slap to her face. No shit, lady. If you know what's good for you, you'll get me a wheelchair and stop talking.

Anyway, this is long and I should probably go check on my child (and maybe even my napping husband). The hospital portion of the story is hopefully more interesting and will be added later. Hope everyone is well!