I realized most of you probably know bits and pieces of our birth story but probably not the entire thing. Plus I wanted to write this down so I don’t forget the details and figured I might as well share. It’s a bit late but better late than never right? 
Friday, September 18th, started just like every other day at our house. I got up around 6:45 to use the bathroom and then went and laid back down waiting for Addie to get up. I was uncomfortable but just figured it was a combination of being 39 weeks and 6 days pregnant and maybe sleeping funny. Addie got up around 7:15 and she and I headed downstairs while Adam started getting ready for work. While I was walking down the stairs I noticed my back hurt a little. My first thought was “this is how my labor started with Addie!” but I didn’t want to get excited because I figured my back just hurt and didn’t really think it was because of contractions.
When we got downstairs I started making Addie breakfast and picking up the kitchen. I was still curious to see if what I was feeling was possibly contractions so I found a contraction timer online so I could just hit start and stop as needed rather than actually paying attention to the clock. After a few starts and stops I looked at the times it was recording and it appeared to be contractions that were 30-40 seconds long and about 2 1/2 minutes apart! I didn’t really think my labor was starting that fast so I assumed they’d slow down after a while.
Adam came down shortly after and I told him that I didn’t think he’d be going to work. He asked why and I told him to open the laptop where I had the contraction timer open. He was surprised that they were so close together and asked me if they were real or if this was just false labor. I said I wasn’t sure and that I wanted to go take a shower to see if they’d slowe down at all. They didn’t. During my shower they quickly got stronger until I was on my hands and knees to get through them. Makes for an interesting shower! After my shower I got dressed and started doing some pacing across our bedroom. (Our room is fabulous for pacing because of the hallway. I did this for several hours while I was in labor with Addie.) At this point I was starting to think I couldn’t do this again which, hindsight being 20/20, should have been a sign to me of just how close we were. A bit later Adam came up to check on me and I asked him not to go to work. Earlier I had been figuring he could go to work and I’d just call him when things started really happening…good thing we decided for him to stay home!
When I came downstairs I kept walking around in circles and sitting on my exercise ball while playing with Addie between contractions. Adam went up to call his work and send out a couple emails figuring we had a fair amount of time. I’d sit down with Addie and read books between contractions and let her bounce with me on the exercise ball. I explained to her that my back hurt so I needed to take a break whenever I had a contraction. She was so sweet and kept going behind me to rub my back.
By the time Adam came back down I was in serious pain. We realized that things were moving faster than either of us had anticipated. He started rubbing my back during contractions and hanging out with Addie between them. At this point I asked if we should call one of the people that had offered to take care of Addie while we were at the hospital to make sure they were available. Little did I know they had been keeping in touch with each other for a while before my due date to make sure one of them was always available in case we needed them! We decided I should call the midwives first and see if they thought we should come in (yes, I was still questioning it at this point). I called the pager number and Kathy called me back. She asked a few questions like when I started having contractions, how far apart/how long they were, and how far I was dilated at my last appointment. She seemed surprised I was 39 weeks and hadn’t been checked yet but I had declined that at my appointment the day before. While on the phone with her I had a contraction and she could hear me screaming despite the fact that I put the phone down and she decided I should probably come in but that it was ultimately up to us.
We called our friend Stefanie and asked if we could bring Addie over. She offered to come here and watch her but I figured it would be faster for us to bring her there because she’s almost on the way to the hospital. She said yes and Adam quickly got all the bags into the car while taking care of both me and Addie. He was amazing!
When he came back in from one of his trips to the car I was in the bathroom and I think he definitely panicked thinking that we’d have the baby at home since that is one of the things we learned in our birth class was a sign that baby is coming soon! Shortly after that and before we got into the car I told him I wanted to push and he promptly told me no I couldn’t!
Once we were all loaded into the car we set off at about 90 mph for Stefanie’s and then the hospital which would be about an hour long trip total. Addie did awesome sitting in back with her goldfish while I crawled around the entire front seat during contractions because I was hurting so much and Adam tried to make me as comfortable as possible. At some point I decided to make sure I couldn’t feel her head so I reached down and could feel my bag of water but no head, that was a good sign! Just before we got to 40 we called Stef to see if she could meet us at the hospital and get Addie instead of us coming there because we realized we’d never make it if we tried to drop Addie off. She was more than willing so we headed straight for UNC.
Once we got there Adam pulled into valet parking (which we didn’t plan on using). The guy was taking his time with the people in front of us until he heard me screaming then he quickly got the van keys and our last name and told us to go! I remember standing there waiting for Adam and the guy yelling to me to start heading in and Adam would catch up. Once we got inside with Addie and all of our bags we had a short walk between the Children’s hospital and the Women’s hospital. I’m pretty certain I scared every single person between the van and the elevator to get upstairs with my screaming. A doctor approached us and asked if we needed help and offered to get a wheel chair which was the last thing I wanted. I don’t remember if she walked all the way with us or not but we eventually made it to the elevator. When we got into the elevator I told Adam the baby was going to be born there and we weren’t going to make it upstairs (L&D is on the 4th floor). He assured me we’d make it and we did.
The woman at the administration desk told me I could have a seat at the desk and I asked if I could stand just before Adam told her we did not have time for this. I ended up having another contraction and she was convinced we didn’t have time and every doctor and nurse on the floor came out of hiding! One doctor told me to come with him trying to get me into a room and I kept telling him “no, I want the midwife!” Adam said I was yelling at the doctor that I wanted the midwife but I think I was calmer than that. After two or three times he finally said okay and backed off. I did finally go to a room with one of the nurses and got settled.
They quickly got me a gown and into the bed. A couple minutes after we got to the room Kathy, the midwife, came in and told me I could start pushing whenever I was ready. She had just asked the nurse for a hook to break my water when my water broke on its own with the first push. There was some light meconium staining so the NICU had to be called to come in for the delivery to check her out. Just a few pushes later she was born!
Addie was in the delivery room for the whole thing. The nurses were awesome and kept an eye on her and got her set up watching cartoons. Then after Piper was born they got Addie a “Big Sister” sticker and some of my graham crackers. Addie did so good. She didn’t run around and push all the buttons in the delivery room and she didn’t seem upset by everything that was going on which was my big concern.
After Piper was born they took her over to the warming unit to check her out. Her first APGAR was 8 and the second was 9. They brought her back to me and Addie got to come over and meet her baby sister. A couple minutes later the nurse said the person who was going to take care of Addie was there and asked if she could come in. When Stef walked in I think she was a bit shocked to see a baby! Adam walked them out to the car (or maybe just downstairs, I really don’t know) and then came back up. We stayed in the delivery room for about 45 minutes, maybe an hour, and then went upstairs to our other room. They brought my lunch and Adam went down and got himself something at the cafeteria. The three of us hung out until about 4pm and then Adam went to get Addie.
The next day Piper and I got to go home around 3pm. I was released around 10am and Piper would have been released sooner but they had 5 people being discharged that day and apparently we were last on the list. Oh well, we got to go home!
So the short version of the story is…contractions started at 7:15, we got to the hospital at 9:58, my water broke at 10:04 and she was born at 10:14.
