Presenting Annelise Claire....

Once upon a time (Feb. 26th 2010, to be exact), I went for my 40 week OB appointment. The doctor examined me and told me I was still at 4 - 4 1/2 cm dilated. The news frustrated me, because for a week I had been walking around 4 cm dilated. For a month, at 3 cm. Most people are admitted and having regular contractions at this point, yet nothing was happening for me. She stripped my membranes again, then sent me up to Labor and Delivery so they could do a work-up on me just to double check my bag of water wasn't leaking.

When I entered triage in the Labor and Delivery wing, they hooked me up to all the lovely monitors. It was then, that I noticed I was actually having regular contractions 5 min. apart. They weren't painful at all though, just slightly uncomfortable.

The doc comes in a checks me out. She calls me "5-5 1/2 cm dilated" and tells me to sit tight, because while there wasn't any fluid, they were noticing slight heart rate decelerations after each contraction.

They monitor me for another 30 min.

She comes back and tells me that because I'm so far dilated AND having regular contractions they were going to admit me.

Wow!

So they wheel me up to Labor and Delivery with an ice water in hand and warm blanket on my lap. Yes, I live a pampered life. ; )

From about 5pm-6pm, we wait. The decelerations went away and everything looked pretty normal. Jon left and took Lilia to a friends house for the night, while I chatted with my favorite nurse, Shara. She offered me an epidural, even though I wasn't in pain yet....just in case. ; ) I declined (which I'll later kick myself for).

Jon returned around 6:45pm. Dr. Braden came in at 7, and checked my progress. I was still at 5 1/2 cm dilated.

"I'm gonna break your bag of water and then we'll start you on pitocin," she says.

Flashbacks of horror start raging through my mind of what happened after my water was broke with Lilia. Given, I was dosed up on pitocin with her and hadn't had any yet.

I wouldn't let her do it at first...but she was completely understanding and waited until I was ready.

Then Pop!

Nothing about it hurt, like I remember it hurting with Lilia. However, when they tried to order pitocin, I told them absolutely not. In fact, I wanted them to order an epidural.

Now, the next two hours was full of pain and in between the pain, me BEGGING the nurse to go get the epidural guy from the room over, because I NEEDED HIM MORE! : ) Which come to find out, I did.

Time after time, he was busy though. Shara had left and all I could think about was how much I wanted her back. This nurse was cold and kept telling me "You're hurting the baby, you need to breath during contractions."

She check me and said "Wow, you weren't kidding, you do go fast after your water breaks....you went from 5-7cm in less than an hour."

"WHY DON'T YOU PEOPLE LISTEN TO ME?! I TOLD YOU THAT!" (and yes, I get a free pass to be rude, since I was in labor).

She goes to check on the epidural guy. Comes back.

"Looks like he won't get here in time with how fast you're progressing."

Once again, I remind her that I told her I wanted the epidural before they broke my water specifically because of this and they didn't listen.

She offers me something else.

The second I get it in an IV, the epidural dude walks in.

I'm pretty sure when I see God, he might give me the happy feeling I get towards epidural guys, while I'm in labor.

If I wouldn't have been so out of it, I would have hugged the dude.

Anyways, in goes the epidural. My legs got tingly and those contractions vanished. I had to push though (just as I had to for the past 20 min., but didn't dare tell the nurse because she would have made me). The need to push, is quite evident even through an epidural....so I still felt every contraction.

I waited for the epidural to take full effect (20 min.), then told the nurse I was ready to push. She checked me and sure enough I was 10 cm and good to go.

At 10 pm, I started pushing and after some amazing cheering by awesome doctors, delivered at 10:17pm.

I loved my doctors. One thing I remember is looking at them in between pushing and seeing them all smiling and telling me "Wow, you're doing awesome at pushing!! I'm so proud of you!!"

So from 7pm-10pm I dilated 5 cm. Those are some hard contractions, but they got the job done fast. ; )

Annelise Claire was born at 10:17 pm
7lbs 9 oz
19 inches

And then being wheeled into the mother baby unit, the nurse tells me "I don't want to scare you, but there is a tsunami warning out of Oahu and it's serious this time....if you're daughter is staying near the shoreline, you might want to go get her."

Dum, dum, dum.....