"I think that was a contraction" - Part 2

Thursday - 39 weeks 5 days - 4am
From around 1-4am my contractions had gotten more unpredictable and further apart (And might I add that I was getting very peeved with this baby for making me play the guessing game). At 4 in the morning is when my eyes were no longer closing between contractions and I had to get up. I got on the yoga ball and did some bouncing. I did Sudoku (who does this?? While in labor??). I tracked contractions for about 40 minutes until they were 3 minutes apart, and definitely getting more intense. The midwife gave me the all clear to come into the hospital! Now all we had to do was leave. I went back to the bedroom to wake Luke up.
"Hon? Wake up it's time to go to the hospital"
[Very out of it] "What? How far apart are your contractions?" He half sat up and squinted at me. Probably with his mouth open a little. He was really out of it!
"3 minutes"
"Why aren't we at the hospital yet??" Now he's awake!
We got to the hospital around 5am and got into triage. They proceeded to ask me 10,000 questions before even examining me. It is incredibly difficult to answer questions when you're having a contraction every 3 minutes. When I had finally been examined it was about 5:45.
I was 3cm. The terrible phone call was made to my doctor "should we admit her?"
YES. Yes you should. Please don't make me go back home. I haven't slept at all. I need have a baby today.
"Okay, your doctor said to walk around for 45 minutes and we'll check you again at 6:30"
And walk we did. Stopping every now and then to rest on a wall and have a contraction. At 6:30 on the dot the nurse came to get us and examine me again.
"4cm" I could stay!
By 7 we were in a room and ready to get things going. Contractions were very intense right away. It was like my body knew we were staying at the hospital and it didn't want to waste time. We walked. I leaned. We swayed. After 2 hours I was in a lot of pain and my doctor had to remind me how to breathe. It was hard to stay focused. I had planned to have a natural birth (if possible) but I remember thinking it was a lot harder than I thought it was going to be.
"I might need something." I told Luke "I want to be examined again and see if I've made any progress and then decide"
My reasoning was: If I'm not making quick progress and I'm going to be doing this for the next 20 hours, I'm going to burn out. But if things are moving quickly, I can hang on a little longer.
At 9am I was 8 1/2 cm dilated.
Uh.... What. I can do 1 1/2 more centimeters. At this point I wanted to try some hot water to try to relieve some pain. Oh boy did it work great! I felt like a new woman. Hello, shower! I stayed in the shower for about 2 hours! I was racking up water bills single-handedly. And then... the shower stopped feeling so great. So I moved to the bed. The pressure was getting pretty real at this point. I was uncomfortable. And the only thing that felt better was laying down on my back. At this point I was remembering my ignorant self, months ago, thinking "I don't want to give birth while on my back. I want to be more "natural"." Um. No. There was no moving or re-positioning. There was no squatting. There was only my back. My doctor checked me again. 9 1/2! And my water had not broken? Who cares. Let's start pushing! Light pushes were really a game changer. It felt so much better to start pushing just to relieve some pressure. My doctor checked me again a little while later.
10cm! (At this point I think she was tired of my water not having broken so she "accidentally" popped it)
PUSH. Rest. PUSH. Rest. Listen to my doctor give instructions. PUSH. Look at Luke (I was SO tired, I'm pretty sure I was cross-eyed). Rest. For 2 hours.
I. Was. Exhausted. WHEN is this baby going to crown??
And then, in a sudden rush of commotion, I remember my bed being laid back as far as it would go, the doctor saying "Good! Here she comes!". Nurses hustling around the bed. Luke right there, ready!
And there she was! At 1:56pm, 7 hours after we got into our room, our precious little Hazel made her appearance! They immediately laid her on my belly as I sobbed/laughed uncontrollably.
"My baby! My baby!" I couldn't stop. She was perfect! She had hair! She was so calm! Tears were streaming. I was crying, Luke was crying, the doctor was teary. It was the biggest rush of every emotion I have ever had. And Luke, too.
"This is why I love natural births" My doctor whispered to a nurse
One of my nurses was about my age and engaged. She had no children. During my labor I remember thinking that she was probably going to be turned off to ever having children because she sees first hand what women go through.
I looked at her through my watery eyes and said "I don't know how you feel about having kids, but it is totally worth it"
And there we were. A tiny family of 3. Clueless, exhausted, but over the moon. The pain, instantly forgotten. The journey, eager to begin. This chunky little 9 pound baby had been permanently placed in our care.

I guess it was a good thing we took our last birth class the previous Saturday.

"I think that was a contraction" - Part 1

Saturday - 39 weeks
For several days I had been feeling what I thought was just the baby headbutting me. But on Saturday I realized... that was not a headbutt. I paused for a minute and started thinking of all the things I had felt throughout the pregnancy.. but that didn't feel like anything familiar.
I said "I think that was a contraction".
His head whipped around to me "WHAT. Really? Are you sure?"
Well... no... I wasn't sure. I had never felt contractions before, I wasn't really sure of what they were supposed to feel like?
After a few more "heabutts" I determined that they were in fact, contractions. Tiny as they were.
"I don't know if this is necessary, but we might want to start tracking these" I definitely didn't think that this was the real thing, but I didn't know for sure!
Queue the stereotypical (semi) freaked out husband and the nesting Momma! There was laundry I was putting off everywhere. The dishes were stacking up in the sink. I couldn't have my home in this mess if I was really going into labor.
So after a few hours the "headbutting" stopped. False alarm. Talk about an adrenaline rush!

Sunday - 39 weeks 1 day
The "headbutting" continues in an annoying, non-progressing fashion. I believe at this point we were walking whenever we had the chance and people at church were saying to me "You better not be here next week!"

Monday - 39 weeks 2 days
Continuing of "headbutting". I had ditched the hubby at this point to walk alone during the day. I tried really hard to go into labor on this day so Luke's uncle could have a birthday buddy, but to no avail.

Tuesday - 39 weeks 3 days
On Tuesday my wonderful friend, and fellow pregnant woman, gave birth to her beautiful baby boy! The annoyance of tiny contractions continues. I begin to think "This needs to either increase and start labor or stop"

Wednesday - 39 weeks 4 days
On this day is when things really started to pick up. I had a doctors appointment in the afternoon.
"About 2cm dilated and 80% effaced!" the midwife told me. "any day now!"
After this appointment, my contractions started to pick up. They were not painful, not difficult, still just annoying. I just didn't feel well.
In the evening I went to Bible study. However, as soon as I sat down I had to get back up. It was too frustrating to just sit down and be still so I walked around. Every now and then someone would ask "are you okay?" I probably told every person there that I was having mild contractions. After Bible study we decided to swing by the hospital and visit our friends who had their baby the day before. We got to the hospital around 8pm and visited. We all love to talk so its no wonder we stayed for about an hour. It was around 9pm when I said "I think we should go. I'm just not feeling the greatest." What I really wanted was to be in my pajamas. So we headed back to our domain and scooped some great big bowls of ice cream and laid down in bed watching Netflix. Pretty soon, I was getting pretty uncomfortable.
"Maybe we should start tracking these again.." so we did.
We then proceeded to "rest" for a while. (any woman who's given birth knows how incredibly impossible that is)
After resting for about 45 minutes, we decided to get up. Guess what we did? Walk! That's right, at midnight or a little after, we got up, threw on some jackets, and walked around outside our apartment building. Walking helped, but after walking every day for the past 5 days, it grew old quickly. So we decided to come back inside. I couldn't rest so... I did dishes. I had to pause mid knife scrubbing to have a contraction. Probably not my finest decision.
At about 1am my contractions were pretty consistent at about 3-4 minutes apart so I called the doctor's office! (which, by the way, I felt so terrible for waking her up at 1am)
"Hi, um, I'm not sure if I need to come into the hospital? I think I'm in labor"
[Very groggy midwife] "How far apart are your contractions?"
"About 3 minutes"
"And what baby is this for you?"
"My first"
"Have your contractions been getting more intense?"
At this point I realized that they had not, in fact, been getting more intense. They had only been getting closer and closer together. The midwife instructs me to try and rest and call her back in an hour if they started getting more intense. So that's what I did. Luke promptly fell asleep and I laid in bed next to him, only closing my eyes between contractions. There was no sleep.