It Was a Dark and Stormy Night.....

To preface let me just say that when my other blogger friends were having babies recently I was always super anxious and impatient to have them post pictures and the story of how their labor went. If I knew they had already had the baby and it was three days past I couldn't figure out what was taking them so long!! Well, now I know. Getting on the computer is the furthest thing from your mind when you have a newborn who is demanding your attention round the clock. So here we are a whole week past Sawyers big debut. And his story goes like this......

It really was a dark and stormy night, the wind was out of control. In the future we will probably tell Sawyer the wind blew him to us that night. Matt was insistent that he would be born in October and sure enough it was October 1, 2009 at 3:00 am when I first woke up with pain. The whole week before I was looking up on the internet what exactly a contraction feels like because I wasn't sure I would know. Now that just seems silly because it's true what they say that when you have one you WILL KNOW. From 3 am til 7 they were consistent about 5-7 minutes apart so we left for the hospital at 8. I was afraid we would get there too early and they would send us home.

Once we arrived, they hooked me up to a monitor and apparently my contractions were more like 3-4 minutes apart, but unfortunately I was only dialated at that point to a 2. They thought about sending me home, but wanted me to walk around for an hour first and see if I progressed. After an hour of shuffling the hallway with many, many, many stops to breathe they rechecked me and I was a 3. They doctor on call decided to admit me and wanted to break my water. We called Matt's mom Carol at that point to let her know that we were definitely going to be having a baby that day and she headed to the hospital. They started an IV after 5 attempts to get the needle in my hand, and after 5 times of me nearly passing out from their poking the needle around in my veins. At about 10:00 they broke my water and that's when the fun really started!
I really thought I was smiling in this picture when it was taken, but I don't think my attempt to mask the pain was very convincing. I got some kind of medication to take the edge off at around noon when I was dialated to a 5, which didn't do a thing except make me loopy. Matt was feeding me ice chips, and gobstoppers to suck on, and rewetting my washcloth for me. From 12-2 I don't really remember a thing, I almost felt delirious from the pain or it could have been the medication too, but now I know why when you ask someone on a scale of 1-10 how bad their labor pains were they say it was a 30! I didn't want to get the epidural too early, but finally I was getting to the point where I was gonna rip of the nurses head if she didn't get me something STAT! It felt like an eternity before that glorious needle got put into my back. Little did we know (since they didn't check me before the epidural) but I was already dialated 9 at that point and was almost ready to push. The nurse had to turn the epidural down so I could have more feeling to be able to push. We did a practice push session and he was ready to come out!! She called the doctor and told here to come over asap. I couldn't feel any contractions, but my body was doing a good of a job of getting him out on it's own, so good that the nurse had to hold my legs closed until the Dr. got there. She barely had time to put her gown on! After some excellent coaching from Matt and Carol and a few pushes later and out came baby Sawyer Emmett at 4:12 pm.
Here Matt is cutting the cord.
Proud Daddy.
Tired and exhausted, but also relieved that it ended up being an easier labor than expected. I highly recommend getting an epidural by the way. I was a happy camper after that and was even joking to Matt that we should have 6 kids if was going to be this easy of a delivery. Because the whole process was so fast, the nurses all told me that with any future children I better be ready to rush to the hospital or I'll have the baby on the way there.
Grandma Howell holding her second grandbaby to be born in one month.

Grandma Carol holding Sawyer.
On his way home from the hospital. Looks like he is contemplating whether he is going to like it here or not.

My favorite shot of Matt and his new son.

Eyes wide open.
Moxie trying to greet her new friend.

Our little beanie baby.