Joshua Stephen's Birthday

March 29 was a normal Sunday. We went to church and then had dinner at Ron and Alecia’s house. We needed diapers for Andrew and they were on sale at K-Mart, so the three of us went together after lunch. While we were there I had one contraction. I looked at my cell phone and it was 4:05 pm. I told Spencer and thought that maybe I would start having them every fifteen minutes, but I didn’t. We went about the rest of the day as normal, no more contractions. Around 9:00 pm I started to just feel funny but I wasn’t having any contractions. I went to bed at 9:50 and I started to have pains in my lower stomach, but I wasn’t convinced that they were full blown contractions. After about 15 minutes of dozing on and off and still having the stomach pains I figured that they were contractions but I was more bothered by the growing “pressure” that I felt with every contraction. Spencer came to bed around 10:30 and I told him that I was pretty sure I was in labor, but that I figured that it would be a couple more hours before we needed to go to the hospital. Since it was starting to get late, I sent Emily a text message to tell her to keep her phone on so that I would be able to get ahold of her if I needed to. She immediately called me back and asked if I was in labor, I said that I was pretty sure, but not to call anyone else and wake them up.

By that time the contractions were coming every 3-4 minutes and they made me too uncomfortable to sleep. The pressure was so bad that I thought my water was going to break every time I stood up. At 11:20 I got up and went to the bathroom so I could sway at the counter through contractions and then went to the restroom. It was at that point that I noticed some spotting. I immediately yelled for Spencer to wake up. He stumbled into the bathroom and asked what he should do. I told him to call his parents so they could come stay with Andrew, I wasn’t going to mess around, I knew we needed to get to the hospital.

Ron and Alecia got to our house in about 10 minutes, Spencer threw some stuff together (I already had my bag packed) and we decided that Alecia would come with us and Ron would stay with the baby. I showed him the list of instructions I had typed up for Andrew and then we all prayed together and the three of us left for the hospital. While we were on our way to the hospital I was having a contraction and Spencer started singing me one of the songs from Andrew’s Veggie Tales sing-a-longs and asked if it made me feel better, I smiled and nodded because we are always singing those songs even when Andrew isn’t around! We got to the Emergency Room around midnight and Spencer asked if we could use a wheelchair and we headed up to Labor and Delivery. On our way up we passed a man in the hallway and he said, “I wonder where you’re going!”

We got to the nurse’s desk and went through the whole registration process. The nurses talked back and forth for a minute while trying to pull up my pre-registration information when Alecia piped up and said, “When she got here with her first one she was already dilated to 9.” The nurse looked at me and said, “Please don’t be dilated to 9!”

They got me to my room and I quickly changed and the nurse got me hooked up and I had a huge sigh of relief when we heard the baby’s heartbeat because I knew that he was ok. She proceeded to ask me if I was planning on having an epidural. I told her that I had not had one with my first baby and I wanted to see how far dilated I was before I decided because I didn’t want one if I thought I could handle it. She finally got around to checking me and said “Well, you won’t be getting an epidural, you’re already at 9!” I was so relieved to know that I didn’t need one and that the end was in sight! At that point I remember thinking that the next time we saw Andrew we would be a family of four. The nurse then called Dr. Lemay and told me that I needed to try and wait until she got there if I could. Pretty soon I was getting poked for blood, getting an IV hooked up and they were setting up all the equipment for the baby. There was also a nurse having me sign a bunch of consent forms…she apologized for the timing, and I told her it was ok because it was a distraction between contractions!

Within a couple of minutes I was having a very strong sensation to push and knew I couldn’t because the doctor wasn’t there yet. Thankfully I had the help of a wonderful coach and husband telling me just to breathe and letting me squeeze his hand to pieces! After two more contractions Dr.Lemay walked in and checked me, told me I was 10 and broke my water. She told me to go ahead and give a push on my next contraction to see what would happen. I started to give a big push and she told me to stop. At that point she got her gown on and I said. “Is it going to take long?” She smiled and said “You’ll have a baby on your next push.” On the next contraction I pushed and they told me I could take a breath, and Spencer told me he was almost out, so I just kept pushing and at 12:58 AM Joshua Stephen was born!

They took him to clean him up and the first thing I asked Spencer was if he looked like Andrew and if his head was a nice shape. Spencer assured me that he was beautiful and his head was fine! It was so wonderful looking at his sweet little face for the first time and getting to kiss his velvet cheeks! Once the nurses and doctors left Spencer and I had a chance to thank the Lord for the beautiful blessing of our second son. Since the moment Joshua was born he has been a sweet and pleasant blessing in our lives!