Birth Story

I know this isn't everyone's cup of tea, but for those who are interested in hearing his story, here it is!

Good Friday
I had contractions pretty regularly for awhile, so I called the office to find out if I should get checked out. We dropped off the girls and drove out...and nothing was progressing. They had us walk around the hospital for an hour to see if anything would change, but no progress. Contractions stopped shortly after we left the hospital.

Tuesday
I woke up in the middle of the night with more contractions that were much more regular (every 3 minutes, lasting for a minute) and the possibility of a small leak, so in the morning we dropped off the girls and went back to the office to get checked out. Still no progress. They didn't see any amniotic fluid leak, either, so we wandered around for a bit, but contractions had again fizzled out, so we went home. This time we ate spicy food, took herbs and homeopathics that were supposed to get labor moving again if the body was ready...
After a few hours contractions picked back up again. They were stronger than they had been in the morning...enough so that as we went back to the hospital, I laid down in the back seat of the car so I could really relax through them.
The midwife checked me: still no progress!! She told me my body was just tired, and to go home, take a day or two off of the herbal stuff and to rest. So we went to Applebee's for dinner and I had a glass of wine to help calm the contractions (that hadn't stopped this time).
As we left the restaurant, I knew I had developed a leak. So much for a good night's sleep!
We picked up the girls and drove them home, hoping that I could get a decent amount of sleep before we headed back to the hospital for the fourth time.
No such luck. I slept for a couple hours until contractions really started picking up, so at 2:00 we called Josh's parents to come stay with the girls.
(Wednesday)
Back to the hospital, again. Me lying down in the back seat, relaxing through contractions and trying to get some rest.
The midwife came in at around 5 to see if my water had really broken. It was a slow leak, but this time they confirmed that it had, indeed, broken, so this time I wasn't going home until Hudson was in my arms.
Contractions weren't doing a whole lot, though, so we both dozed off and on throughout the morning. Walking didn't do much to pick up the contractions (which was consistent with the past few weeks, so it shouldn't have surprised us) so we took the "rest up" route.
Mid-afternoon the midwife started me on something to try to get labor started and we talked about antibiotics to prevent infection. Contractions started again but weren't terribly long.
Josh dozed again, and at 9, after starting the antibiotics, she broke my water the rest of the way (I'd had a high leak up to this point) and started a small amount of pitocin. Everything together made contractions start full-force. And much more painful than anything I'd experienced with the girls.
She told me I'd need a "good hour" of contractions like that, and my eyes got big. I said, "BEFORE I can get in the water?" (I had a room with a tub with jets, and had spent the whole time knowing that I wanted to labor in the water) She said no, I could get in the water now.
Unfortunately, since I was on pitocin, they needed to keep the monitor on me, but it was affected by the jets, so every other contraction she had to turn it off so she could get an accurate reading of his heartbeat. Those times were pretty rough. The contractions were very strong and painful, and I was pretty nervous that if this was "only" active labor, how on earth was I going to make it through transition?
I finally called for Josh between contractions so he could come be with me (he was still sleeping), and he quickly got up to speed, though he didn't know what all had happened...just that labor was in full-force now.
I asked the midwife how far I was dilated, figuring that if I had time, it was time to get some pain relief. I was 6 cm by this point, so I knew I wouldn't have time for anything to take effect. It didn't help me any to know that, though...I knew I had to get through it and there was absolutely nothing that could be done to make it easier.
Contractions stayed very strong, but the urge to push started joining the other feelings. I told the midwife about it, and she said, "let's see what happens in the next couple." By the second or third after that, I had actually started pushing without trying to, so she had me get out and dried off. We walked back to the bed and I started pushing.
2 contractions' worth of pushing (and hearing her yell to me to stop pushing and BREATHE), and then having her tell me to push more gently so I didn't tear, and he was OUT! (and he made it out on Wednesday, but just barely: he was born at 11:27 p.m.)
They put him on my stomach...he was absolutely perfect! I could tell right away that he was bigger than Bekah had been, but didn't want to let go of him too quickly to find out just how big he was.
They finally got him away from me to clean him up and weigh/measure him. I was right: 8 pounds, 1 ounce (Bekah had been 7 pounds even).
And I'd made it! No tearing, no problems...they kept the pitocin going for awhile to make sure I didn't bleed badly (being a redhead and all).
He nursed really well "right away" (within the first hour or so; I don't remember exactly when). They bathed him, which he barely fussed at, and at 2:30 or so, we walked down to my room (I pushed his basinette, I felt that good!) and we slept GREAT!