Birth story finale

So the epi-doc comes back in and says that he’ll do it al over again, which I’m fine with. So Rich gets back in front of me, and the too-happy-nurse is behind with the doctor and I just tell her I’ll put that annoying finger thing back on as soon as I sit up – and she didn’t argue this time. I think she just knew it was a losing battle. So I get situated in my drugged up stupor, and I don’t remember much of him re-doing it, just the warm feeling after it started working.


We quickly – or as quick as I could go – got me situated back in the bed before I went completely numb. This time I went beyond the numb feeling I had before and couldn’t move my legs – and my left side this time went extra numb. Strange.



I know they came back in to check me, but I was asleep a lot of it. Ok, so I was asleep for just about everything – I don’t remember much. I do know I’d wake up to talk to Rich, mom and the nurse, but I’d quickly be back out. I remember trying to type on my phone to update people on Facebook and it took me forever!



I don’t remember when the feeling started coming back, I just know that this time my right side was waking up slowly. It got more and more intense, so I told the nurse. Now let me say that I know that epidurals aren’t 100% pain-free, but mine were fading too quick. I know some of it dealt with me getting it so early on, but I figured the second one would last a while, but it was just as quick as the first.

I remember the contractions taking my breath away, I’d grunt, gripe the bed rails, and just all around was in pain. I know the nurse came in at some point and said that the epi-doctor I had originally had gone home, and the on-call one was on his way up to do an epidural for another person and she’d get him to stop by and see what was going on. (On the whole L&D floor there was me and one other lady in labor, so the nurses were pretty easy going and attentive.)



I know around maybe 4:30pm the nurse came in and said that Dr. B had asked her to check me because he was about to get off work and head home if all was well and he’d see me that evening for the birth.

She checks me and I’m 9.5 cm, full dilated and ready to start pushing. Holy crap!

She calls Dr. B back and tells him he’s not going home, but coming across the street when the office closed at 5pm to deliver a baby. Go me, my girly parts are awesome!

After getting that news we were all shocked – we were told it wouldn’t happen until way later that evening, not that soon! So the room started buzzing with the nurses getting the layette ready for Braxton, changing up the hospital bed so I was in the pushing position, getting all the equipment for the doctor ready – and that doesn’t count Rich and mom on the phones letting people know, and getting the laptop set up so dad could see via Skype!



All that’s going on while I’m contracting, and now in a lot of pain that my grunts have gotten louder, I’ve griped Rich’s hand so hard I thought he was going to scream – the nurse told him to not let me get ahold of his thumb and pinky when I squeezed incase I break them. Haha! The epi-doctor wouldn’t make it in time for the birth, so I had no choice but to suck it up and deal with the pain. I remember not crying, I didn’t want to come off like I couldn’t handle it, but I finally just cried, it hurt too bad.

We set up the laptop at the foot of the bed so dad could see since he couldn’t make it in. I know it had to annoy the nurses since we were all talking/yelling (depending on where we were in the room he couldn’t hear us, haha) to the computer, and dad was doing the same back. The secretary, Sandy, was there too – she really wanted to be able to see it all happen. So while we were talking to them, I was doing small pushes in hopes that I could have him crowing or something by the doctor came in.

Funniest part having the computer set up was since dad was at work at the office, all the guys kept walking in and out of the room and could hear stuff going on and wondered what it was. So dad and Sandy told ‘em I was about to give birth, and hey, why not sit and watch. Haha! All I kept thinking was I was going to give birth via webcam to a room full of guys back in Tyler, Texas and I honestly didn’t care in that moment! Modesty-shmodesty.



Dr. B comes in a few minutes after 5pm joking that he had to call his wife and tell her he’d be late for lunch and how I’d ruined his plans. Haha! I told him I was going to do all I could to have him home in time to eat with the family, so he had me do a few practice pushes to see where I was at, and then went to change clothes.

By this time Sandy had ot leave work, so it was just dad via Skype, Rich was on the left leg, mom on the right and we were about ready to get the show on the road!

Dr. B comes back and is telling me when to push – and I’ll be honest, I was afraid to push, it hurt that much without the baby coming out, I was terrified of how bad it was going to be when he did start to come out! Haha! So the first few pushes sucked, but I was making progress.

I remember him asking for a needle of numbing medicine, I promply asked if I was tearing, which I had a little bit, but he said I was going to more when the baby started coming out so he was going to cut me. I was terrified I was going to feel it since, by this time, I was 75% awake, atleast. But when the next contraction hit, he told me to push and come to find out he was stabbing my girly area with the needle numbing it. When I opened my eyes I saw that Rich had blood on his shirt, they all kind of giggled, and I asked what the heck was going on. Haha! On the contaction as I pushing, Dr. B cut me – which if you ask Rich, is the nastiest sound ever, reminded him of cutting through gristle.

Did some more pushing, the head coming out was pretty darn painful, and then they all just kept telling me to keep on since we only had to get the shoulders out and we were home free. I pushed with all I had, and then it was immediate relief, and he was out! I looked down and he had Braxton with his head angled down quiet a bit, and he was pretty blue, he whimpered and then was put on me. I got to touch him, Rich cut the cord, and the nurse whisked him away – where Rich and mom followed with lots of tears, and some from dad. (I was told dad was doing paperwork when he was able to see my lady bits, and would look up when he couldn’t. Haha!)

I pushed for ten minutes, and was born at 5:19pm.

I remember laying my head back, looking to the side and seeing them all around the layette, where he only whimpered, and I was fighting closing my eyes and taking a nap. It didn’t take long before the placenta was out, then Dr. B started stitching me up and was changing clothes again. I talked to him and the nurse, about what I have no idea, while Braxton was getting cleaned up. I was told that he still had a lot of amniotic fluid in his lungs, they’d suctioned out as much as they could, but he was going to be spitting it up for a while and not to worry about it – so that’s why he was pretty blue.



They handed him to me, I remember looking at him, but for the life of me I don’t remember much else. I know the nurse needed me to get up not long after that so we could change the bedding/pads under me, and get some undies/ice pack/meds on me. I talked some to dad on the computer, Rich went tog et us all dinner, mom made phone calls, nurses had shift change, Dr. B left, I started breast feeding, and we got ready to change rooms.



It breaks my heart because I can’t remember details, hell there are hours of time that I don’t know what happened. I wish I could remember more, but that’s what I have Rich and mom for, they can fill in the blanks for me.







We changed rooms I think around 8pm-ish, Rich got to go with the baby to get cleaned up (he video taped and took pictures), mom went ahead and went to the house, and they had me massaging my belly to stop the bleeding since I hadn’t yet. Nothing overly exciting. Haha!

We got Braxton back, got us both set up to go to bed soon, talked to dad on the phone, and by then it was midnight and we needed to go to bed – Rich had to be up for work at 330am to get ready for work! So, off to bed we went. I know Braxton woke up close to time for Rich to get up, so we did our first diaper change, he took a shower and left.

I remember that feeding before Rich left, I looked down at Braxton and really saw him for the first time since I was out of that drugged up stupor, and just kept looking at him. I told Rich that I liked him. Haha!

Mom came up around 730-8am and we didn’t do much. They took the baby out for tests, I took a much needed shower, ate, watched tv, played online, and that was about it.

That afternoon our friend Melissa and her step-daughter Rose came up to see him for a little while. Rich got off work and came up, then Braxton’s godfather and his wife came up – hes the one we got his middle name from actually. (And Braxton’s got another set of awesome god parents in MS, April and Josh! J They haven’t gotten to meet him in person yet, so we’ll have to change that.) Rich had to work, so he went home to sleep and mom stayed the night with me.

That night was rough, Braxton was super fussy and didn’t want to sleep alone so I put him in bed with me and slept as much as we could. He was up and down, crying and grumpy, I was having a hard time breast feeding and staying awake. Mom said later it took all her willpower not to get up to help,s he rolled over and pretended to be asleep because I needed to learn how to do it on my own since we live so far from everyone, we’ll be alone anyway. It was tough. I was in tears by 4am, when thankfully a nurse came in to do some tests and asked if I’d like for her to keep him an hour – I couldn’t verbally say yest because I knew I’d cry, so I nodded. I think they heard him screaming that whole morning, so she helped, she kept him for nearly two hours where I was able to get some sleep.

The whole day was just filled with a grumpy, fussy, gassy baby. We were just told that since he’s “brand new”, he’s got air in his belly and it’s having work it’s way out, so he wasn’t happy. We sat around that morning waiting for the doctor to release us, Rich was at work, and finally around noon-ish we were able to leave! Woohoo! So off we went, I couldn’t wait to get home in my own enviroment. Rich came home and started his four days off and we got to see how it was going to be with a baby.



Now I can admit this, and some may think it’s horrible, but I didn’t fall in love with Braxton for a few days. I’m honest when I say that I don’t really like kids… ok, I don’t like those annoying kids who scream at Walmart, or who do ninja kicks in the middle of the aisle, or wear those studid wheeled shoes (seriously, those things piss me off more than anything) – I don’t like bad kids. So the joke was that I’d rather have a house full of animals than have a kid… which may have ended up being true if I hadn’t married Richard.

But something happened after we got home and I got to look at him, interact, snuggle, all of it! Something clicked in a while I didn’t think was possible and I feel head over heels for him. I’ll be honest and say that I never thought it’d happen in the way it has, even Rich says it. I never want to put him down, I never want to stop smelling or kissing him – like now, I’m laying in bed and he’s beside me sleeping in his boppy with his little hand grazing my arm. I’m in love with him.





There is obviously more, and you can tell that I skimmed those days in the hospital – there wasn’t anything interesting that happened. But I can say it’s been one hell of a roller coaster since he’s been home – but more on that later.