It's Time!

For nine months, I tried to imagine how Hayden would make her way into the world. I came up with numerous scenarios, but of course it's never the way you think it's going to be; but being surprised is the best part of all.

Monday, June 4th started off like any other day. I had done a lot of resting (finally) that week and had spent the majority of the time watching The Tudors on DVD from start to (almost) finish. After Anne Boleyn lost her head, I made my way downstairs to bake some butter cupcakes with chocolate icing. I figured I better make them and eat some of them before I couldn't eat that kind of stuff anymore. I was in between batches around 7 pm (still waiting on Will to get home from work... he'd had a big day that day and then had worked late) when I went to the bathroom and my water broke. I was unsure at first because, heck, I've never had this happen before. It wasn't like you see in the movies. I called my long time friend Amber who is a labor and delivery nurse and told her what happened. She was so calm. She told me, "Well, your water broke. When Will gets home, ya'll go on up to the hospital. It'll be okay." I wasn't going to call Will and tell him and have him kill himself trying to get home; but he called me when he was close (so I could start dinner, yeah right) and I told him. He was calm also, which was good, because I had broken out into a sweat and my heart was pounding as I went around the house doing and gathering last minute things. We arrived at the hospital around eight o'clock and they immediately put me in a room and hooked me up to the monitors. My nurse Melissa did a test to make sure my water had actually broken because she wasn't very convinced since I was not dilated at all. That kinda scared me, because I really, really, really did not want a C-section, only because I wanted the full experience. I did not want to "fail to progress," as they say. Sure enough, she came back from the lab about half an hour later and said, "You're staying!" It was only then that we called our families to tell them that it was finally "time"! My brother came right away, which was very sweet since I told him that nothing was going to happen until morning-- they were going to induce me with Pitocin at 3:00 am. My mom and dad also arrived for a short time, and Will's mom had a long trek ahead of her from Midland, then on to North Dallas to pick up my sister in law Meagan, and then down to Houston. They drove through the night to get to our precious baby. About 11:00 pm we sent everyone home and I had started getting some contractions on my own. They were coming pretty good when they finally gave me the Pitocin, and boy did that kick it up a notch. I was in some pretty good pain and I'm not ashamed to say that I couldn't hang. You think you know what it's going to feel like, but multiply it by ten, or maybe twenty, who knows, and you might be scraping the surface. I only dropped one curse word on Will but I did it in a very pleasant tone, if I might add. That was when Melissa gave a good chuckle and said she thought it was time for my epidural. Um, yes, please. Bring it on. The epidural was no picnic, but I knew that any burning sensation or pain it gave me was better than what I was going through, and the Promised Land was on the other side. Sure enough, twenty minutes later, I was in much higher spirits. Thank the Lord for modern medicine. I'd gone through the night by this point and around 6:00 am my family showed up (to be followed by Will's mom and sister in a couple of hours.) At 7:00 when Melissa's shift was over and she was handing me over to my new nurse Tamara, she checked me and said I had dilated 2-3 centimeters, which was fine. At least I was moving along. Tamara said that on average, I should progress at 1 centimeter an hour, plus push time, and that Hayden should arrive somewhere between 2:00 and 4:00 that afternoon. It looked like it was going to be a long day ahead of us. After Will's family arrived and everyone visited, my brother decided to head to the gym and my dad was going to go to work for an hour (literally across the street from the hospital) and that they would be back. It seemed that we still had about a good ten hours to go until her arrival, so no big deal. It was around 8:30 am, just an hour and a half later, that there was a big dip in Hayden's monitoring; bigger than usual. It concerned Tamara a little and she said she wanted to put a scalp monitor on Hayden's head for more accurate monitoring. I am in full blown epidual mode by this point, and that was fine by me. As she started the procedure, suddenly her eyes went as wide as saucers. "Oh my God," she said. "You're at a nine!" She couldn't believe it. Everyone had left or had stepped out of the room for coffee or whatnot, so I was alone when she discovered this. "Looks like you're going to be following in your mom's footsteps," she said (since I was born in only three hours) "We gotta get ready; we'll be pushing soon." Holy moly! Will and my mom returned and I yelled out, "I'm a nine!" and suddenly everyone was a-flurry around me. Will immediately called my dad and brother to return to the hosptial; nurses were setting up shop, my mom was holding my hand. In a matter of minutes, Tamara said, "Whoever's in needs to get in, whoever's out needs to get out." My mom, dad, mother in law, and Will were in the room with me and before I knew it, things were under way.I had Will on my left leg and my mom on my right. My dad was to the left of my head; he was only there for the auditory version. He definitely did not want the visual version. Ha. Will's mom sat to my side for support. I knew the nurses had called my doctor, whose office is connected to the hospital. But I found out rather quickly that it's the nurses who do everything; my doctor didn't show up until last minute and she sat in the back while my nurse did all the work until it was time to literally catch Hayden. But I pushed for a good hour, which is a good time, I found out. But geez Louise, I was seeing fireworks behind my eyelids, I'm telling you. My mom said my face was beet red. I turned a little feral at the end; I was tired and pushing to the point of nausea. And epidural or not, I didn't feel too cheery. I was ready to get this baby OUT. But I didn't give up. Even when I thought I couldn't go anymore, I did. I just put everything out of my head and pushed, because I knew it was the only way I could get any relief. I knew Hayden was doing well, but she had a hard time getting past my pelvis. Once we rounded that corner, it became a tad easier. When I finally saw my doctor put on her hat and surgical coat, I knew I was close to the end, thank God. They kept telling me to keep going, you're doing good, don't stop, and finally I yelled out, "I CAN'T!" and everyone said "Yes, you can!" That was when I just put every ounce of energy in every fiber of my being into it; and finally, at 11:10 am on June 5th, Hayden was born. She let out a huge wail right away and they immediately put her to my chest. I was crying, everyone was crying. She was crying. They gave the scissors to Will and he cut her cord, then they took her away for clean up, weighing and all that good stuff while they finished up with me. When they brought her back to me clean and swaddled and placed her in my arms, my whole world disappeared. I was wailing, and Will was holding us both, crying. She was so calm and alert, though. She was just looking at me like she knew me. That was all I could think; she's looking at me like she knows exactly who I am. I thought she was the most beautiful and perfect thing I had ever seen. It was the greatest moment of my life. 

I'm a little in awe that's finally over with. Sometimes I thought she'd never get here; now it seems like it was no time at all. We are so incredibly blessed, and all I can do is thank Jesus everyday for the greatest gift He has ever given to me; that I have a healthy and happy baby that I love with my whole heart, soul, and being. I've waited my entire life for this moment. Every heartache it took to get here was worth it. The Lukers are finally, finally, finally a family of three. We are overjoyed!

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Cue the Pomp & Circumstance!

We graduated from our four week Lamaze class last night! And I'm happy to say that Will was able to make all the classes-- we'd been a little worried since he's out of town so much for work. But, we made it through together, and it was actually a pretty fun experience. We had a really fun nurse, Lisa, who was our teacher. She's been at Clear Lake Regional Hospital for almost twenty years. She liked Will right off the bat, too. He was the most forthcoming participant. While all the other soon-to-be dads sat there like a bumps on a log and had to be poked in the ribs by their significant others to so much as answer a question, Will was right there offering up all the information he'd retained or volunteering the be the guinea pig when she needed an assistant. He walked in the first day cracking jokes (as usual) and when she was preoccupied with setting up, he was letting people know what to do when they came in late. She really appreciated that and took a liking to him from there on out. Especially when we moved off our mats and into our classroom the first day-- after we'd all found our seats, she said, "Just so ya'll know, I'm really quirky and notice quirky things. I just noticed that only TWO of you helped your partners off the floor when we made the move to the classroom." I am so proud that Will was one of those two people. She had some high expectations of him after that. I laughed at us one day after class, because I can imagine everyone in there thought we were the teacher's pets, sitting front and center (really, we did!) I was also extra proud when Will volunteered to wear the "pregnancy weight backpack" (in the front of course) for the duration of the class so he could see what it felt like to lug all that weight around. It was funny seeing him try to get up, walk, or get comfortable. I'm sure all the girls in there were jealous of my awesome husband. :)

There were nine other couples in the class with us. Will and I have this habit of whenever we are around the same people (who are strangers) for any significant amount of time: we make up nicknames for them. It started on our honeymoon at Sandals, because you see the same people everywhere you go, but you don't know who the heck they are. Now, it's something we do all the time. So we had several nicknames for the people in our class, and we didn't really care that they wore name tags. We preferred their nicknames. Here's a few: The Disney People. On the first day, the men had to introduce us both, how far along we are, who our OB and pediatrician is, what we're going to name the baby, baby's sex, and nursery theme. This guy is the first one up (right before us.... because we're front and center, lol) and tells us that their nursery theme is Disney. Now, don't get me wrong. I love most everything Disney. I love Disney World/Land, Disney books, Disney movies. But that's where it's gotta stop for me, in my opinion. I had to guffaw a little bit, because it was about the most unoriginal theme I'd ever heard of (so sue me for my creativity.) Beyond this, one or the other wore some article of clothing Disney related for the remainder of the classes. Then, Will tells me last night after class in disbelief, "Get this." (The men had gone outside to make a list of things they were going to do to be helpful both during and after delivery.) "Disney Guy tells us that they've already planned a trip to Disney World two months after their baby is born.... and they're taking the baby with them! He said the baby was conceived at Disney, so they might as well take it back there when it's born!" I can't imagine walking around Disney World with a newborn in the August heat. Seriously? I know they are going to get that baby some Mickey Mouse ears with its name embroidered on it. Or a onesie that says "Future Mouseketeer" or something.  I found this couple to be, by far, the most annoying people in the class. She was worse than him, because she always had to put in her two cents. He asked about five times if there was a DVD connection to the TVs in the hospital. He was very concerned about this. He said he didn't want to watch the boring old hospital channels. What do you mean? Like the ones you get at home? It's cable, for cripes sake. And you're going to be there for 48 hours. You'll live. If Will dragged a DVD player to the hospital with his Scary Movie trilogy, I would kill him with my eyes alone. I think Nurse Lisa was annoyed by them too. I could just tell. Next up: The Baristas. They both worked at Starbucks, so that's self explanatory. They were young, tattooed, and both of them had their ear lobes stretched to disgusting lengths. She was cute in her own way, though. I liked her red hair. Storage Baby Couple: Oh my God. I almost fell out the first time I saw them because she was SO. PREGNANT. Like, way out there. When her man introduced them, he said, "We're almost 37 weeks pregnant...." WHAT?! 37 weeks? You signed up for a FOUR WEEK Lamaze class when you are 37 weeks?! You've got to be kidding me! Then when he got to the nursery theme, he laughed and said, "Well, I guess our nursery theme is JUNK, because that's what's in the nursery right now. It's our storage room and we haven't done anything with it." WHAAAAT??? You're 37 weeks pregnant and you haven't even cleaned out the room the baby is supposed to sleep in?! Get out of town! I would be freaking out. They thought it was funny. So, they became Storage Baby. The last couple I'm going to tell you about wasn't really a couple. It was two women, one of whom is pregnant, of course. But they weren't lesbians or anything. I think the other woman was either a relative or a friend. However, they were both very large women (and by very large, I mean more than 300 pounds each, and I am NOT being facetious), the non pregnant one had hot pink bangs, and the pregnant one wore a decorative eye patch and had her brunette hair dyed blonde, and it was obviously a home job. But the eye patch was really what did it for me. I called her One Eyed Wanda, and told Willie that her baby will probably come out with a peg leg. Arrrrrrrgh!

So we never actually learned any Lamaze breathing like you see in the movies, or what our moms did. I think that's just the term they use for an educational birthing class now. We got a book, a folder to keep all the handouts from each week, and we learned a lot of stuff about birthing a child that we never knew before. Important stuff, too-- how to time contractions (kind of important), different positions that help ease pain, what our partners are expected to do, our options when it comes to pain control and the delivery of those medications, cesareans, and just about anything you can think of when it comes to delivering a baby. And it was really helpful to have a professional to answer any questions you have. She's been there, done that. And yes, we watched a video of a birth. Several births; with analgesics, with an epidural, natural, a cesarean-- you name it, we saw it. The first one we saw, they were right up in there. And when that baby's head popped out, I couldn't help but to give a little burst of laughter. It was so silent, and there I was with this sudden chortle of incredulity. I played it off like it was emotional (it kind of was) but I think my emotions didn't know where to go, so it went to the default: laughing. I was a little flabbergasted. The cesarean was the worst by far. Wow. Now I know why they put that drape up, and it's not only to keep the environment sterile. It's so you won't freak out when you see your guts splayed open with forceps. Not cool. The best part of the class was "relaxation." That's where Lisa turned out the lights, played some Piano Tribute Players (pop tunes on the piano.... always tried to Name That Tune) on Spotify, and we got ten or fifteen minutes of massage. That was the best. Another part of the class was that we also got a tour of the hospital, and that was neat. Now we know exactly what to do, where to go, and what's going to happen when it all goes down. All the rooms are private with Jacuzzi tubs and flat screen TVs. They have a warmer in the room so the baby stays in the room with you (pretty sure that's the norm these days) and I really liked that. Plus, they have this great refrigerator filled with ice chips, popsicles, and ice cream. I can deal with that. There's an extra bed for your partner to stay with you overnight, and not a cot or pull out couch either. A real hospital bed. The nurses have "companion phones" so you can call your nurse directly at any time for anything. And, I really love that they have HUGS--it's an infant security system. They put an ankle bracelet on the baby immediately after birth that matches a bar code on my hospital bracelet. If anyone takes the baby outside of the safety zone-- too near an elevator or exit-- an alarm sounds and the entire hospital goes on lockdown. The call for Code Pink and the elevators shut down and all the doors lock immediately. The zone is shown by circular tiles in the floor. That is really awesome. Clear Lake Regional is also a Texas Ten Step hospital, which is a prestigious designation developed by the Texas Hospital Association and the Texas Department of State Health Services that promotes breastfeeding through policy development, maternity care practices, resources, and training. They are very strict about this. They will not give anything artificial (bottles or pacifiers) to any breastfeeding baby. I was happy about that, too. 

I was born at Clear Lake Regional when it was Humana Hospital. So it's really neat that I'm going to have my child in the same hospital that I was born. I am so thankful that Will has been so proactive in this whole experience. He makes me proud that he's my husband. Now, all there is to do is wait. See you soon, little baby.

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