I loved reading birth stories while I was waiting for the arrival of my baby, it was almost an addiction like it would bring him faster. It is only fair that I share my birth story. Enjoy and good luck to you momma!

There were no signs that I would be going into labor that day. I woke up grumpy that I was still pregnant and limited by the pregnancy. My husband trimmed laurel bushes, I cried very hard that I couldn't help him, a couple friends came over to visit but I wasn't in the mood for visiting, and we watched another friend tell a story at a local bar and left early because the hard chairs were hurting my hips. My feet and hands were swollen, I finally had to take off my wedding ring because it was starting to hurt my finger, and I was exhausted. I went to bed at 10pm disappointed.

At midnight I suddenly woke and within 10 seconds of waking I felt a POP! Uncertain of what the popping noise was I got up to go to the bathroom to check it out, as I was walking the short distance from my bed to the bathroom water started flowing. I made it to the toilet just in time! The flood gates had opened, a big gush of water came flowing! I looked down and saw brown fluid and blood. My water had broken!

I knew there was meconium in the fluid and that I would most likely need to go to the hospital right away rather than wait for contractions to get really bad. I sat on the toilet waiting for the amniotic fluid to stop flowing, that's what happens in the movies, right? Realizing that it wasn't going to stop I called my husband up, the "oh shit! It's real!" look on his face was priceless! He called the triage nurse who didn't answer, then he called labor and delivery who told me to put on a pad and get to the hospital. I didn't have pads but luckily my sister sent me some Depends, leaky vaj problem solved.

Contractions had started about 3-5 minutes after my water broke and they felt like period pain. It was subtle at first and grew in intensity. By the time we got to the hospital 20 minutes away they had become strong enough to make me pause in my tracks.

The nurses put me in a room, gave me some very sexy mesh underwear and a giant pad and a very glamorous hospital gown. 😉 I was hooked up to a monitor to track baby's heart rate and my contractions, they were 3-5 minutes apart and getting painful but still bearable. I was stuck with an IV not once, not twice, but three times. Not fun! Within the first hour or two my baby's heart rate started to drop and this sent the nurses into a sense of urgency.

With my husband looking on, helpless, the nurses gave me oxygen, called the doctor, and anxiously waited to see if the baby's heart rate would go up. It did! Another thing the movies don't show you, your whole body shakes during labor because of the rapid increase in hormone levels. What a scary sight for my hubs. Can you imagine?

I labored for about 7 hours before the contractions became so unbearable that I couldn't breathe. Tears would run down my face and I would have to remind myself to breathe. It was time to get that epidural and thank god for it! I labored for another 5 1/2 hours with the epidural. During the time, my baby's heart rate would randomly drop. The nurses tried repositioning me, they tried moving the umbilical cord with the fluid (via a pipe stuck up my vagina), increasing my fluids (via the tube stuck in my hand), and keeping me on oxygen. It would work for a short time but they were concerned and started talking to me about getting a c-section.

My husband was given scrubs and I was being prepped for surgery. The nurses took the tube out of my vagina and realized I was 10 cm. They were shocked, I was so exhausted I couldn't fully comprehend what that meant. It was time to push and I was about to become a mom!

I pushed for less than an hour and luckily baby's heart rate did not drop the entire time. He came out with a cone head, a heart rate monitor stuck in his skin, and absolutely beautiful! I bawled when the nurses out him on my chest and my husband cried even harder at the sight of his son. My husband had never looked more handsome to me.

My son, Finnegan Lawrence, was born on July 7th, 2017 at 1:41pm. He weighed 6 lbs and is 18 inches long. It has been one week since his birth and I am still so mesmerized and enamored by him.