My water ended up breaking at 11:30pm the day after my baby shower. When it happened I was kind of in shock, like what do I do! I was waiting for the crazy amount of contraction pain to ensue, I thought for sure as soon as my water broke I would be in pain but I wasn’t. This gave us time to make it to the hospital (5mins away) before the slow onset. We made it to the hospital through the ER and were taken up to labor and delivery via wheel chair. As we entered the room I was informed to change into the gown, by this point the contractions were more noticeably painful though not so much as to stop my breath. I went into the bathroom and figured I should probably try to poop, pooping during labor being something that would likely happen but in my mind completely avoidable. As soon as I sat on the toilet to try and poop...BOOM “oh okay now I feel the pain”. When I got back in the room the nurse had me lay on the bed, she held a test strip between my legs and told me to cough. To make sure my water had actually broke they needed to test the fluid to see if it was amniotic fluid, in which the test strip would turn blue. I coughed and heard her go “oooo well that’s definitely blue”, as she got up to go to the sink and clean off. Apparently when I coughed I had kind of sprayed her! That was a laughable moment. By this time my mom had arrived and I was introduced to the doctor and the rest of the nursing team. All of my nurses were amazing, so nice and light hearted. I was currently 3cms dilated. The contractions were much stronger now, I had my husband holding my hand and rubbing my head as I tried to breathe through them and was asked if I was planning on an epidural, of which I said yes. Until then I breathed through my contractions with the my husband by my side. At 1:30am The epidural was administered. For this I was nervous , I had heard via my sister, who had given birth just months before, that it hurt when she got the injection. To make it worse my contractions were pretty strong and you have to sit perfectly still and hunched over when they do it. My contractions were like less than a minute apart ( or at least that’s how it felt) they just kept coming. My concern was that I would get a contraction at the same time I was getting the epidural. No surprise but that’s exactly what happened, so I buried my face in the pillow I was holding on my lap and bared through it. The only pain I felt was the initial injection to numb my spine, I didn’t feel the catheter in which the actual epidural is administered. As soon the epidural was released I felt this numbing sensation go down my left leg then down my right. Immediate relief!!! I was so comfortably numb that I was able to FaceTime my cousin and joke with the staff, it was amazing! One of my nurses suggested We try and get some rest so my husband pulled out the recliner cot and my mom settled in the comfy chair. With the lights off and the tv low we were all about to drift off to sleep when the doctor came in to check on me and see how far I had dilated. And just like that I was 10cm, and it was time to push! I was like “what!!! Already??” By this time it was 4:20am. The doctor left and the nurses came in, one grabbed my left leg and my husband grabbed my right ( no stirrups! The bottom half of my bed actually disconnected and dropped down to form a sort of ledge). The doctor had informed the nurse to turn off the epidural. I was freaking out, I asked how long before it would wear off, she said  it took some time something like 20 mins, but I immediately felt the difference in my mind. We started pushing but because of the drugs I couldn’t really feel where to push, they had me take a deep breath, hold it, then bear down for 10 seconds, I did this 3 times back to back whenever I had a contraction. When I started crowning the doctor came back in to finish the job. By now I was feeling lots of pressure everywhere and I was out of breath and lightheaded. I remember thinking...”Never again, I will never do this again, what was I thinking”.... and then just when I felt completely spent and exhausted the doctor said “almost there, one more big push”... I pushed,felt the doctor pull the baby out with a rush of fluid, almost immediately heard him cry, and just like that I thought “I would absolutely do this again”... I instantaneously forgot all the pain I had endured and was miraculously in love with the tiny human  that was now laying on my chest as my husband cut the umbilical cord. I looked at the clock and was surprised to see that I had only been pushing for an hour. My baby boy was born at 5:34am, beautiful and healthy at 36weeks to the day! I later asked my husband if I had pooped during labor, he said no but the baby did on his way out lol