Obsessed!!

My 3rd baby, 2nd princess is here!! Due date 12/16, born on 12/12 at 1:23pm, 7lbs 6.2oz and 20in. ❤❤ in love ❤❤

So, at my regular appointment on 12/3 I was 1cm dilated and had a membrane sweep. 6 days later at exactly 39 weeks, I woke up and felt like some light contractions were starting. They continued all day, slowly getting closer and closer together and slowly increasing in intensity, but never warranting going to the hospital. I lost the rest of my mucus plug throughout the day. Then, after 18 hours everything stopped. I was soooo disappointed 😭 I was already scheduled for an induction Saturday night at 39+3 but didn't want to wait and secretly wanted baby to come on her own.

Well, Friday night we were running some last minute errunds to prepare for baby and we got in a minor, but rather traumatizing, vehicle accident. It didn't warrant going into the hospital, but it was very stressful. After our adrenaline calmed down, we finally went to bed around midnight, only to be woken up at 2:15 to go to the bathroom only to find my underwear already really wet. I laid in bed for 45 minutes googling "water breaking" trying to decide if my water broke and was leaking or if I was leaking pee. I finally decided it had to be my water, called L&D, called the babysitter for our older kids, and at 4am we headed to the hospital.

At the hospital in triage they took a sample of the fluid to verify if it was my water and then checked my cervix and in the process, the rest of my water broke and exploded all over the poor nurse. I was so embarrassed I couldn't stop laughing awkwardly 🤣 she said "well, we don't need to test that fluid anymore, we are just going to go ahead and admit you."

I was finally admitted and in my room around 6am and was 3cm with only minor contractions I couldn't even feel. Around 10am they gave me some cytotec since nothing had changed in 4 hours. Very quickly the contraction intensity kicked up!! I got painkiller via IV and they said it would make me drowsy, and that combined with hardly getting any sleep the night before, it knocked me out!! I couldn't stay awake until about an hour later when the contractions were too much and I needed the epidural. The epidural took forever but was such a relief!! I took another nap after the epidural until the nurse came in to readjust me because baby's heart rate kept dropping. When she couldn't get the heart rate to stabilize, she called the midwife in. He wanted to do internal monitoring but checked me first and I was 10cm...it was time to push!! I was still so tired and not ready but we went for it and only pushed for 15 minutes before my beautiful baby girl was in my arms.

I had an amazing, supportive care team in L&D!! And my husband was by my side the whole time. But that night he went home to our older kids and I was alone with our newborn. That night was the most exhausted I'd ever been in my life! But we got some sleep and felt better in the morning and the next day got discharged.

I am excited baby girl came on her own before the induction, but I wonder if it was the stress from Friday night that caused my water to break and if that incident hadn't happened, if my birth story would have been totally different.