Mikayla's Birth - Part 1

All of this baby talk with Prego has made me realize that I never documented Mikayla’s birth story.

So...here we go:

Disclaimer - all of this is from the memory bank of someone who was in labor AND didn't have a very good memory to begin with. Poster is not accountable for any details that may not be 100% accurate. Ha!

The last week of December 2004 was pretty hectic. Both of my hips were occasionally getting dislocated...oh so painful, Christmas was coming up and work was...oh so stressful. To help out with my hips, my doctor prescribed some muscle-relaxers that were safe to take during my pregnancy. We had finally finished preparing the nursery for little Mikayla’s arrival. The walls were a pale purple, a lilac really. She had a large oak crib that had the cutest bed set: lavendar and pink with butterflies.

There was this really comfortable pink gigham rocker in the corner next to the window ready for her first rocking and an oak changing table opposite the crib. Her closet was FULL of clothes that would have her dressed for the next year. We couldn't wait for her to get here and thought we were going to die of anticipation.

The day before Christmas Eve was the last day that I had to work that year and I was looking forward to the upcoming holiday. We woke up on Christmas Eve and got ready to go run a few last minute errands (read: go buy some last minute gifts because we suck and are procrastinators). Cullen talked to my belly and told Mikayla that we couldn’t wait to see her and that she could come and see us whenever she wanted as if she were a neighbor who wanted to pop in for a brief visit. He had just found out that the new year had started with our insurance coverage...it wasn't on a calendar year. He didn't want us to pay all this money for deductibles and such just to have a new year start in January. The delivery costs would cover our out-of-pocket maximum costs and everything else that year would be covered at 100%.

We spent a few hours over at my mother-in-law’s house opening presents and then we left to drive up to Georgia to stay the night at my grandmother’s house. On the way up, I decided that I really needed a chocolate milkshake. Since it was 9:00 pm and Christmas Eve, it took 4 stops to find out that I was out of luck. Apparently, McDonald's and Burger King do not understand what it's like to have a pregnancy craving. They were either closed or their milkshake machine was broken. Damn. Them. All. To. Hell.

The plan was to wake up on Christmas morning and have a nice breakfast with everyone before getting down to business and opening up the presents. By the time we got to Georgia, it was pretty late and we hopped in bed for some much needed sleep. At 1:30 am, I woke up with the sheets beneath me wet and I thought I was peeing the bed. I tried to stop the stream, but couldn’t. I woke up Cullen and told him that I thought my water had broke. He jumped out of the bed and smelled the bed.

“It smells like sheets.” Hmmm. Imagine that!

“The lady from the birthing class said that amniotic fluid would have a distinctive smell. It doesn’t smell like anything. The muscle-relaxer probably just let your bladder relax a little too much. Do you have back pain?”

“No.”

“Well, she also said that labor would start in your back and move to the front and don’t go to the hospital unless that is how you feel it.”

“True.”

He grabbed a couple of towels, threw them on the bed and went back to sleep. I crawled back into bed and laid there for a few minutes. I started getting Braxton Hicks contractions.

Sidetrack: From about the time I was 4 months pregnant I would get them several times a day. However, I didn’t know that’s what they were until I was 6 months pregnant. One of the dumb doctors told me it wasn’t possible to get them that early and that I just had gas. Can you guys tell how much I LOVE doctors?

I put on my glasses and watched the clock that was on the other side of the room. Interesting. Every nine minutes.

I stayed like this for a few hours. Finally, at 4:00 am I woke Cullen up and told him that I thought I was in labor and that I was having contractions every five minutes. He jumped out of bed, wide awake and I ran into the bathroom. He picked up the phone and called my doctor's office. I got on the phone with the nurse and she started asking me a few questions. About a minute into the call she said, "Come on down, you're going to have a Christmas baby!". Holy crap! It was Christmas! I had completely forgotten.

Cullen started throwing clothes on and woke up my grandmother. I remember that all I wanted to do was run a quick bath so that I could shave my legs. Cullen and my grandmother wouldn’t let me. What evil, evil people you guys are. I think I talked to my mom somewhere in there, too, but can't really remember. We packed everything into the car and started the 45-minute drive to Baptist Hospital in Jacksonville. I don’t remember much about the drive except I was in pain. Lots. I just knew that I was 5 cm dilated and when we got there, her head would be popping out. I kept asking Cullen, "How much longer?"

“Three more bridges, honey. Just three more bridges."

Only in Jacksonville could you describe how long a trip would be by counting the bridges. I remember us driving on an overpass and asking if it counted as a bridge.

ETA: I guess maybe I should get around to writing Part 2, huh? Eh.