Kailee's Story!

Kailee Mya has arrived and she came with quite a story! Her labor was entirely different than Hailey's 2 1/2 days of camping out! My contractions started around 11am Friday morning (one day before my due date). They weren't very strong but were coming pretty regularly at 20 mins. apart. By 1pm they were 10 minutes apart, but no real pain...I was doing last minute things around the house, ran a few errands, and took Leila for a long walk. I was trying to be very active and get things moving because my labor with Hailey was SO LONG.(Hailey: contractions started Friday night in the middle of the night, Saturday stayed about 10 min. apart with no real pain, Sunday they were pretty steady all day with enormous back labor pains, Sunday night we were admitted and I got the epidural, by 2am Monday morning I was fully dialated and ready to push, but she was too high, so they just let her "labor down", 4am my epidural wore off, 6:30am I was finally ready to push and at 7am on Monday morning she was born--on her due date) So, mentally I was preparing to attempt a natural birth with no pain meds with the thought that an epidural can slow things down and being able to walk around vs. lying in bed puts gravity on your side and gets the baby down faster.

By 7pm the contractions were coming around 4-7 minutes apart with moderate pain involved (I actually had to stop what I was doing and breathe through it), so we decided to head into the hospital because it's about 25 minutes away. When we got to the hospital they hooked me up to monitor the contractions and they all but stopped!!! They were only coming at 11 and 14 minutes apart...I was SO frustrated!!! The midwife decided to check me anyway and was surprised that I was 4cm dialated. Once I stood up from the table the contractions went back to 5 or so minutes apart!! My friend, Tiffany, who was orignally due the same day as me had given birth the day before to a beautiful baby boy so she and her husband were still in the hospital. We decided that Leevi and Jim could hang out in their room and Tiff and I would wander the halls and time contractions. We called Tiffany down to my labor room so she could help me through the contractions and Leevi went to the car to get our bags and to check me in at admissions. I had two contractions with Tiffany in the room and I was sitting on a yoga ball getting ready for the next one to come. (The room had a jacuzzi tub, yoga ball, and I had all kinds of goodies in my bag to help me attempt a natural birth.) That next contraction came on so hard I stood up to brace myself and my water broke and then I just started screaming, "I need to push!!! I need to push now!!!" I lost all control!!! Thankfully the midwife (and Tiffany) were in the room and got me onto the bed. I was still screaming and pushing; Tiffany called Leevi on his cell, but it went to voicemail because there isn't good reception in the hospital! My water broke at 10:36, Leevi got to the room around 10:42 and Kailee was born at 10:48!!! Once Leevi got back, Tiffany grabbed the camera and started filming! She got amazing (clean) video and we were so grateful that she was there...she hadn't been part of our birth plan because we expected her to be home with a new baby or her two older kids. Funny how things work out! I doubt at that point, with how fast things were going, that someone was going to grab our camera and set it up for us!! Anyway, another part of our plan was to have Leevi deliver the baby. He got cleaned up real quick and pulled her out and put her on my chest! We still couldn't tell if she was a boy or girl, so you see in the video were I look and announce, "It's a girl!!!" Afterwards, I was so weak, but the adrenaline was kicking at the same time. I kept saying,"Oh my gosh, oh my gosh!" I think I also said quite a few times that I wasn't having anymore children!!! Once I got some food in me I felt much better. I layed awake in bed until 3 or 4 in the morning still high on endorphins replaying over and over the delivery! Thankfully, we hadn't left the hospital to get dinner or to walk around the neighborhood or thankfully I was still in the labor room (with the midwife present) and not somewhere else in the hospital!!!!! Things could have turned out so differently!!

So, overall I can't decide on which labor I would prefer...2 1/2 days of waiting around and then a lot of back pain for a long time, but then a peaceful delivery (Hailey's delivery was so easy...the epidural had wore off for the contractions, but I was still numb down below, so I'd push a bit and then hang out and chit chat until the next contraction came) vs. 12 minutes of absolute hell! Regardless anyone out there pregnant or planning on having more children, GET THE EPIDURAL!!!!!! Thankfully, I had at least mentally prepared for natural childbirth, so I was able to finally get some control back right before Kailee was born. I think the shock of how fast it came on is what caused the exorcism-like screams!

We are so blessed to have two beautiful, healthy girls! My next blog will be comparing pictures of Hailey and Kailee...their resemblance is uncanny!

I'm going to put the labor videos on YouTube as a private video, so if you really want to see it, email me and I'll send you the link. They are both very "clean", but I just felt weird putting them on this site. :)