Claire's Birth Story

It's hard to believe that it has been one whole week since Claire joined the Martin team!  I must say that round 2 has been significantly less anxiety-filled than the first time.  Before I forget the details of the day I want to write them down.  So, here it goes.  It is very detailed (but not gross details, just a lot of small details that only I care about), so you've been warned.  (Long story short: I was in labor Thursday morning, Ryan came home from work early, we picked up my mom from the airport, and then went straight to the hospital to have the baby.  It was fast and easy, thank goodness.)

I had my weekly doctor's appointment on Wednesday, October 2nd and I was measuring all the same as the week before, although my doctor said I was very ready to have the baby.  I felt like I could have gone for a nice long walk to start labor at any point, but my mom was flying in at 3 pm the next day and I really wanted to wait until she was here so I wouldn't have to worry about sending Lucy off somewhere.  So I  tried to relax as much as possible last week.

Thursday morning, October 3rd, I started feeling contractions, although they were pretty irregular and easy enough to sit through.  My neighbor friend invited us over to hang out and distract me and Lucy, which was great because Lucy and her little boy love to play together and I love to chat with her.  As we sat around while the kids played, my contractions started getting way stronger but still pretty irregular.  Every contraction I debated about whether or not to call Ryan to come home from work or not.  I kept putting it off but when it got to where it was hard to sit still and breathe through them, I knew it was the real deal and called Ryan.  Lucy and I went home, had lunch, and then I put her down for a nap.  As soon as she woke up at about 2:30, Ryan was home and we had to leave to pick up my mom.  The ride to the airport was getting increasingly uncomfortable but I still didn't know how far into labor I was.  It's a good thing her flight was on time though (even with all the thunderstorms that afternoon) because we literally went straight back to our house, dropped off my mom and Lucy (I even waited in the car... my poor mom had NO instructions or info as to what to make Lucy for dinner, where her PJ's were, where and how much of her medicine to give her, etc.), and then Ryan and I headed into the hospital.  The hospital is just about 10 minutes from our house but there were several accidents on the freeway and made it a total standstill, so we ventured through side streets to get there and luckily made it just fine, although there were a lot of painful stoplights to sit through!  At this point, I could hardly breathe through the contractions.  This was about the point where I got an epidural with Lucy, and we weren't even there yet.  I am a wimp with pain and all I could think about was getting my epidural.  Anyway, we finally arrived at the hospital at 4:30 and they took me back to get paperwork done and check out my progress.  It was a slow night at the hospital with no one else in labor and all of the nurses were around having a party, but unfortunately they gave me the new nurse who was still learning the system and taking 95 years to get stuff done before she would/could hook me up to the IV.  Her comment during an obviously excruciatingly painful contraction was "We're almost done and then we can see if we can get your IV going, but I bet you'll get to stay and not have to go home."  Uh, I can tell you right now that if you send me home I will have this baby in the parking lot, now get me my epidural pronto! I finally got my epidural, which with round 1 was a quick, easy thing, but this time not so much.  The anesthesiologist took what felt like 5 hours to get it in the right spot and literally stuck my back in like 5 different areas.  I. Was. Dying.  And once it was in, it only numbed the left half of my body so the anesthesiologist had to come back and give me a double dose of meds, after which I was in labor HEAVEN!  I literally don't even know how people can even push during such pain and I don't care to ever find out.  Props to them but no thanks for me.  I enjoy every second of giving birth after the good stuff kicks in!  Anyway, my doctor showed up shortly afterwards and we were good to start going.  It only took a few rounds of pushing and 12 minutes later at 7:43pm little Claire Janae Martin arrived and was 8 lbs. 12 oz., and 21.5 inches long.  We were all in shock!  She was a whopping 2 pounds more than Lucy and had a bunch of black hair (literally not just dark brown, it was black). We are in love with our sweet little baby and so happy everyone was healthy, happy and safe.

(Note to self: even if your skinny jeans are actual maternity ones and are super stretched out and baggy, don't wear them to the hospital.  It will be next to impossible to get them off from around your ankles when you are trying to breathe through painful contractions!)  A few hours before we headed to the hospital!

 Just waiting and smiling only in between contractions!