By the way, we started a flickr dedicated to just Emmy photos, because if I upload them all on facebook, I'll end up having no friends haha.
Wednesday the 6th was a pretty normal day for me. Nothing out of the ordinary, not even any Braxton hicks contractions that I can remember. Fast-forward several hours to Thursday morning at 3:45 am.
“Holy Shit my water just broke!”
Pretty much the strangest feeling mentally I ever had. It was a combination of “I’m in trouble”, excitement, fear, “What do I do now?” and pure adrenaline. Mark jumped up and turned on the light, which confirmed my outburst. I was relieved it wasn’t blood because until I saw it I wasn’t sure. It was a terrifying few seconds.
I immediately called the doctors office, which was an answering service during closed hours.
“We will page the doctor, if you don’t hear back in 15 to 20 minutes give us another call”
They were lacking in every sense of urgency that accompanies the opening ceremonies of childbirth. So we thought we had a little time to spare, after all don’t most babies take hours upon hours to arrive? Mark hopped in the shower for a quick rinse and refresher to get awake for a 35-minute drive to Lehigh Valley Cedar Crest Hospital. Meanwhile, I gathered the last few items for our hospital bags and tried to remain calm ha-ha. I felt completely normal minus the leaking ha-ha.
Contractions started about 15 minutes into the drive and were comparable to mild cramping I have felt every month except for the previous nine. The drive was uneventful, no obstacles to get around, excessive speeding, or police escorts like you see on the cinemas.
Once we arrived, we pulled up in typical VIP DeLo style in the valet lane. Who am I kidding, Valet was closed for the night and Mark doesn’t pay anyone to do anything he can do himself. Instead we just left the car parked right in front of the entrance and I waddled in with Mark in tow.
After what seemed like 8 years sitting in a maternity ward triage room a doctor finally came in to check me. Again, no sense of urgency that I was a month early and the nurse even seemed to doubt my conviction that I had indeed experienced my water breaking.
“Three centimeters and thinning, let’s get an ultrasound machine in here.”
By this time contractions were definitely evident, I actually had to breathe through some pain. As soon as the probe was placed on my belly the doctor turned to me and said, “Uh Oh.” Not exactly the kind of words you want to hear when you are already two hours into the biggest moment and surprise of your life.
“This baby is breech, you know what that means right? C-section.”
Add major surgery to the list of things I didn’t think I would be doing on April 7th. I was scared and disappointed. This was not going at all like my “birth plan” had said it would go. Luckily, Mark and I had been watching nothing but birthing documentary style tv shows for months before. We were pretty stocked on all the info we would need for every possible situation when it came to childbirth. Whether we liked it or not was not part of the game.
Contractions at this point were getting worse; it was about 7 a.m. when they started wheeling me back to surgery. At this point the pain was intense, and had it been a regular birth I would have been considering an epidural. Things seemed to be progressing much faster then I thought they should. I think because of her positioning it made my contractions come on like crazy once most of the fluid had come out.
Getting ready for surgery was like being on a TV show. My doctor was quite dreamy looking, everything was bright white, and Katy Perry was playing in the background. Seeing Mark in scrubs was also pretty theatrical. All of it was surreal. I was pinned down like I was about to be put on the cross, arms out stuck full of needles and tubes. I was shaking like crazy not so much from nerves or the sheer coldness of the room but from the drugs.
Once I was all settled, as if being settled is an option when someone is going to slice through five layers of your belly and pull a person out, Mark came in and sat next to me. He held my hand and was saying soothing things to me, which I can’t remember. I just remember seeing him, shaking and praying that I wouldn’t feel any of the cutting.
I was also listening intently on what the doctor was saying, trying to detect any fear in his voice or unease. I didn’t, he was calm and collective and even giving pointers to someone who was learning or observing the procedure. I can remember feeling lots of pulling and wiggling, no pain or pressure really. Just like if the bottom half of my body was turned into Jell-O and someone put their hands in it. It felt like the cut was right under my ribs from all the shuffling of my organs, but it is a tiny incision a couple inches long right at the bikini line which was comforting to know once I found out.
Not too long after they documented the first incision time, I hear the doctor talk to mark.
“Hey come over here.”
Mark got up off the stool to see behind the big blue curtain and his face went from nervous to shocked and scared to seeing the most amazing thing someone can ever see. Their child being born, I will be eternally jealous of him for this.
They twisted and squirmed Emelia out of me butt first, folded in half. Mark said that she was covered in vernex and was limp until they got her to the table to stimulate her and get her to cry. They first time I heard her cry was so relieving, it seemed like hours had gone by from the time Mark said they pulled her out and he went to her side until I heard her little squeal. Instant tear factory.
Mark followed Emelia wherever she went, which was the cleaning up area, then over to see me for like a millisecond, then out to the waiting room to show family and friends and then up to NICU to make sure everything was going as it should be for a month early bambino.
Meanwhile, I am still shaking uncontrollably on the operating table getting sewn back up. The nurses and doctors were all super nice and talked to me to calm me down while Mark was looking after Emelia. I was then transported to recovery where family and friends came in threes to congratulate us and see how I was doing. I wish I could have seen me, because in pictures I looked like a hot “just out of surgery” mess.
After 6 hours in the NICU, Emelia was able to join us in our room, which was amazing. I did get to spend a couple minutes with her on my trip from recovery to my room, but nothing compares to the moment they hand her over and say “She’s yours”.
We opted to keep her in our room rather then have her go to the nursery during the night. It was difficult but we managed and Mark did a fantastic job since I wasn’t the most mobile yet.
They got me out of bed a few hours earlier then they said they would initially because I was doing well with the beginning of the recovery so that was nice. I was able to get up and change some diapers and shower, kind of feel human again.
The next couple days were full of visitors, lack of sleep and hospital food, which wasn’t so bad after all. Lot of people brought flowers and gifts, which we can’t say thank you enough for.
Rolling out the hospital door and putting our daughter in the car for the first time and heading home was so surreal too. I was so emotional, but I held it together because crying amongst laughing, sneezing, coughing and any general responsive action hurt like hell haha.
Her first days and nights at home have been wonderful. BUSY but wonderful. The delirious nights have been hard but each one gets a little better. I also manage to get some laughs out of Mark in the middle of the night.
Last night, I asked him to get Emelia and rock her and he started diving through the covers looking for her. Apparently, he must have found her because he then started rocking an air baby until I finally got him out of his funk and woke him up a bit more.
Emelia spends most of the day sleeping, eating and pooping, especially today with the pooping. She loves her furry sisters Snaps and Dora and they in turn try to lick her face and sniff her whenever they can.
Mark and I are extremely thankful and feel so blessed to have such a perfect little baby and are so excited for her to show us what life is all about. I won’t go on and on because there are no words that can describe all the feelings that come along with becoming a parent. We love her more then anything and are looking forward to watching her grow, but not too fast.
