Don't You Dare Pack A Bag!!!

Time for some updates and then some birth story fun! A special thanks to my mother and Matt for actually getting me to go to the hospital. I was in total denial that I was in labor and kinda lost my mind early on. (Ok, I went completely crazy).



But first, some updates!



I have once again become a human milk machine, which is a lot less scary this time around. Sloane is an awesome eater. Recovery has been amazing. I felt so awful when I was pregnant that now that I'm not pregnant, I feel like I could run a marathon. I LOVE being able to lay on my stomach. Every night I crawl into bed, lay on my stomach and say, "Matt! Look! Look! I'm on my stomach!".



Holynd has been cutting teeth left and right. She's working on her fourth top tooth and sixth bottom tooth. She's starting to form sentences, so we get to play "Guess-What-The-Heck-Holynd-Is-Trying-To-Say" all day long. She talks so fast that she tends to run all the words together. My favorite thing she started to say is, "No-ie, no-ie, no-ie you!". It's what she says when I tell her "No". We're also considering introducing a big-girl potty... Since she now tells us when to change her. She's also started taking off her own diaper if no one is heeding her "change me!" warnings. Holynd is (slowly) learning to love her little sister. She's had some jealousy issues, but Sloane is an awesome baby, so she doesn't care. ;) Holynd has developed a pretty serious Toy Story addiction. We watch Toy Story and Toy Story 2 at least once a day. I have dreams at night about Woody and Buzz getting hit by a bus because I've watched these movies so many times.


I think I can count on one hand all the times I've heard Sloane cry. Seriously. She is definitely my little Peterson-baby. She loves to snooze all day long. When she is awake, she likes to be right in the middle of everything. She's completely content with Holynd running full-tilt screaming, the vacuum running, the TV on... Sloane already seems to be her sister's complete opposite. At night, she wakes up to eat and goes right back to sleep. She even sleeps in her cradle! (Something her sister would never do).


And now for my slightly-crazy birth story!


I started contracting at 10:30pm on the 17th. They we're pretty painful and very consistent. Matt started timing them and they were 5 minutes apart, over a minute long until about midnight. They started to space out a little and weren't getting any worse, so we decided to just go to bed. I managed to sleep until about 4am and then my "somewhat" painful contractions turned into "I'm going to loose an ovary!" contractions. They were really far apart, so I tried desperately to sleep in between them.

The next morning I got out of bed in a very annoyed mood. I was so mad that my body was just playing "tricks" on me! I was 110 percent sure that these contractions weren't doing ANYTHING except making me miserable.

Holynd went down for a nap at about 10:30am and I started looking for things to do around the house. I was still having really painful contractions, but they were over 10 minutes apart, so again, I figured it was nothing. I started to clean things that weren't dirty, just for a distraction. A few minutes later, my mom called to check on me. After talking to me on the phone for awhile, mother's intuition kicked-in, and she convinced me to call my doctor. I called and left a message with the on-call nurse. At this point, I couldn't sit or stand because I had so much pressure in between contractions. I just kinda shuffled around the house leaning against things.

At 11am, I lost my mind. I was so frustrated that I was going through this and I wasn't going to get a baby out of it! I called Matt sobbing. He decided to come home. Right after I got off the phone with him, the nurse called me back. She made small talk for awhile, so she could hear me talk through one of my contractions. She asked me a few questions, then told me to head to the hospital. Right before I hung up with her she said, "It's always good to prepare to be sent home, just in case". This did not make the situation any better.

Matt got home a little while later and started to help me get Holynd ready to go see her G-Ma. (My mom was going to meet us at the hospital). After she was dressed, he asked what he should pack her for her G-Ma visit. I started screaming, "Don't you dare pack a bag!! We are coming home tonight! There will be no baby, not ever!!!! Stop getting your hopes up!". (Seriously, I was on the verge of a nervous breakdown).

When we got in the car, I noticed that my contractions were exactly seven minutes apart, like clockwork. They were getting increasingly painful and I started praying that they would at least give me a shot of pain killers before they sent me home. It was at this point that we noticed that we didn't have an insurance card on us and we had to turn around and go back home. By the time we left (again), I actually looked like a woman in labor. I started grabbing my stomach and breathing deeply during contractions. I didn't want to move, but I didn't want to sit still either. While all this is going on, Matt decides to take a "quicker" route to the hospital. It ended up taking us over an hour to get to the hospital.

We got to the hospital and dropped off Holynd. (With nothing more then a few diapers and a pair of pajamas. I have a very awesome mother who took care of everything until we got Holynd a bag of things the next day). We started walking into the hospital and I started bawling. I kept thinking about how embarrassing it was going to be to get sent home. I was so upset that I didn't notice how close my contractions had become.

At about 3pm, the triage nurse got me hooked up to the monitors and checked me. "4 cm" she said. I looked at her in disbelief, "What?!". She gave me a puzzled look and said, "You're contracting every 2 minutes. How far progressed were you at your last doctor's appointment?". I answered, "2 and a half centimeters". She smiled and said, "Did you want an epidural now or later?". I nearly died. I wanted to get up and hug this lady. "Now".

She left to go speak with a doctor and to watch my monitors for a few minutes. The contractions kept coming and I started to feel like someone was trying to drive a bus through my butt. (Yep, I just said that. No other way to describe it). Every time I had a contraction, I held on to Matt and told him, "Take me home! I don't want to have a baby anymore! Tell them I can't lay here anymore!" It was all too stressful and I wasn't 100% convinced they were really going to keep me there. The nurse came in and said my room was ready and they were admitting me. I was excited, but STILL in denial. I didn't let Matt start calling or texting anyone because I was convinced it was all a huge joke.

They got me to my room, stuck an IV in my arm and sent the amazing epidural lady in. After they got me all set up with a wonderful epidural, they checked me again, "5 centimeters", the nurse said, "You are definitely having a baby today. I'll send Dr Jones in to break your water". I finally told Matt we could start telling everyone. :)

At 8:28pm, Sloanie Balonie had arrived. She cried to 2.2 seconds and has been pretty much content ever since. We went home the next day, enjoyed some Thai food and laid in bed until 10:30am the next morning.