A Personal Story, part 8

My water broke at 3 a.m. on January 24, 2009. Mason was moving back to Regina that morning, and it looked like the baby would be coming the same day. My mom drove the 45 minutes into town to take me to the hospital at 3:00 a.m. (it just had to be my mom, even though my dad and step-mom were just upstairs)! We went to the hospital, but were sent home. While my water had broken, I wasn't actually having contractions yet. Mom and I went for a 6:00 a.m. breakfast and then went home to try and get some sleep. I managed to get about four hours of sleep until my contractions were too uncomfortable to sleep through. Then came the waiting game.

Gavin's birthday, Dad offered to take one last picture of pregnant me.

I got myself ready to go the hospital and then tried to relax while I waited for Mason. He kept me updated on his activities and by the middle of the afternoon he finally came over. We tried to take it easy and spend some time together, but my contractions kept getting worse. At 5:00 p.m. we went to the hospital, this time to stay. I didn't get a labor room, but instead they just put me in a bed separated by a little curtain from a bunch of other beds. My contractions hurt a lot, and kept getting more intense. The nurse was monitoring Gavin's heart rate, and seemed a little concerned. She called in another nurse, and they just stood and stared at the machine. They got me to move around, then take oxygen. Then they called my doctor in. At this point, the three of them just stood and stared at the monitor. They didn't give us a lot of information, probably because they didn't want to worry us. My contractions were now about 90 seconds long without actual breaks in between, but I was nowhere near ready to have the baby.

Finally my doctor broke the news. My baby's heart rate was dropping extremely low and not recovering very well because of my contractions. We could wait it out, but it would probably be another 10-14 hours of labor and even then a c-section might be inevitable. So a c-section it was. I was terrified, but things moved very quickly. An amazing nurse in the operating room made things like needles in the back a lot easier. Mason was with me the whole time and when Gavin was born, Mason was the first family member to hold Gavin. We laughed and cried, and Mason went with Gavin to the nursery and shared the news with our families.

January 24, 2009

the final chapter... next week...

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9