J has arrived

Weighing in at 7lbs 13 oz, 22 inches long... J arrived on July 10 at 5:03am.

The birth story

I am afraid if I wait, I might never write this down, and one day, I will forget details - so here ya go little J.... the story of the day you were born.

Friday morning, July 9. We had a Doctor's appointment. At that time I was 40 weeks and 6 days. I didn't want to be induced, but since we were already 6 days late, I knew that we were about to have a conversation with the doc about when induction needed to be scheduled. I expected her to tell us to come back Tuesday or Wednesday of the next week. As we were driving up to the doctor's office, I asked Ronnie, what if she says we should go today? (of course, since we live about an hour away from the hospital, I already had the car packed just in case!) We both kinda nervously laughed it off.... knowing that was impossible!

We went in, went through the motions, weight, blood pressure, heartbeat, etc. etc. and then Dr. Fogleman walked in. She listened, measured, checked to see if I had progressed... I had not done much... She sat back and discussed the risks of inducing, not inducing etc. with us... and I asked the question "if it were you, in our shoes, what would you do?" She has had kids before and had been very honest with us up to this point... so, I trusted her.

Her response:

"I would go today."

In my mind, this is what happened:

"WWWWWHHHHHAAATTTT???? OH MY GOODNESS!!! THIS IS REALLY GOING TO HAPPEN!!!!"

What I said...

"today? really?"

She said yes, she was on call that weekend, so we could know for sure she would be delivering, and it would outweigh many other risks.

We left the office, a bit stunned.

Ronnie texted my parents in Alabama while we were walking down the hall of the Doctor's office. I think I was a bit shocked to even text! He just said "start driving."

We were checked in after a few phone calls to tell people what was going on, and I was plugged in to the Pitocin at 11:45.

At 4:30pm, I was still not progressing much - so my water was broken.

WOW did that change things. Doctor Fogleman had said right before breaking my water that they needed to speed stuff up, I was still texting through contractions. It wasn't going fast enough yet.

It still took a while to gt from 4-5cm. At that point, it was 1:30am, and J's heartbeat was slowing down into the 70's with each contraction. They were getting concerned that I might have to have a C-section. I am so thankful for a team of Doctors and nurses that are willing to try every other option first.

They started with changing my position. I already had my epidural. I got it at 4cm... I had been having contractions every 2 minutes for the last 8 hours and couldn't take it anymore. I wanted to be at 6 cm.... but I just wasn't tough enough for that.

I laid on my left side, then my right side... nothing was fixing it. They even had me get as close to laying on my belly as possible to try to move J around just in case he was laying on his cord or holding onto it with the contractions. At 2:30, the heartrate was still dropping with about every other contraction. They started an amnioinfusion.

I was kinda nervous about this, as I had never heard of it before.

They just pumped fluid back into my uterus in one last effort to keep his heartrate up during the contractions. They were getting concerned that he might not make it through birth if his heart rate was slowing so much.

This worked....

By 3:30, the nurse checked, and asked if I was ready to have a baby! yep... She started prepping me for delivery!

There was a short delay, and we started the pushing phase around 4:15 or so. I pushed a few times and then heard the nurse make the call "please tell Dr. Fogleman that we are ready for delivery."

Ronnie and I made eye contact... Of course we have known this moment would come... but it has felt like FOREVER to get here!

The excitement, love, impatience, expectation, and fear, all merged into one in my body.

Here we go.

It was much harder than I thought - I could feel the tightness of contractions. I had heard that epidurals made you rely on the machine to tell you when you were having the contraction. That was not true in my case. Honestly, the machines were failing. I had been looking forward to only knowing the contraction was happening except for the little screen beside me. This was not the case. My monitor would not stay in place. I couldn't see the screen and if I could, it wasn't registering the contractions accurately. I had to feel for the contractions myself! I had to tell them when it was time. At this point, the fear of "what if I don't know how to do this?" was overwhelming. I didn't want this responsibility.

I pulled it back together in my mind as best I could. Looking at Ronnie between each contraction watching his face for signs of concern, fear, anything. There was none - just absolute love and devotion for what he was watching take place.

At 5:03, the final pushes delivered a precious little boy. I had wanted him placed on my chest for nursing immediately afterwards. So, I knew immediately that there was a problem when the doctor cut the cord and stood up quickly.

Ronnie just kept telling me "pray" I kept asking... "why isn't he crying?" "why isn't he breathing?" "why isn't he crying?" Ronnie's steady answer... "pray Julia, just pray."

His cord had been wrapped tightly around his neck, which was what had been causing the lower heartrate during contractions earlier in the night.

The nurse made a call, the Doctor was doing the suction thing, it felt like forever.

Dr. Fogleman said "he is in shock."

She passed him off to a team of people that had rushed into the room - I don't remember how many. Ronnie looked at me again and said "pray." I sent Ronnie over to stand with J.

Before Ronnie got over there, we heard it - that amazing sound.... one loud cry! My heart jumped. Ronnie looked back at me and smiled. I then wanted to hold him so badly! I had to wait for the doctors to get finished with the initial check out.

Finally they brought him to me. He was amazing. Perfect. Breathing. Life.

So much that day could have gone wrong. I am so thankful for a team of doctors that responded so quickly to save my son's life.

Little J - your first day was stressful - but your life is already precious and we are so thankful for you. Your dad is amazing and stayed so focused on the important throughout the whole process. Without him I would have panicked... He already takes such good care of you.

We love you so much!