Sarah Abigail

Please help us welcome Sarah Abigail to our family!

All week I'd been having false labor that just kept stopping, so Thursday night when I was awakened at 10:51 I thought this was the same. It did hurt, but only in my back - though the contractions were about 7-8 minutes apart. We decided to run into Labor & Delivery anyway since it did hurt and I wanted to see if anything was actually happening!

We called Nathan's mom to come over and headed over to the hospital. We checked in at midnight to be monitored for an hour. The contractions were about 5 minutes apart and really beginning to hurt, I was having to breath through them in a big way! After an hour of monitoring I had dialated from a 4 to a 5.5, so they decided I could stay. I was moved to a Labor & Delivery room from Triage - in the process I made it abundantly clear to the nurses that I wanted pain medicine and an epidural. I said "Drug me silly!" :)

My contractions were really coming quick and HURT. I was moaning and really uncomfortable. The nurses got an IV in so they could give me fluids to prep for the epidural and drew blood between contractions.

The nurses checked me again and SURPRISE! I'd gone from that 5.5 to an 8 in 20 minutes! They said, "Hon, you might not have time for that epidural!" They started trying to locate the doctor, as he still hadn't come.

10-15 minutes later I was insisting that I needed to push and the nurses were telling me no, wait for the doctor. In that time they are calling him, saying I am complete and ready to push - 3 times they called! I was dialated to 10 and ready to go! Finally the doctor arrived - just in time to sit down and tell me, "okay, next contraction, go ahead and start pushing!"

I pushed for 20 minutes (4 good sets of pushes) - through which I screamed "like a banshee" according to Nathan - I am rather hoarse now! And she arrived!

I learned afterward that I hadn't even got the pain medicine! They never had time for the meds or the epidural - so I did it all naturally, even though I had NO intention of doing so! That's what I get for going so quick I guess! Next time I'll have to camp at the hospital!

Sarah Abigail arrived at 2:18am on July 24. She weighed 10 lbs, 8 oz and was 21" long. She looks a little like a linebacker with no neck! She is healthy and beautiful - looks much like Hannah did at this age, we'll be able to tell they are sisters!

I will post more pictures later - my computer is not being helpful! (Or check us out on facebook!)