** I should note, I started writing this two weeks ago and am finally getting around to finishing it. Such is mom life. Speaking of mom life, I am blaming all typos and misspelled words on said life. Ok, go.
Well, if you are a follower on Facebook or Instagram, you’ve obviously noticed an influx of chubby-cheeked, baby pictures of our SON! Yes, Maddox Wade was born Saturday, September 26 and has been melting our hearts for more than a month now.
For those of you wanting to know the story, here it is. If you don’t want to know the story, then re-visit some travel posts or a recipe post or something. 🙂
To set things up, I spent the week prior to going into labor wrapping up some client meetings, organizing paperwork, setting everything up for a “maternity leave” and prepping some food for the freezer for easy meals for our first weeks as a family of three. I also spent the week finishing teaching my barre classes, bouncing on a medicine ball and walking the zoo. Thursday I walked the zoo with April and when my mother-in-law called me Friday and proposed the zoo for a Friday activity, I figured I was motivated to walk, so I did it again! That must have pushed me over the edge because my labor started on Saturday morning.
I woke up Saturday at 5:00 a.m. to the feeling that my water was slowly breaking. Upon checking it out, I was more convinced but confused as well since I had no contractions. I decided to lay back down until something else happened and 5:45, that first big contraction that wraps around from your low back to the front of your belly almost made me sit straight up out of bed. (Side note: They always say, “you’ll know” when real contractions start and I was unsure that I would because I hadn’t had many Braxton Hicks contractions… however, I WAS VERY AWARE!)
I hopped in the shower (thinking I’ll be gross for three days straight so I might as well go in with clean hair.) When I hopped out, I had asked Mack to make me some toast and some chocolate milk, knowing I wouldn’t get to eat anything once I arrived at the hospital. It was about this time that I started drying my hair and timing my contractions. They were still a good 6-7 minutes apart, so still not quite hospital worthy BUT since I thought my water was breaking that was reason enough to go ahead and get it checked out. By 7:30 a.m. I had gotten to the point that I really didn’t want to talk during contractions, so we finished loading the truck and made our way into the hospital.
We made it in and got checked into the triage area where I was checked and was told I was a one… a ONE. I thought, “oh this is gettin’ REAL, REAL if I am only at a one?!” But as we suspected, my water had broken so I was a keeper. My OB was actually on-call that weekend so she did a round by me and checked me. I say checked me… I was a one when she came in and a little more than a three when she left. Yowza.
We made our way upstairs to the delivery room after being downstairs for a few hours. It was about this time that we started to notify moms and dads that I was admitted and that we were going to have this baby sometime in the next 24 hours. I had been in labor for a little over six hours at this point and an epidural was sounding pretty great but I wanted to get it at the correct window {from hearing horror stories of epidurals wearing off, epidurals only working on half the body, etc.) but I was told it would be ok regardless of whenever I received it. I went ahead and had the nurse put me on the anesthesiologist’s rotation. Upon waiting about a half an hour, I was told there was another woman in an emergency C-section and that it would take a minute to get him down to my room. I said, “she’s having a much worse day than me so please, let her go and come back to me later.” 30 more minutes went by… 30 more minutes went by… as my contractions got stronger my empathy for said girl was wearing off and I was wondering where my epidural was.
Finally Dr. Cotton arrived and bless his heart, I answered every question he asked me as short as possible. I was in no condition to chit chat and was relieved when the process was complete and felt almost immediate relief. My nurse told me I had awesome breath control and I remember responding, “well, I’d hope so, I teach yoga!”
Baddha Konasana pre-pushing
From then on, labor was… dare I say, fun? My entire family was already up at the hospital so that whole, “rest while you can before labor” didn’t really apply to my situation and I spent the day more or less just hanging out with my family getting the occasional check and position change.
Just a casual pose, we should work on photo shoots for sure.
Best friends are surely the family that you get to choose.
They wanted in on the cheese too!
But she’s got all the feels
Last picture of just us two!
(At one point, my legs were covered up by blankets so I couldn’t see them and I tapped my shin and asked Mackenzie what it was. He looked at me like I was crazy and said ummmmm your leg? I responded, “no, my leg’s up here!” Enter the blank stare from Mackenzie that his wife had surely lost it.)
I wasn’t about to be in labor without my ruby red slippers. (There is also no way to not have cankles when you’re that pumped of fluid.)
Right about a 9, Mackenzie and the nurse started to usher people out in hopes I could get a 30-minute cat nap before it was time to push. I was relieved for a nap as I was pooped! 5:00 a.m. wake up call and contracting and entertaining all day will surely take it out of you. Post-nap, it was pushing time. Since I was feeling ok, I gave Mack the go ahead on the “Pumped Up Jams for Labor” playlist. We were jamming to Bring Em’ Out and Push It when my OB walked in.
I should tell you that I LOVE my OB. She is perky, she is positive yet realistic, she’s down to business, she’s busy and for this whole pregnancy, I was seemingly an easy patient to her. But when she walked in, her face didn’t register the normal chipper attitude that we were accustomed to. She had been monitoring my stats and pushing remotely and decided it was time for her to intervene and get this baby out. She let me push for a few minutes and then during a break, told us several bits of minor bad news but all combined, sounded like a lot and not good. “The baby’s desatting, he’s flipped from posterior to sideways, it’s likely that you have a small infection from your water breaking so long ago which has caused you spike a fever and subsequently the baby to have a fever as well and the baby is stuck on your tailbone as it is protruding quite a bit. Woah. That was a lot to hear for a new mama’s heart.
She put me on oxygen and called the NICU just in case. She let me know she might have to use forceps or vacuum to get Maddox out and I told her I was fine with whatever she needed to do to get my son out ok. I pushed for a few more minutes on my own and when it was clear that I (quite literally) couldn’t ramp Maddox over my tailbone, Dr. Hager used a bit of vacuum suction just to get him over the bone but let me push him the rest of the way out. Mackenzie was narrating the labor for me so I would know what was happening and then the most blessed sound we’ve ever heard, our son’s first cry.
I wanted my son first and then immediately after, MY GATORADE! I was so thirsty!
They handed him to me for a few moments before taking him to the incubator to be cleaned, weighed and most importantly to get his temperature taken since he had a fever as well. Maddox’s began to drop almost immediately, which was a great sign! They brought him to me as I was very adamant about skin to skin for the “miracle hour”. After a few moments of skin to skin, I was able to nurse Maddox for the first time, led by him. It was all I could have dreamed of. God’s design of everything is just so incredible.
After our hour, we slowly started letting grandparents back. Wait, that’s not true. After I had nursed Maddox, we had a visitor pop in… It was my brother. He said, “do you guys know everyone’s out there? They said I couldnt come back but I just walked through the doors behind someone?!” Bless. Mack told him that was by design so I could feed Maddox for the first time. Of course that was enough to gross my 25-year old brother out so he made his way back to the waiting room until everything was covered and safe to go! Ha!
Maddox was covered in love from the very beginning and the shower hasn’t stopped! We had a wonderful hospital stay and such great nurses and doctors working for and with us. In fact, after my mom left, I thought… do you think they’ll let you go back to the hospital just to stay a few nights? No?
We left on Monday morning and brought Maddox home to what Mackenzie refers to as “the greatest house ever” and started our lives as a family of three. My mom stayed with us for that first few nights and her holding Maddox through part of the night was invaluable. We were kind of heartbroken when she left! Her staying, accompanied with the meals people brought and Mack’s mom staying with us on Mondays and Fridays (so I can get work done since I don’t technically have maternity leave) have been some of the greatest gifts we could receive!
Now Maddox is almost six weeks old and we are doing great! He’s a little grumpy sometimes but luckily his cuteness, precious pouted lips, sweet sleepy grins and grunts and tiny baby everything always trump that!
meg your pardon 