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About Z:
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Our Story:
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About A:
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About M:
Friday afternoon (January 28, 2011) is when we're pretty sure that my water broke. We went to Labor and Delivery to get checked out and from all appearances and tests, everything was ok. They sent me home with orders to rest and take it easy. I did just that for the rest of the day and into Saturday. I woke up with cramps on Saturday, but they weren't anything that I thought were something bad. At least until they woke me up at 12:30 am in so much pain I could barely breathe or walk to the bathroom. Z came and asked me what was wrong and I said that I was in a lot of pain and that we should probably go make sure everything was alright. We called my mom and she came and stayed with A.
In the time it took for us to get ready and my mom to get to our house, contractions had started and were 4.5 minutes apart. We got to the hospital around 1:15 am, they hooked me up to the monitors and checked me. I had gone from not being dilated to being dilated to 1 cm. Not much progress but something and coupled with the contractions they were concerned. They gave me several shots to stop the contractions and by 5 am, the contractions had appeared to stop, however, when they sat me up so we could go home the pain returned full force, but without the contractions in my abdomen. I asked the nurse about it and she explained that sometimes the pain I was feeling was caused by the position the baby was in and then gave me some instructions on how to help her move so that the pain would subside.
We got home around 5:30 am and I attempted to go to sleep. It was a rough 3 hours before A woke up around 9. I was still having pretty severe cramps and trying to deal with them the way I was instructed, but nothing was helping. Around 10 am, Z suggested I take a shower, which did help with the pain to some extent, but only until I got out. At that point, I was in so much pain I was having trouble walking or breathing again. I was sticking to my bed and the bathroom as I felt was most comfortable. At about 10:45 am, Z left to take the turkey we were planning to eat for Sunday dinner with my family to my parents' house to put it in the oven.
As soon as he left, the contractions came back in full force and were about 3 minutes apart. I called Labor and Delivery and gave them a run-down of what was going on. The nurse told me to come back up and get checked again. Z walked in as I was hanging up the phone. He asked me who I was talking to him and I told him, he then asked what the problem was. I said I was having contractions and needed to go back to the hospital to get checked again. He asked if he had time to "freshen up" - change clothes, to which I gave him a look that said, "You'd better make it quick." Shortly after he asked that question, I got up and pushed past him into the bathroom in what I now realize was panic. He followed me and asked what was wrong. My response was, "You need to call an ambulance NOW!" He asked why, and I responded, "Because I have to push". That was about 11 am.
He was on the phone with 911 by 11:03. The dispatcher called my mom to come get A because we weren't going to be able to bring her to their house and then instructed Z "restrain" A until my mom got there, because she was trying to "help" mommy. Z was then instructed to get me lying on the floor in the bathroom. Yes, it was the bathroom, not the living room, contrary to what the newspaper reported. The first responding officer arrived on the scene around 11:07 and stayed with me the rest of the time. The second officer arrived shortly after - around 11:10 and is actually a long-time friend of the family. The ambulance arrived around 11:13. When the paramedic came in the bathroom, he forced me to open my legs, something I wasn't willing to do for the first police officer. At that point, he said, "We have a head." In another push, we had a baby who came out crying and with beautiful color for being 6.5 weeks early.
M was born at 11:17 am, January 30, 2011, weighing it at 4 pounds, 12 ounces and measuring 17.5 inches long.
While delivering at home was not the way I would have preferred to do it, I was blessed to have a husband who kept his cool and stayed calm and medical and public safety professionals who did their jobs the best way they knew how and made the actual delivery relatively trauma free for me. The rest of the day was a whole different story, but both M and I recovered well, our lab work came back clear, and while, even now, they are still not sure why she came so early, they are thoroughly impressed and satisfied with her progress so far.
We brought M home 21 days after she was born. She spent that time in the Special Care Nursery – our hospital’s version of a NICU – growing and learning to regulate her own temperature.
God blessed our family with a new baby girl who was not expected as soon as she came, but was welcomed to the world with more love than many babies see in a lifetime and I cannot thank Him enough for the people he sent to take care of us during those crazy days.
Two weeks after M came home, we ended up back in the hospital with RSV, which resulted in a 9 day stay at Mott Children’s Hospital. Although it was incredibly difficult, there is nowhere else I would have wanted to be in that situation then Motts.
