Tuesday, 10 February started like many other days in an Oregon winter. Foggy and wet. There was a dusting of snow on the ground and when Megan walked Oliver she wore some warm clothing. I woke and cooked us both a bowl of oatmeal with a sliced up apple while Megan caught a few more moments of sleep. After breakfast Megan asked me if my phone had a full charge because she had a pretty rough night with some cramps and she thought (hoped anyway) that our baby might come a few days early.
I left for work excited at this prospect. During the day megan and communicated a few times through varius means (txt, email, and chat) but her hopes for an early baby were never as high as when I had left for work. At one point she told me she was excited because the cramps we getting a little intense but after she walked the dog they all but went away. When I got home that night (1900) Megan had prepared one of my favorite dinners and asked me to right down the times when she had a small cramp. At first I enthusiastically wrote them down but, like many other things in my life, quickly lost interest. My ADD tendencies may have played a part but I really lost interest when she told me this could last for hours, days or even weeks. After dinner we watched the last episode of The Office from season four on Netflix.com and downloaded the first episode of season five. I remember the evening being very relaxing. Oliver and I got back from our walk around 2230 and every body was in bed shortly thereafter.
Megan got up around 2300 with cramps to find a more comfortable place to lie down. She very peacefully woke me up at 2330 and told me that she was pretty sure that "it's time". I slowly got out of bed and helped her get all the hospital stuff together. Our original plan was to stay at home until the last possible moment. The idea being that it would be less stressful at home because we wouldn't have all the medical people around us all the time. Also, megan wasn't sure she wanted to use any kind of pain medication and thought that if we were home it would be less of a temptation and also easier to keep her mind off the pain.
Turns out we didn't know anything. Nothing we did let us take our mind off the pain. Megan would have a few moments to relax but when she was having a contraction was hysterical with pain. We tried some breathing techniques with very limited success. I grew more stressed out with every moment that went by. We abandoned our isolationist strategy and at around 0130 I loaded the car.
Bags. Dog. Wife. Shoes on. Shoes off. Water. Shoes on. Ignition.
We stealthly dropped oliver off at my parents and were in triage by 0200. The nurse checked to see how far along she was and found that she was dialated 3 cm. Because she had vomitted a few times and she wanted the possibly of a quick epidural they decided to put Megan on an IV. One point five hours and eighty billion contractions later she decided an epidural was the way to go. We had heard many horror stories about it taking a long time for the anithesiologist to come. sometimes taking so long that the baby came out first. This was not our experince. When the nurse asked if we wanted one Megan had one no less than fifteen minutes later. At this time she was dialated 5 cm. The epidural was in at 0345 and at by 0400 Megan was VERY comfortable. She would later say that the pain wasn't the part that caught her off guard but rather she didn't feel like she got a break between contractions. In her mind there was going to beunbearable pain for a minute or two with a few minutes of relative calm between. After the epidural she was able sleep between contractions. Now that's relative calm.
I slept straight from 0415 to 0715. Megan will have to update you on what happened during this time, although, she slept through a good portion of it too. I woke up and heard that she was 10 cm and was about to begin pushing. When she began pushing, sometime around 0730, the midwife asked me to help hold her leg in a certain position. It only took about 30 seconds before I knew that I would not be able to help in this capacity. After getting a little further from all the action I realized that I would not be able to help in any capacity and that if I didn't move futher away I would only hurt the situation by passing out.
Chase was born at 0746 and sometime between 0730 and then I could tell that there was a slight problem. First I heard someone say neecu and knew that it was an acronym, NICU, that stood for neonatal intensive care unit. These are the people that prospective parents never want to see. They are called on when there are problems. The second sign was that put a special monitor on Chases as of yet unborn head. We learned in our parenting class that they "sometimes" need to this. To me "sometimes" only happened when there was an apparent problem. The third and final sign I picked up on was that Megan shifted her position her birthing position several times while pushing. note that none of the signs were from the medical personal, they had a calm demeanor and were very professional.
When Chase came out I didn't need any subtle signs. He was as blue as a smurf! Immediately after coming out of Megan they put him on her and scrubed all of the slime off of him. While doing this he didn't seem to be moving at all, but it was hard to tell because of the four hands and half as many cloths doing the cleanup. After what seemed like five minutes (but was probably only twenty seconds) the midwife picked him up to bring him to the NICU people. After only one step Chase let out slight peep. She paused. Nothing. Again she started heading away from Megan and I. Another peep only this time not as small. It was almost a chirp. For the first time since Chase was born I saw our midwife, nicknamed Happy, smile. Her smile, though encouraging, did not cheer me up nearly as much as the full blown cry that Chase blurted out only moments later. I was the pround parent of a beautiful baby boy.
(I wrote most of this post from our hospial room with Chase asleep on my chest. :o) )
