We've been doing everything this last week to get SJ to decide he's ready to meet us. Spicy food, walking around the mall, bouncing on the yoga ball....and nothing. Friday night we gave it one more try with going over to my parents house. My mom fixed a green chili stew and we played a round of cards all while visiting about the coming due date (Monday) or Thursday when we were schedule to be induced. We got home, and feeling victorious from a win in cards, I treated my wife to some extra-curricular activities (you know, for the baby) and off to bed we went.
Saturday morning, I woke up early with a bad cough so I decided to go get on the couch so Trisha could get some more sleep. At about 9am, she texted me with needing some water so I brought it in and asked if she felt any different from our full day of labor inducing activities, but she said no. So we cuddled and decided it was perfectly fine to take a mid-morning nap. At that point we both realized SJ wasn't coming anytime soon. Trisha, through hard work and self-sacrifice, had built the perfect pregnant paradise for him and he was going to take an extended stay in his little self contained resort. We needed to be patient and although Trisha didn't want to be induced on Thursday, it really wasn't in our hands.
Lesson #1: SJ is in control
10:15 am - I feel Trisha roll out of bed and waddle to the bathroom. "Um, honey....I think my water just broke!" I was still half asleep but it felt like I've been waiting my adult lifetime for this moment. I jumped out bed and had my clothes on with the hospital bag and keys in hand ready to go when she explained she needed to get pretty to go to the hospital. You see, my Peepaw had given us some money for Christmas and we decided to purchase a nice DSLR camera with it so we could document the next years of our family with pics not taken on my iPhone. Little did I know that while I was at Best Buy yesterday telling the sales guy that I had a week to play with the thing until my son came, I was lucky to just get the battery charged and the basics learned.
By 10:45, we were off to the hospital and checking in to the registry desk.
Trisha has had false labor before and we didn't want to be "that couple" that jumped to the hospital every time she felt something weird going on. In fact, Trisha had contractions for about 16 hours straight last week and we almost took the trip but I convinced her to try and wait it out. Luckily we did wait as we found out in the triage room that its no fun being strapped up to the machines for a few hours just to find out you're not in labor. I'm sure the nice couple next to us (who went home an hour later) wasn't too fond of our excitement and joyous laughing.
We were still having a great time because Trisha wasn't even having contractions. Which is a little off. The majority of women start their contractions, head to the hospital and have to have their water broken there.
Enter: pitocin
Once we got to our labor room and Trisha got her gourmet delivery gown on and IV in, it was time to get this process rolling. The contractions started light and mama was doing quite nicely. We knew this was going to be a loooong day because for the last few doctor visits and even up to the triage this morning, Trisha wasn't even dilated to a 1 yet.
3 hours, several cups of ice chips and 4 popsicles later...the nurse told us we were still at a one. The contractions were ramping up but we weren't progressing any. This is when Trisha decided she wanted to take a walk. She was being a trooper and wanted to wait as long as possible before she got the epidural so she wanted to walk around a little while she still had use of her legs.
This was the last smile we got out of her. The walking jump started those contractions to the point where she would stop in mid step and had tears running down her cheeks. It was hard to watch my love in so much pain. We made it back to the room and she had one more contraction before she was begging for the drugs. Luckily, we found out that due to everyone having scheduled births in this age of convenience, the labor floor on the weekends was extremely empty and the anesthesiologist was in our room working on Trisha in about 5 minutes. (Which was probably about 15 minutes late...as Trisha has noted that during her next birth, she will be requesting those drugs A LOT sooner). After the epidural, I got my happy wife back and we found out we were at a 3 which made us happy she was finally progressing.
A couple of hours of watching the contraction charts being spit out of the little printer next to her bed and listening to the little beeps of his heart rate, it was time to check her progress again. We were really hoping for a 6 or 7 due to her slow progression and was extremely surprised to her our new nurse ask us if we were ready to start pushing. Talk about a heart stopping moment! I think Trisha and I looked at each other dumbfounded because the time was finally here and we were getting very close to meeting our little man. The nurse explained that sometimes there were hours of pushing and the doctor wouldn't get there until right before he was ready to pop out.
This was an exciting time. Trisha decided she needed to make sure she was fixed up for delivery and I practiced my "catching" position.
But the excitement was short lived. After about 15 minutes of pushing, SJ's heart rate dropped from 150 to 40. I could see the emergency in the nurses eyes when she dropped Trisha back down into a lying position and rolled her over away from the computer screen. She was instructing the desk nurse to call our doctor to quickly head this way and to pay attention to the notes she had left and also prep the on-call doctor for an emergency c-section. We were told that if SJ didn't stabilize quickly, that we were about 3 minutes away from surgery.
I don't remember being that scared in a long time. It was really hard trying to be calm for Trisha because she didn't know what was going on and had only me to show her that things were going to be ok. SJ did calm down and Dr. Hatton did show up. We took an hour break and decided to let SJ do things on his time and let him work himself down a little on his own. We were nervous when the pushing time presented itself again but Trisha's instincts kicked in and she rose to the occasion. Several nurses filled the room prepping the carts and delivery table and....ME!
Now I've heard from probably a dozen fathers that child birth was an un-natural and crazy, creepy, gross experience. But I took all of that with a grain of salt as I decided to share in the delivery experience. We were blessed with a doctor that was going to allow me to "catch" my baby son and I couldn't be more excited. It was truly a crazy sight when I first saw his head. And after the doctor said "this next push is going to be a baby" I got into my position to bring my baby boy into this world....with a little help from his mama of course.
It is a moment that I will never forget. And I'm blessed to have pictures like this one to remind me of the awesomeness that is our God for allowing us to bring a healthy, perfect baby into his world. I was so proud of Trisha. She sacrificed caffeine and nitrates and other luxuries that I take for granted for 9 long months in order to ensure our babies health and I loved her more In that moment than I have ever loved someone before.
Sean Alan Kirkpatrick Junior
Born on Saturday, January 5th, 2013 at 10:50 pm
Weighing 7 lbs 9 ozs
Measuring 20 inches in length
It was a long 36 hours in the recovery room. Having someone check something every 30 minutes doesn't allow any rest. Poor little guy got poked and prodded and snipped and weighed and changed. All he wanted to do was snuggle with mama. We were blessed that he had no problem feeding. During our pregnancy class, there was a full session on breast feeding and the complications that could arise from all of it. But he's a hungry little one and has no problem demanding feeding from his mom and her all-you-can-eat buffet.
The time came for us to go home. Two little old ladies wheeled Trisha and our belongings to the car and we strapped SJ into his car seat for the first time. It finally hit us...this little guy is coming home with us. I think we both cried the whole way home which wasn't too far but it seemed like I drove slower down Indiana than I had ever before. A new chapter in our lives has begun and now can truly embark on
The Kirkpatrick Adventure!
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