Monday morning I woke up around 8:30 to a normal morning. Sarah was playing in her room and Velocity was watching a show on our computer. A little after 9 I felt what I thought could be a contraction, but I had been having frequent braxton hicks for the last couple weeks so I didn't want to get my hopes up too much. I proceeded to go about my morning, I had the girls clean their room and then we went and got them some cereal. After getting the girls some cereal I decided to sit on the couch and start timing my contractions. 9:22 AM at 9:41 AM I messaged Jared and told him that I was having some contractions that were a little more intense than normal but they weren't consistent. At 9:53 am I decided to take a bath to see if the contractions would subside or continue to increase in intensity. (Thinking that if the contractions, which weren't consistent, were just false labor then they would subside and I could continue on with my day rather than going into labor and delivery just to be sent home). While in the bath I continued to message Jared and time my contractions. They continued, but did slow down a tad. I also texted my mom (10:02 AM) to let her know I was having contractions. At this point Velocity and Sarah decided to join me in the bathroom and were splashing in the bath water, I proceeded to tell Jared that they were driving me crazy so he decided to head home from work to help with the girls while I labored. It was now 10:05 AM. After a couple more minutes the contractions started to increase so I decided to get out and get dressed, thinking we would head to the hospital shortly after Jared got home. As I was getting out I messaged my mom to have her meet us at the hospital to get our girls (10:24 AM), I then got out and got dressed. After getting dressed in the bathroom I walked to our bedroom to grab socks, while grabbing socks I had a strong contraction that caused me to drop to my knees for the duration of the contraction. After the contraction subsided I walked to the front room, sat on the couch, and put on one sock. While putting on the sock I had another strong contraction that caused me to stop putting on the sock, during this contraction I thought that I felt the baby crowning so I grabbed my other sock and went to the bathroom. When I got to the bathroom I laid out my towel that I had used to dry off and then sat on it and put on my other sock. I then had another strong contraction, I went up onto my hands and knees to help with the pain and I quickly felt the baby crowning and my body start to push. At first I tried to stop my body from pushing but quickly decided that stopping my body wasn't going to help and that the baby was coming, now! At this point I sat back down on the towel, pulled down my pants, leaned against the wall, and let my body do its thing. As this contraction ended I could see the top of the babies head. The next contraction quickly started up and my body pushed the babies head out. (Luckily the cord was not wrapped around her neck). After what seemed like forever, but was probably really only 30 seconds, I had another contraction and my body pushed the rest of the baby out. She didn't start crying right off the bat, but quickly let out a little cry/whimper when I turned her face down and rubbed her back. At this point Velocity and Sarah heard that baby cry and come into the bathroom (they were in the front room during the birth). Upon seeing the baby they both said something about the baby. (My mind was kind of hazy at this point and just sort of noticed what was going on around me, but didn't take note of it). Sarah kept saying that the new baby needed a shirt, and said that "the new babies hair was long". Velocity was very concerned about getting the baby her toy. She said that "they needed to go get the new baby her giraffe toy" and then she left the bathroom to find the toy and come back into the bathroom to give it to her. (Giraffe toy story: One year for christmas Amber gave Sarah a little plastic Giraffe that sings. While organizing the girls room one day, they found this giraffe and proclaimed that it was for the new baby. They held onto this giraffe for 2 months and everytime they saw it they would say its for the new baby. They made sure to keep it in a safe spot so it didn't get lost and they could give it to the new baby when she was born. We did not take the giraffe toy to the hospital when we left, but Velocity held onto it and made sure she brought it when she came to visit her little sister and she gave it to her when she saw her at the hospital.) At this point Jared walked in the door (although it seems like it has been a while from her birth to him getting home it was actually only like 1 minute, maybe. He probably heard her second cry as he walked in the door, and was probably pulling into the parking spot and getting out of the car as she was born). When Jared walked in the door he heard a baby crying. He says that his first thoughts were that I was listening to a baby cry on my phone, thinking that maybe I had read somewhere that listening to a baby cry would help stabilize contractions. As Jared walked down the hallway and stopped in the bathroom door he quickly realized that it was his baby crying. As he stopped he said "theres a baby.." and then he asked what to do and i said "i don't know, call 911?". As he dialed 911 i thought to see what time it was to see when the baby was born. I tried to get Jared to look at the time (my hands were a little bloody and full so I couldn't grab my own phone) but he was a little occupied. While on the phone with 911 they asked Jared questions to make sure everything was going fine. They had Jared grab some towels to dry the baby off and then wrap her up to keep her warm. They asked him questions like "do you see an excessive amount of blood?" "Is the baby crying?" They asked the babies gender (at which point jared came to take a peak to make sure it was a girl, even though the ultrasound said it was a girl!). After about 6 minutes the 911 operator told him that it had been 6 minutes and they had him find some thread and tie the babies cord about 6 inches up. A couple minutes later the firetruck showed up and came in to take over. Everything quickly became a rush at this point! We had 4 firemen coming in and out of our tiny bathroom all trying to tend to me and the baby. They were asking how I felt as they discussed what needed to be done. One firemen found cord clamps and clamped the babies cord while another firemen found a scalpel and proceeded to cut the babies cord with the scalpel after it was clamped. After they cut the babies cord one firemen took her from me and handed her to Jared. Shortly after this I delivered the placenta and one firemen noted that the placenta was delivered at 10:49 AM. At this time the ambulance was arriving and the firemen were getting me ready to transport me to the hospital. They helped cover me up with a sheet and moved me to a wheel chair to get me out into the ambulance. At this point they were asking us what time the baby was born, since we didn't know the exact time we estimated based off of the call to 911. They said the call came in at 10:32 so from our best estimation we figured the baby was born around 10:30. As the firemen were moving me to the wheel chair our manager came up to find out what all the commotion was about and to make sure everything was ok. After finding out that I had had the baby and that we were fine she left our apartment and joined the crowd of neighbors that had gathered at the bottom of our stairs to watch the "show". The firemen then wheeled me to the stairs and then somehow extended bars out on the handy wheel chair to make it into a half wheel chair, half stretcher and they sort of wheeled/carried me down the stairs and then wheeled me to the ambulance. At this point I saw my mom driving up our street (Jared had texted her and told her to come to our house instead of the hospital, but didn't tell her that I had had the baby already). As the firemen got me to the ambulance and were getting ready to move me to the bed my mom quickly parked and came over in a HUGE panic saying "I didn't make it? Is everything ok? Are you ok?" At which point I just kind of laughed, while slightly fighting back tears as everthing all of a sudden hit me, and said "Jared didn't even make it!" My mom then gave me a hug, quickly climbed into the ambulance and held that baby for a second and then ran to our apartment to check on Jared and our girls. The firemen and EMTs then helped me move from the wheel chair to the bed and then lifted me up into the ambulance (which was kind of a rough ride, and I thought they were going to drop me!). They then latched in the bed and asked if I needed anything else, at which point I realized I didn't have my phone and couldn't let Jared know what was going on so I said that "my mom was here now to watch the girls and my husband would need to know what was going on cause I didn't have my phone and so he couldn't call me". They then closed the ambulance doors. Inside the ambulance there were two women, one was a trained paramedic and the other was one in training. One of the ladies had my little girl. She went to swaddle her better in the sheet they had her in, before handing her to me, at which point I noticed she had gone poop already and so I mentioned it. They wiped her off as best they could with the sheet, wrapped her in a new one, and then handed her to me so I could feed her. At this point the ambulance started driving and headed to labor and delivery. The drive was definitely an uneasy feeling as I'm laying on a bed, not strapped in, holding my brand new baby while thinking of what would happen to us if the ambulance had to make a sudden stop... As the ambulance got the the hospital, and they were getting me out (this time it was the two women moving the bed out of the ambulance) I had some more random spectators! I again felt like the women were going to drop me as they were getting me out, but was more anxious this time cause I was holding my new baby and it would be both of us getting dropped, not just me!. As the women sat down the bed and I turned the first person I saw was Jared, which was definitely a relief cause I didn't even know if he was on his way yet, and it was nice to see that he was there with me! (Jared actually rode in the ambulance, but I didn't know he was in the ambulance. I thought he was going to drive my moms car over so I was watching for it out the doors of the ambulance, but I never saw it so I wasn't expecting him to be at the hospital when we got there). The EMTs then wheeled me and the baby into the hospital and the nurses directed them to a room to take me to. As we got to this room one nurse took the baby and they had me move over from the ambulance bed to the hospital bed. I was then given the baby back to continue nursing. While I nursed, one of the nurses got information from me. They also had another doctor that worked with doctor Cain come in to check me out and make sure that I didn't tear during delivery (no tears!). At this point the nurses continued to get information from me that they needed and checked out me and the baby. We were in this room for what seemed like a couple of hours while the nurses checked everything out and got the information that they needed. After the baby (she still didn't have a name at this point) finished nursing the nurses took her weighed her and measured her. They also cleaned her up a tad cause she decided to pee and poop, again, while nursing. (luckily the sheet soaked up all the pee and it didn't get on me..). The nurses measured her at 20 inches long and 37.2 KG which converts to 8 lbs 3 ozs. After getting the measurements the nurses helped me change into a hospital gown and then gave the baby back so I could finally do skin to skin with her. As we started skin to skin she curled into me and immediately settled down. She quickly fell asleep and was snoring a tad while drooling down my chest. While doing skin to skin the nurses moved us from the room we were in and transferred us to a recovery room. Once finally getting to the recovery room Jared and I spent a little time with our little girl and tried to decide a name for her. It was now nearly 2PM and we finally texted family and let them know that she had arrived (although most my family already knew..). Visitors started coming around 3 and Elizabeth finally got her name around 5. (Jared had suggested Elizabeth but we hadn't decided on it for sure until later in the evening.) Elizabeth received her first sponge bath later that evening after all the visitors left. Sadly we were a little occupied and in shock at home, so we didn't think to take any pictures of Elizabeth. So our first pictures of her are from when we got to the hospital and the nurses where taking her measurements. Side note: the firemen did an excellent job cleaning up the bathroom before they left, and they stole our towel (which was one our our nice towels!!).
