Annabella's Story

Well better late than never, they say! Right?

As I sit here, my sweet Annabella, who is already two months old, is cooing and smiling at her toys. Not many sounds are better than that!

I can't believe how different two birth stories can be. I was always told that pregnancies and births can be so different from each other, but I never knew the full extent of what that meant until two months ago! October 2nd was my due date. I had been partially dilated and almost completely effaced for weeks prior to my due date. Annabella was for sure coming early in my mind! Abby was 4 days early and my water broke, so I assumed Annabella would follow suit. Wrong! I didn't have to worry about timing contractions or even feeling them much at all with Abby, so I was a little nervous and anxious with regards to the whole "consistently 5-minute apart for an hour" thing. Not to mention the fact that our hospital was in Mesa and we would have a 40 minute drive ahead of us.

So days went on and Annabella never came. Nights of contractions came and went, but they were never consistent enough to get us to the hospital. I finally reached my due date and went to my final doctor's appointment. I was extremely nervous since it was my first time ever seeing this male doctor. Chris and I had discussed asking about inducing on the 5th if Annabella hadn't come yet - Chris's sister Caitlin's birthday is October 5th, and Annabella's middle name is after Caitlin, so we thought it'd be special! I was pleasantly surprised when he came in and said "It's your due date - where's your baby?!" and managed to explain to me that there was no need for baby to keep getting larger and larger inside of me, so what do I want to do? So we discussed inducement and they were going to set me up with the earliest available time. He stripped my membranes (for the second time) and sent me home.

That night the contractions hit. BIG TIME. I sort of freaked out and panicked, is it time? Do we go? What if they stop? Why aren't they consistent? Five minutes, then eight minutes, then six, then three. It was stressing me out, so I finally woke up Chris (it was around 11 pm) and said "It's show time." My mom was my on call for the nights - since we didn't want to have to wake up Abby and take her with (ugh, could you say nightmare?!). I called to give her the thumbs up to head on over - we needed to leave!! No answer. Hmm. I'll call again. No answer. I called 10 times. No answers. So I panicked again. What do we do?! Thankfully Chris got a hold of his dad, and his dad was going to send Kevin over in the meantime while we tried to contact my parents. Whew. So one last call to leave a voice mail to my parents to let them know what was going on. Ring ring
 "Hello?"
"DAD?! Where are you?"
"Uh.. at home?"
"I've tried calling like 10 times. Send mom over now!"

That's basically the short version of the conversation... but thankful that my dad had just happened to wake up and look over at the phone and see the phone light flashing... definitely a God thing. So we canceled Kevin's arrival and threw our bags in the car as we waited for my mom. 11:42 pm we were driving down our road heading to the freeway. That's when I sent out my mass text letting our family know that Annabella was on her way!

The drive felt like an eternity, while my contractions got stronger and closer together. I was seriously afraid that we weren't going to make it to the hospital in time. We arrived right around 12:30 am and got ourselves in the hospital. We finally got into a room and I was to change into a hospital gown. When I got up and put my gown on, as I climbed back into bed, I saw blood all over the floor. I panicked (again) and opened the door to the nurses and said "I'm bleeding!" They came in and checked me, and I was at 8 cm. By this time it was around 1 am. The contractions were only getting harder and I could barely keep myself upright. The nurse shared that it was only my water - that it had ruptured - and I had nothing to be afraid of.

They got me into the delivery room, and by the time I arrived I was at 9 1/2 cm. Things were moving too fast! I wanted an epidural, so they were trying to find a vein for my IV - which for some reason was almost impossible. Chris told me later that you couldn't see a vein anywhere on my body! Thankfully they managed to get one on the third or fourth try and they called in the anesthesiologist. By the time he came I was already at 10 cm, but I am so thankful for the kind nurse and her "fudge" on the numbers, telling them I was only at 9. I don't know if she was being nice or if she just forgot, but if I was really at 10 I was afraid I wasn't going to get my epidural!! The wait time for the anesthesiologist felt like another eternity. I kept asking the nurses "Is he here yet?" "Can I please get an epidural?" They were super nice and kept telling me I was doing an amazing job - which I guess there's not much else to do when you're keeled over in pain every two minutes. Chris also told me (later) that I was literally crushing his hand every contraction, and he was bracing for the contractions too! Haha! Just call me Hulk woman! I think he was wanting that epidural to come quichly, too!Once the anesthesiologist came in and got me my epidural things calmed down and I chose to wait a bit for the anesthesia to kick in before we pushed. Not that it was probably all that helpful since I basically went through labor without any medicine, but it was worth it to wait and get myself ready for the big pushing event. I mean, I pushed for 2 hours with Abby, might as well prepare and get a bit of air before the hard part. So I told the nurses I was ready once I could barely feel my contractions (ahhh - modern medicine, how I love you!) - and we pushed once. She was coming. Pushed twice. Almost there. Pushed three times. Crowning. "No more pushing! We need to call in the doctor!" By the 4th push Annabella was born. 2:31 am on October 3rd. 4 pushes. FOUR! I couldn't believe how fast it went.

A 2 hour labor versus a 22 hour labor.

Yeah, I'd say that was a different experience!