Boston's Arrival

August 19th, was a day that I thought was never going to come. Being pregnant for 10 long months was harder than I thought. My entire body was aching everywhere. My feet were swollen, the bottoms ached so bad it hurt to walk, my back constantly ached and it hurt to try to even bend over to put my shoes on or pick anything up off of the ground. I had mad heart burn and acid reflux, I would get up every 2-3 hours to have a trickle of pee come out. Even with all of this pain and negativity, I got the most wonderful, beautiful boy and it was all worth it, I would do it over and over again. I honestly have forgotten how horrible I felt those last few weeks of being pregnant.

My inducement date had been scheduled on my 40 week appointment for the 19th. I had instructions to call the hospital at 6:30 AM and see if it was alright if I could come in. I figured there was no way they would push me back and I kept saying if they push me back I WOULD FREAK OUT!! I had a minor freak out and then all was good. Well, I called and they said they had an "influx" of patients I would need to call back at 8:00 AM. Well, I had been awake since 4:00 AM already and was so ancy to get this going we drove up to Josh's mom's house who lives only 5 minutes from the hospital, just so we would be closer once we actually got the call. Once 8:00 AM rolled around I called the hospital, AGAIN, they told me that they were just waiting on a nurse to show up and then they said they would call for me to come in. SERIOUSLY?! I was getting so mad hahah. 9:00 AM finally rolled around and they said they were finally ready for me. YAHOO!

We got to the hospital at about 9:15 and all of sudden it hit me I was really going to have a baby today. Everyday that I was pregnant felt like I was never going to have a baby, but we knew we wouldn't be leaving the hospital without a baby today. By the time I got checked in and in my room, it was about 10:00. They started the pitocin at 10:30 and told me that my doctor wouldn't break my water until I got 4 hours of penicillin in me, because I tested positive for Group B Bacteria. I was kinda bummed, but my doctor came in at 11:30 and broke my water!! It was a huge gush of fluid and felt so gross, but I was happy to get the process going. When I got to the hospital I was dilated still at a 4 and 80% effaced. I wasn't feeling any contractions or pain. Once she broke my water things became a lot different. The contractions were getting stronger and stronger and the pain was super intense. I was still really determined to go without an epidural, but the pain was becoming unbearable. I asked for some demerol to ease the pain, and it helped for a about 15 minutes. The contractions were coming every 1-2 minutes and they were pretty intense. I had to be hooked up with an internal monitor to see how strong my contractions were, plus had the pitocin, so walking around and getting in the tub to control the pain were out of the question.

Finally, at 1:30, the pain was HORRIBLE! I was dilated to a 6 and 100% thinned out, but I was dying. I finally gave in and got the epidural. Josh was amazing through the whole thing and felt so horrible I was in so much pain. I didn't' want him to touch me or anything, he just sat there and was amazing. Once the anesthesiologist came and to give me the epidural I was in heaven. The epidural didn't hurt at all. It felt like a little prick in my back. Josh loved watching him put the needle in my back and thought it was really cool how they did it. I didn't even look at the needle. I think that would have made it 10x worse. After about 15 minutes, I was pain free! It was amazing. I couldn't believe I had not wanted to get an epidural ever. I was just laying there and the contractions were coming pretty quickly and intensely and I felt nothing. I was progressing about a cm an hour so things were going great. It was crazy how heavy my legs felt.

At 6:00 PM, the nurse said we were finally ready to start pushing. I couldn't believe how amazing my nurse was. She did everything! I was pretty shocked to see only her and my doctor and the baby nurse in the room for the delivery. On TV shows it looks like a whole herd of people are in there. Once I started pushing, I was making pretty good progress each push. I still couldn't feel any pain or even pressure. My doctor came in about 6:30 PM and we had about 10 good pushes and he was out. Josh swore my whole pregnancy he was going to stay up by my head and not look "down there," but once the process happened he thought it was so amazing. The last 3 pushes I could feel a lot of pressure, and they could see all of his hair! The doctor said he probably would have been here a few pushes ago if he didn't have as much hair. At 6:57 PM Boston James Strickland arrived. It was amazing! Once, he was out they laid him on my chest while they cleaned him off and all I remember is saying how little he was. I was dying to know how much this so called 9 pound baby weighed. Once they were doing all the tests, and weighed him only 7 pounds 11 ounces. I was shocked as well as everyone else. It truly is the best feeling in the world giving birth to a beautiful healthy little boy. It is true what they say you don't know what love is until you have a child of your own.

Josh has been an amazing father. He is so concerned about everything little thing Boston does and is so hands on. He changes his poopy diapers, baths him, and loves to just sit and hold him. He can't wait for him to be a little bigger so they can play and go fishin. I love my two sweet men!