Micah's Birth Story

I need to record the birth story before my mommy brain forgets everything! Like I expected I went past my due date with little man #4. I think he was scared to join the craziness! After my experience with Gavin I wasn't going 2 weeks past my due date again and the doctors agreed with the high fluid and other issues I had during the pregnancy. The doctor I wanted to induce me was on call the 28th so that's what we went with. Gavin's induction was pretty quick and smooth so I had expectations of the same. It didn't quite go as planned.

I got to the hospital right at 7am and got up to our room to get started. I think they started pitocin around 8:45am and the waiting game began. I wasn't feeling anything for hours. Eventually I could tell when I was having a contraction but I barely had to breathe through them. Time seemed to be ticking away pretty fast. The doctor checked me around 2pm and I was 4cm. He told me I should go ahead and get the epidural if I wanted it. I think his reasoning was I progressed so quick with Gavin that I could miss my opportunity this time around. I am all about the epidural but I had a hard time getting it when I wasn't feeling anything. So we waited. Contractions were consistent over the next couple hours but still not very strong. That is the hard part about being induced. I had to stay hooked up to all the monitors. I couldn't walk around, it was hard going to the bathroom, etc. We were hoping Brad would be home by bedtime to have the boys back at our house but we started making plans around this time to have the boys spend another night at friend's houses. Around 5pm, I actually had to start breathing through the contractions so I went ahead and agreed to get the epidural. Of course the last 2 labors it took 2 hours to get it and I was really in pain and this time the doctor was in the room in about 10 minutes. It was hard getting it knowing it wasn't going to relieve immediate pain. I actually felt worse after - I got a headache and I had a pain in my side I couldn't get rid of since I couldn't move around. This made me very emotional. I was crying and they kept telling me to calm down because my heart rate was going up. The nurse gave me phenergan to help with the nausea and that knocked me out. The nurse came in a little before 8pm and said that the baby was starting to have sharp decreases in the heart rate. They wanted me to move around in case the baby was on the cord. After a couple times of rotating back and forth I noticed that everyone was starting to get ready for me to push. I was wondering what was going on since I didn't feel like I needed to push. I guess the amniotic sac was coming out of me when they were moving me so the doctor broke the water and they knew he was coming. I was checked at 8:10pm and was 10 cm. They wanted me to push during the next contraction..I did and there he was! The doctor did have to take cord off the neck before I pushed the rest of his body out. I was so glad I had the epidural because the placenta took a while to come out. He was massaging my stomach pretty hard and pulling the cord trying to get it out. Glad I didn't feel that. I am not complaining now that everything took so long because I didn't tear which is a huge blessing.

I was still really out of it after the birth. I held him right away because I felt like I should but I was grateful when the nurses took him to clean him up. I was right on my guess of 9 lbs. He is another long one coming in at 22.5 inches. We both liked the name Micah. I wanted another 5 letter name with a different initial than the other boys. We also decided that since we had 2 non-biblical names (Chase & Gavin) that we should go with a biblical name to even it out (Jacob). Charles in my grandad's names and also my youngest brother's middle name (his daughter's middle name is Janelle). I lived with my grandparents for a year before going to K-State. They made it possible to attend there and meet Brad, etc. :)

You can't tell here but he came out with a head full of dark hair. I could tell from the ultrasounds that he had a lot of hair but was surprised how dark it was!