The birth that finally started....

I'm finally typing the birth story for my Third little baby girl. I guess procrastination runs in the Mikfamily, because baby girl took her sweet old time deciding to arrive (little lady was 10 days late). On Friday July 11 the Officer and I went out on a date for the first time in months. It was wonderful, but halfway through I definitely thought I was going into labor. I started to get very uncomfortable and have some random pain and shortness of breath (one might consider these contractions, but I never like to say that I'm actually having contractions until a baby is about to appear). We got to dinner and I was in a lot of pain, and the Officer and I both began to think that maybe baby would come that night! Then halfway through dinner all of my pain, discomfort, and shortness of breath ended completely, and it was obvious the baby would not be coming yet.

Saturday morning the Officer was gone at his prayer group, and I woke up with a sudden uncharacteristic surge of energy. I knew that one way or another this baby would be coming very soon, so I frantically cleaned the house. I was trying very hard to be patient while I waited for baby to arrive, and most days I did okay, but I also tried everything I possibly could to induce labor. That morning, as my final attempt to encourage this baby to arrive before my Sunday night induction, I made myself a "Midwife cocktail" (thank you Miesha for the recipe!). Of course about 15 minutes after I started drinking it the Officer came home and informed me that my in-laws would be coming over that afternoon for a cookout. Awesome. There is nothing like the idea of being in labor in front of a house full of people. Oh well.

The girls were enjoying some pool time with their cousins, while I was inside being "crampy"

Either I was already about to go into labor or that "Midwife cocktail" is a miracle worker, because 2 hours after I drank it the contractions began. Of course, I don't like to say I'm having contractions until I'm 100% sure, so instead I just told the Officer that I was feeling "crampy".... at 41 weeks "crampy" would be code for "I'm in labor, but too dumb to admit it". My sweet SIL Mantha stayed with me and a few times kindly informed me that, "Those are definitely contractions", but I just kept going with the idea of "crampy". Around 2:00 it was time to put all the children down for naps, and I finally admitted that I was having regular contractions. I was reading Belle a book before her nap, and I had to stop and stand up twice in the middle of it to breath through contractions, but again for some reason, I figured it was still early labor, because it just wasn't that painful yet.  My wonderful SIL was still keeping a close eye on me and my contractions, and around 3:00 started urging me to go to the hospital. The Officer was not sleeping this time, but was watching Golf with his family :)

Gonna meet this baby soon....

I hadn't been timing any contractions, but Mantha was paying attention and knew they were only a few minutes apart. She just kindly kept urging me to go to the hospital and making sure I had everything I needed. The Officer and I got to the hospital around 4:00, and it was the perfect time to get there. When I got all checked in my contractions were consistently 3 minutes apart and I was 6cm dilated. After my delivery with Bug, I was thinking things might go pretty quickly at this point, and I was right.

Part 2 coming tomorrow.....