Baby's Birth Date: August 24, 2006
Baby's Weight: 8 pounds, 0.6 ounces
Baby's Height: 19.5 inches
Enola, PA

"I started having mild contractions after the appointment, but didn't get my hopes up as I'd been having contractions for almost 3 weeks."

"Around 5:00 p.m., the contractions started getting more intense. Around 7:00 p.m., I became pretty confident that I was really in labor as my contractions were becoming increasingly painful, which is what the midwife said to look for since I was already having "regular" contractions on a daily basis."

"We got to the hospital at 9:00 p.m. We went up to Labor and Delivery and we were admitted to one of the last available rooms. They were busy that night!"

"A nurse came in and got me hooked up to the monitors and asked all the standard questions. We confirmed with my obstetrician that I was definitely not going home that evening."

"My obstetrician did a pelvic exam and confirmed I was 3-4 cm and about 70% effaced in his opinion. At that point, I was still debating whether I wanted to attempt to deliver without any pain medication or if I wanted a smooth delivery and should ask for the epidural now. It only took a few minutes for me to decide that I wanted as comfortable a delivery as possible and so I asked for the epidural at around 10:00 p.m."

"At 10:20, the anesthesiologist arrived to do the epidural. It took him 30 minutes to get it done because I had so many contractions while he was doing it that he had to keep stopping to wait."

"Finally, I got a little relief. Over the next 3-4 contractions, I could feel the epidural starting to work little by little. I could still feel the contractions, but they weren't nearly as painful as they had been."

"Then at about 11:10 or so, I thought I felt my water break. The nurse checked and said I was mistaken, but she thought I was now fully dialated and was going to have the doctor check me as well. My OB agreed and broke my water since that was the only thing that would prevent me from delivering sooner rather than later. Once he broke my water, he said that the baby was at +1 station. He was going to let me labor down for a bit so that I wouldn't have to do much pushing. The nurse warned him before he left the room that I had only pushed 3-4 times when my first child was born."

"As soon as the doctor left the room, the contractions became intensely painful again and I yelled to my husband that I thought the baby was coming out on his own but that I also sort of felt like I needed to push."

"The nurse rushed to check and saw that the baby was coming out. She told my husband to "hit the button". She meant the "nurse call button" on the wall, but he misunderstood and thought she meant the epidural button (to give me extra pain medication). He finally understood and hit the call button."

"The nurse who answered the call button couldn't hear the nurse in the room over the noise that I was making so she came into my room to see what was going on. As it turned out, the nurse already in the room had told her to call the doctor."

"By then, I was in an extreme amount of pain again and was yelling that I needed to push. The nurse told me to go ahead and push once, which I did. From there, she was telling me not to push anymore, but the baby decided he was coming out anyway."

"As a result, my OB did not make it back to the room in time to deliver my son. Our nurse did the delivery and Trevor Jacob was born at 11:29 p.m. He came out on his own with his left hand up by his head just for a little extra drama. He got 1 minute and 5 minute Apgar scores of 9. He had no medical problems and we were allowed to be together in the room until approximately 1:30 a.m.

"From there, I went up to my post-natal recovery room and Trevor went to the nursery. He was brought back to my room at about 4:30 a.m. and spent the rest of the hospital stay in my room except when they had to take him back to the nursery for the standard tests and his circumcision."

"Over all, we had a wonderful labor and delivery experience and I look forward to hopefully being able to do it all again in a few years!"