Happy First Birthday Eve Will and James | A look back at 1 Year Ago Today
7:57 PM |
| My last Belly picture: I know it says 35 weeks, but it was actually taken 3 days before the boys were born. |
This day last year I woke up feeling as though my right leg was swelling while my left leg was not. My doctor sent me to labor and delivery to have the swelling checked out (part of me was hoping that they would decide I needed to have the babies). I spent several hours sitting in a hospital bed hooked up to monitors listening to the boys heart beats while I waited to have an ultrasound done on my leg to make sure there wasn't a blood clot. One of the monitors was checking contractions and apparently I was have contractions every so often, but it wasn't anything I could feel. I was lucky no blood clot, beautiful sounding babies and was sent home just being told to prop my feet up (something I had become very good at since being placed on bed rest at 21 weeks). I spent the rest of the evening resting on the couch, napping and chatting on the phone with my friends complaining that the boys were never coming out!! By 10 o'clock I was exhausted and decided I needed to head to bed. I kissed Chris goodnight and headed off to sleep, not knowing that I would be awake in 2 hours and our lives were going to change forever.
At midnight I woke up to make one of my many usual trips to the restroom, just as I was getting ready to head back to bed I felt something that made me stop, water running down my leg. At first I was slightly unsure of what was happening but then the large amount of water that I felt left me in no doubt that my water was breaking. I couldn't believe it, hadn't I just been complaining that I was going to be pregnant forever, I knew that no matter what happened from that point on I would be meeting my baby boys in no more than 24 hours. I went to wake Chris, who had just laid down to sleep, called my doctors office and took a shower to relax and wait for contractions to start or a call back from my doctors office to tell me what to do.
After waiting for an hour and a half I hadn't heard back from my doctors office, but I was experiencing a constant pain in my lower abdomen that was slowly becoming increasingly more painful. I wasn't sure if I was having contractions or not because there was no ebb and flow of pain, which is what I expected the contractions to be like. Once it became hard for me to walk around with the pain I decided we should head to the hospital telling Chris the worst thing they could do was send us home. We made it to the hospital around 2:00am and after checking to make sure that my water had actually broken, which it had, they took us to a labor and delivery room. I was changed into a hospital gown, met my nurses and the on call doctor who would be delivering the babies and then checked to see how much progress was being made. I was already dilated to 7cm! I remember being in so much pain that it was hard to lay in the bed, using choice words to describe the pain I was in and then apologizing about my language to the nurses (who reassured me that there was no need to apologize and that they had definitely heard worse). I finally started to feel some sort of contractions, but the pain never went away it was either extremely painful or just a little less painful. In-between these painful contractions I had to sign papers, giving them permission to do a c-section if necessary, allowing them to give me an epidural, etc., and meet poor med students who had to introduce themselves to me letting me know that they would be in while I delivered. I couldn't wait to get my epidural and by the time the anesthesiologist made it to my room I was already 9 cm and the babies were sitting extremely low. The anesthesiologist had to place my epidural while I was laying on my side instead of sitting up on the edge of the bed like they normally do. The anesthesiologist was wonderful, she was very kind, she did worn me that sometimes when epidurals are placed this late into labor they don't always work as effectively as they are supposed to. After hearing this I looked at her and told her she needed to make it work! Once the catheter was placed and the normal epidural drugs where flowing she proceeded to pump in several other drugs to try and get the epidural working. At first all it did was numb my legs which was disappointing, but eventually the pain in my abdomen melted away and I was able to relax for the first time, It Was AMAZING!!!
Soon after receiving the epidural the doctor came back in to check on me and determined that I was 10cm and ready to push. He had me do a few practice pushes in the room we were in and by that time James was just about ready to come. (When you deliver twins you have to deliver in the OR just incase they have to do a c-section) So we were wheeled down the hall and into the operating room. There were lots of people in there: Each baby had two nurses, I had two nurses, there was the doctor delivering me, my doctors boss, a few med students and of course Christopher. Once everything, and everyone, was in place it was time to meet our boys. I pushed a few more times and at 4:47 James was born, after he was taken to be cleaned up and weighed it was time to push again and at 4:53 William was born just six short minutes after his brother and my life has never been the same!
I look back on that night wishing I could go back sometimes, it was the most amazing night (technically morning) of my life. I put my babies to bed tonight on the eve of their birthday thinking of those tiny babies who a year ago made me a mommy and I have tears in my eyes. I can't believe a whole year has gone by. My sweet boys have grown and changed so much! They are sweet and silly, they are becoming stronger and braver every day! I am so blessed that I get to be their mommy!
Of course a story about the night Will and James were born wouldn't be complete without a few pictures of my itty bitty babies! Happy Birthday Eve my sweet boys!! I can't wait to celebrate you tomorrow!!!
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