They started my IV and Pitocin around 9am and we waited for things to start happening. While I watched Live with Regis and Kelly my contractions started. Not painful, just crampy. So far, so good. I can do this! As the Nate Berkus show got underway the contracts got more painful. I was hungry so I ordered some room service. Chicken broth and cherry jell-o for this pregnant lady. Only clear fluids, but since I was really hungry it tasted great!
As The View started the pain still was bearable and I could still breath my way through the contractions. The Doctor broke my water and the pain started to get more intense. The nurse suggested some sort of pain killer to take the edge off. She promised it wouldn't slow things down so I agreed. I don't know what she gave me, but I won't get it next time. All it did was make me feel drunk. No reduction in pain but now the room was spinning in addition to the intermittent pain.
Then, all of the sudden, a labor and delivery room opened up, my parents arrived, and in the snap of a finger the contractions went from bearable to TOTALLY UNBEARABLE. I was instantly in tears. The nurse asked if I wanted an epidural and I'm guessing that Jay answered for me, affirmatively. Next thing I knew my parents were there to say hello and the nurse decided to forgo the wheelchair and take me to my new room in my bed. The Anesthesiologist who is always on the floor had just started a C-Section. My wonderful nurse knew I didn't want to wait at least 30 minutes before he could get to me so she called down to the OR to see if they had someone available. An amazingly friendly Anesthesiologist came up immediately and gave me an epidural. He literally followed us into my new room. He let Jay stay in the room and hold my hand through the contractions. After the epidural.....pain free. Entirely, I felt NOTHING! It was the best thing ever, I highly recommend it.
I finally got to enjoy my new, spacious room. The Doctor came in to check on me and told me that I would probably progress one centimeter per hour. I was at 4 centimeters. An hour later the nurse came in to check on me and I was at 5-6 centimeters. She said that she would be back again in another hour and to rest in the mean time. My mom and I were chatting while Jay napped and about 20 minutes later the nurse came back in to check me again. I reminded her that she was only going to check me every hour and that it had only been 20 minutes. She apparently had been watching my contractions at the nurses station and they indicated that Aiden was making his way down the birth canal and wanted to make sure everything was alright. Sure was, I was at 9 centimeters! Um, that was fast. So she laid me down, set up the room for delivery, and took her lunch break. When she got back we cleared the room (except her and Jay) and tried pushing. I could still feel nothing, so I had no idea what I was doing. I must have been doing something right because after pushing during three contractions she left the room. When she returned she told me that Dr. Flora was on her way. I pushed some more, missed a couple of contractions because my monitor was not working correctly, and when Dr Flora arrived I pushed once and he was here! Aiden entered this world at 5:37pm with his eyes wide open, ready to see what was going on.
The nurse said that they don't start the timer on labor until you are at least 3 centimeters. She calculated that I was in labor (by their definition) for 5 hours and 18 minutes and that I pushed for 36 minutes. Now that's what I call getting it done! We tried nursing right away and Aiden was a champion eater. Soon after our families were allowed back in the room to meet the newest Jewell. At about 7:30 they moved us upstairs to my recovery room.
My labor and delivery was such a wonderful experience because of the staff at the hospital. I could not have asked for better nurses. The best part was that the triage nurse that we had seen during our previous three visits came in to help just as Aiden was being born. So the nurse that started our journey with us was there when Aiden finally arrived. It was so special that she came to help because she knew it was us again. Maybe everyone feels this connection with their nurses, but I feel incredibly blessed to have had such wonderful people surrounding us and taking care of us.
Here are a couple of pictures of the labor and delivery room that I spent the afternoon in, and where Aiden made his arrival.
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