Our Beautiful Baby Girl is Here!

Introducing...

Sophie Lind Lyons

Born September 17, 2013

at 10:05 pm

weighing 6 lb 12 oz

19.5 inches long

Our fabulous birth story that I can't wait to tell her about when she gets older...

Monday, September 16th, I woke up to feeling some contractions. They definitely weren't painful, but they were more uncomfortable than braxton hicks contractions. The lasted until about the afternoon and then went away. Tuesday, September 17th, woke up to much harder and much more painful contractions. But they weren't anywhere near regular, so I sent Brandon off to work thinking that I would call him back later that day. But around the time that I had to take David to joy school, they had pretty much slowed down and had almost stopped. So I decided to go walking with a couple of ladies from my church...crazy idea! By the time we were done, my hips were so sore and it really hurt to walk or stand for a long period of time. My contractions weren't really coming any faster, so it appeared to have done nothing! haha I had a doctor's appointment later that day and found out I was dilated to a 2 so at least, so my body was progressing a little bit. Dinner time rolls around and still nothing, but my contractions were starting to come closer together since my doctor's appointment. I start making dinner and Brandon comes home from work...we start to think that this baby wasn't going to come that day either. But by the time I was finished making dinner, I was having much harder contractions, so I laid down on the couch while the boys ate theirs. Around 7, they were much more painful and I had to stop whatever I was doing to breathe through them and they were lasting much longer. We decided not to wait much longer since this was my 4th, so we got the boys ready for bed and called our friend Cassi to have her come stay with them while we headed over to the hospital. She didn't answer her phone, so we started to frantically go through the list of people who had ever mentioned we could call them if we needed help. We called a couple of people and no one answered those calls either! But we finally got a hold of our friend Amanda and she said we could bring the boys over (her husband wasn't home yet, so she couldn't come and watch our boys at our place). So we got the boys out of bed, packed everything they needed to sleep at another person's house and got them strapped into the car. As we were about ready to leave, Cassi calls us back apologizing for not answering earlier but said she was on her way over now. We called Amanda back about the change of plans and finally got everything situated with the boys. We finally started heading over to the hospital around 8. We pull up and walk in and the people tell us to head up to labor and delivery on the 8th floor. They didn't offer me a wheel chair or anything! So we walked to the elevators and went up to labor and delivery. There we had to wait for the secretary to put together all of our information (even though we had called to tell them we were coming...we find out later that she was new). Finally at around 8:30 they take us into a tiny triage room and here we wait again for about 15 minutes before they come in and strap me up to listen to the baby's heartbeat and monitor my contractions. A resident doctor comes in to check me and I'm still at a 2! So they said they wanted 20 minutes of baby's vitals and then we could get up and walk and would check me again at 10. I was definitely hating my body at the moment... 

here I am trying to breathe through some contractions...Brandon was very good at making me laugh...this was before they came in to check me.

  So around 9:20 they tell us we can get up and walk, so we do. I make it maybe one lap around this floor before the contractions are paralyzing. That's the best way I can describe the pain. I literally would grab the handles that lined the walls, lean my head against the wall and try my best not to scream. It hurt soo bad! Brandon tried his best to rub my back but it really didn't do much to help. For 20 minutes we walked those halls before I couldn't handle it anymore. The pain wasn't going away after each contraction, and I KNEW I wasn't at a 2 anymore! So we went back into the triage room and I sat down on the bed and wave after wave of contractions hit. I started crying and telling Brandon that I couldn't do it anymore and I pleaded for him to get a nurse to check me. So he went out to try to find one and the secretary told him she would send someone when she could. Brandon comes back in and tells me this, and then says he has to go to the bathroom. I was back into the same position I was in in the picture...only no more smile on my face...I told him it was ok for him to go, but as soon has he left another contraction hit and I knew I needed to push. I started screaming, "I need to push!" over and over again, and two nurses and a resident doctor came running! They got me back into bed and checked me and I was fully dilated, +2 (for those of you who don't know, +5 is when the head is crowning). I went from a 2 to a 10 in 20 minutes! Brandon came back in right as they were checking me. They told me the baby was coming and I think I said, "I don't want to do this without the epidural." But they told me I had to and then the next contraction hit and I was pushing. Two pushes later and she was out! I delivered my baby in a tiny triage room without any IV or anything! The room was so small they had a nurse standing outside the open door with a sheet up so no one could see! They wheeled us into a labor and delivery room and proceeded to admit us! haha
Brandon told me later he could hear me screaming from the bathroom...we can have a good laugh about it now! :)