birth story. part 2.

Okay, where was I?  Oh yeah... the waiting.  Well while we were waiting I had come prepared with all the ways I could possibly get in touch with Patrick.  I used Facebook, I called his FRO, and I tried the Red Cross but they would only deliver a message after the birth.  I was working on other means of communication when he called!  He had gotten the message!  Lucky for us he was actually traveling and was on a base with a lot better communications set up.  He got word during a brief and afterwards, I am told, he walked out and was greeted by the USO who escorted him to a 'private room' in a tent with a computer and web cam and told him to take all the time he needed.  How great is that?!  Anyways, we got the video chat up and running and then we waited some more...

Surprisingly, the time was flying by.  I thought it would crawl, but the hours went pretty fast.  All of a sudden it was after 8:00 am and I was finally starting to feel a little uncomfortable.  My sister was great the whole day (I mean she's only done this seven times) and she told the nurse I was feeling some pain and it might be time to get the anesthesiologist.  He arrived as the contractions to really register on my pain scale, to the point where I wasn't able to talk through them.  How convenient, just in time to stick a needle into my spine...

He had me sit indian style on the bed and lean forward as far as I could.  Um are you kidding me?  It took a little while and I was 'in position'.  He did his thing all the while I was trying not to shake during contractions.  You know so I wouldn't end up paralyzed or something.  When he was all finished he told me it would take 15-20 minutes to kick in and he would wait and see how it took.  Well immediately the pain was exponentially worse.  We are talking screaming (Kelly said it was more like moaning but I felt like I was screaming) and I was crying a lot and shaking uncontrollably.  Pat said it was torture to listen to.  The 15-20 minutes passed and it was only getting worse.  Way worse.  Mr. Anesthesiologist then decided it needed more time to take and said he would come back and check on me later.  Well 'later' apparently meant an hour and a half, because that's when he came back.  He adjusted the epidural and put stronger drugs in it and I slowly (very slowly) began to feel the slightest bit of relief.  Excuse me, couldn't we have done that in the first place?

Well that whole episode took place between 9 and 11 in the morning.  Pat and I got to have a nice chat after it was taken care of and I could breathe again.  And the internet didn't even cut out once! He kept asking how things were progressing, but no one had been by to check, so I had nothing to tell him.  Around 3:30 pm (just 12 short hours of being at the hospital) I started to feel a little queasy, and my sister told me to page the nurse anyway, and we could at least get her in the room and maybe talk her into seeing how far along we were.  Well she got there just in time to hand me a bucket and up came the entire contents of my stomach.  Aside from that, our plan worked and she checked me and said that it was time to push!  My emotions were first shock, then disbelief and denial.  I was totally not ready for that declaration and thought I would have more time to prepare.  Kelly went quickly to the waiting room to tell our family and then it was just her, me and the nurse for the next 45 or 50 minutes.  Just pushing...

And holy cow.  They don't call it labor for nothing.  It is seriously SO hard!  It was so exhausting that I could have taken naps in between pushes.  Well the Dr came in, said I was doing a great job, and got his shoe covers on (to which Kelly said was a good sign).  I can't be sure, but as soon as the Dr was in position I think it took about 2 pushes for the head to be out.  We took a quick break because the cord was around little man's neck.  I didn't really have time to panic because they fixed it so fast.  And my sister was so good at keeping me calm.  Then I think one or two more pushes and he was out!  Patrick got to see him first (the Dr held him up to the web cam) then they put him on my chest for a second...

Then they took him to get him cleaned up, sucked some fluid out of him, heated him up and gave him a little oxygen.  Then he came back to me, and Patrick and I were left with the task of naming him.  We had a list of names ready to go, and we actually had the same name at the top of our list for weeks, even the same one earlier that day.  It wasn't Gunnar.  But when we first saw him we both thought "that's Gunnar".  Pretty weird how it worked out that way... I didn't think it would, that I would see him and think one name more than the other.   I guess it was just meant to be.

And that is really all there is to that.  We are now left with the task of raising the cutest little boy ever.  So far so good... He is just too precious for words, and I don't really see that changing anytime soon.