Brandi, pictured here, is Ready to Get it Going! Unfortunately her body wasn't. We called at 6:30 am (I should say Brandi called I was still asleep) and the hospital said to call back at 8:30 am. Brandi called back and the hospital said come on in and we could get the party started. It is funny how all of our kids births have been nothing like you see in TV or on movies. Brandi's water never breaks there hasn't ever been a panic scrambling around the house as she screams in labor pain. We nonchalantly took the van in for service ran a couple of errands and showed up to the hospital at about 11:30 am. After we arrived and checked in they hooked Brandi up to Pitocin to help kick start labor. Brandi had been induced for our other two children and David had taken about 7 hours and Katherine 4 hours of being hooked up to the pitocin drip before giving birth. So in Brandi's mind she was going to be done with this baby thing in under 3 hours. Well, 3 hours into the ordeal and Brandi had dilated to a 2. A couple of more hours pass by and she is stuck on being dilated to a 4. At this point she is a little stressed and doesn't understand what is wrong. For those of you who know Brandi her biggest fear of the whole birth is the epidural. For David she waited until the pain of contractions was greater than her fear of the needle. By the time she got the epidural she was shaking because of the pain she was in and she was lucky they would still do the epidural. With Katherine she was extremely stressed and her anxiety was through the roof. In fact the nurses kept telling her she needed to settle down because the baby was stressed bad things were going to happen if she didn't get under control. She finally let them do the epidural. Having to watch my wife go through this and hearing everything from the nurses I was holding her hand when the anesthesiologist came in. About 2 minutes into the procedure and I went to my knees and they had to rush in another nurse with some juice and a paper bag. The epidural went well and I fully recovered from my dramatic experience. This go around we got the epidural early. As she was being prepped to be poked she asked our nurse to hold her hand. The nurse kind of sheepishly said would you rather have your husband and Brandi emphatically said NO! Go figure apparently she didn't like me taking some of the limelight last time.
Joining Brandi and I in the delivery room were Mandy (sister-n-law), Joni (Brandi Mom), Melissa (Brandi Sister), and my Mom joined a little later.
It is now about 7:00 pm and Brandi is convinced that the epidural is wearing off. She is shaking quite a bit from the medication and everyone is convinced she is cold so they keep putting blankets on her. Brandi is now convinced that she is never giving birth and is starting to cry from pain and fear. They pumped up her meds and then checked her at about 7:45 and she is now fully dilated. She went from a 4 to a 10 in about 30 minutes. They call the doctor and get ready for birth, the irony is they told her to hold on so the doctor could get there. The staff are now in full swing and getting everything ready. The doctor arrives and a couple of pushes later the baby is born and in his mother's arms.
This is the first time in Three kids that Brandi was able to hold the baby right after giving birth. Both David and Katherine had minor complications that had to be dealt with immediately after birth. It was pretty cool to see her holding the baby and tears streaming down her face.
Here I am looking in a little pale but not to light headed. I was given the job of holding one of Brandi's legs while she pushed. That was a little close to the action for me but I am happy to report I stayed vertical throughout. Although I think my mom or Mandy might have like to see me go down so they could step in.
As you can see Brandi is very relieved and exhausted yet still striking!
Brandi and I both feel very blessed to have 3 healthy children. We are extremely grateful for the awesome responsibility of being parents for the third time. In watching Brandi go through this process again I am in awe of her strength and courage. I am very lucky to have such a wonderful wife and amazing mother to my children. After everything was done I went into the hall to make a few phone calls and spread the news. After one of the phone calls I had to sit down and I wept with gratitude for everything going so perfectly. It is truly a miracle to witness the birth of a child. We love you all and are grateful for your thoughts and prayers. We look forward to seeing each of you and introducing you to Jack Nelson and yes he is the cutest baby ever.
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