When things don't go as planned...

God is still in control.

Nothing about the past week has gone according to "the plan". Last Sunday, after evening service at church, we were invited to eat supper at our friends' home around the corner from our church. We gladly accepted. After all, we didn't get done with church until almost 9:00 and we still had another 30 minutes til we got home. I was 3 days past my "due date" and tired, really tired of being pregnant. We were all sitting around talking about the inspiring message we had just heard from a missionary to Ethiopia earlier that evening.

My contractions started to pick up. No big deal, I had been having them on and off for weeks. But these were different, and I knew it. So DH and I decided that we didn't want to take a risk of driving back home, when we were already half of the way to the hospital were I was going to be delivering. So, we unloaded the boys' bags that we had been keeping in the back of my car and headed to the hospital. My previous labor lasted only 4 hours, so we wanted to be safe, plus I was past my EDD.

At the hospital, I was checked and hooked up to the monitor to track the baby's heart rate and measure my contractions. It was 1:00 am. At about 4:00, the nurse came in and said that she had just talked to my midwife, and neither of them thought that I should go home because of the speed in which I delivered my last baby, so I was admitted. Later that morning, my midwife stopped in to check on me, fully expecting me to enter into hard labor at any time. However, my progress remained unchanged.

Hmm. We were stumped. My midwife came back at lunch and I hadn't made much progress. I was so discouraged. We decided to try AROM. As many of you know, I do NOT like interventions in labor. But, I had been in labor for 12 hours already and had not slept. I wanted to speed things up. After my AROM, I got in the tub to relax. Then my contractions stopped. What??? So I started pumping to induce contractions, and it worked, but I still wasn't progressing. So, we tried pitocin. Ugg. I hated pitocin. I lasted about 10 minutes and I made them stop it. As it turns out, this little guy enjoyed hanging out on my hip and wasn't engaging. So, my midwife had me get into a very uncomfortable position to get this guy to move. It worked.

I cried like a little baby. I was tired. I was in pain. I actually wanted an epidural. Thankfully, my DH wouldn't let me get one.

Finally. My body was doing what it needed to, but I was exhausted. And with every contraction, I got even more exhausted. So, I moved to the edge of the bed (I was trying to get up and move or maybe move to the tub) but I couldn't move past the edge of the bed. I leaned my head on DH and held his hand as he lightly rubbed my shoulders. I tried so hard to relax and I was so tired that I went somewhere inside of myself and actually fell asleep. In my head I was singing hymns and reciting Scripture.

And then, I was there. I was at THAT point. If you've had a natural birth, then you know what I am talking about. That point of needing to push, but not wanting to push, but knowing that if you don't push you will. be. pregnant. forever! So I got up in the bed and did what I had to do.

Little man had his chord double wrapped and he was blue and not breathing. They rushed him to the warmer and gave him oxygen and worked on him to get him to breath. After what felt like an eternity, I heard that precious cry. The nurse bundled him and let me hold him. Then she took him back to the warming table to finish her exam. During that time, our pastor showed up to give us his congratulations. The nurse brought little man back to us and DH and Pastor Ray got to hold him. He was still blue and the nurse said that he was still experiencing respiratory distress. But we would later learn, that wasn't the only thing little man was dealing with.