I was very set on having my baby on September 4th... the date we set for induction. Life was extremely busy. I had a lot of responsibilities that took up the majority of my time, which made planning and preparing for a baby near impossible. I had just started a new preschool year, and really needed to get a solid two weeks of teaching in before my maternity leave. I wanted to set a routine and behavior expectations before I left, plus my maternity leave substitute wasn't even available until after Labor Day. Since I didn't go into early labor with either Sydney or Cooper, I didn't really even consider that I would have my baby early on my own. But my baby had other plans.
On Wednesday, a week and a half into my two weeks of school, I lost my mucus plug. That had never happened to me before, so it freaked me out, to put it lightly. I knew that labor would be sooner rather than later and I went into a full blown panic attack. Bawling, yelling, and just so beyond stressed out, I was a mess. Matt held me tight in his arms, and just kept telling me that everything would be ok. The house didn't need to be clean, her room didn't need to be ready, we didn't need clothes or diapers/wipes... people could help us by getting those things while we were in the hospital if we needed. They were all just things I wanted to have ready, not things we needed. After Matt calmed me down, I began making lists of all the things I really did need to do. I put preschool and APA responsibilities aside and prepared for my little baby to come.
A good friend saw my list, and gave me most of the items on my list, I buckled down on the baby's room and got it finished, and felt pretty prepared, other than my extremely messy and dirty house. On Friday, I taught school, and was so happy that I made it through my two weeks, and then went home to work on cleaning. I cleaned, cleaned, and cleaned. That night we watched my friend's kids during a viewing for her dad, and went to bed early after a long day. I woke up a several times on Friday night, which is pretty typical, but I kept feeling wet. I remember wondering if my water broke, but my sheets weren't wet at all. I went to the bathroom, and there was no gush, I jumped a couple times, and no gush, so I dismissed the thought and tried to sleep. I told Matt in the morning as he was leaving for work. We both had busy Saturdays ahead of us.
I spent the morning cleaning. I cleaned toilets, got on my hands and knees and mopped floors, and tried to get as much done as I could, before I had to get ready to go to my friend's dad's funeral. All morning, I kept feeling like my underwear was wet, but nothing was running down my legs, not a lot of fluid, just really damp. So I started putting toilet paper in my underwear, and it would soak after some time, and I'd change it out. It was Saturday, so I couldn't call the doctor and ask his opinion, and I just didn't want to go to the hospital and be sent home. I wasn't having contractions or anything, and was still feeling the baby move, so I just kept working. I talked to Matt at one point, and he thought we should go to the hospital, so I finished cleaning the bathroom I was working on and got in the shower. I took my time getting ready, which Matt wasn't too pleased about, and packed up a couple of things I thought I might want in case I was admitted to the hospital, and we left our house around noon. We took Sydney and Cooper over to my mom's house, I chatted with her for a little bit, and then we left. I prepared myself mentally to be sent home. Matt didn't valet the car, and we found a parking spot. It was so weird to be so calm walking into the hospital, not for an induction. We walked to the desk, and I told them that I thought maybe my water had broken. They looked at me questioningly and said, "you think?" So I explained my story, and they took me to a room to have me checked. At this point I had been having some contractions, which made me feel a little more validated, but nothing regular or too strong. The nurse hooked me up to monitors, and checked the fluid that was leaking.
There were two tests they used to check the fluid. A quick test, which was less accurate, and a long test which was pretty accurate. The quick test results came back, and it was negative for amniotic fluid, so the nurse administered a second quick test, and it came back negative again. We started getting ready to be sent home, when a nurse buzzed in and told us the longer test was positive for amniotic fluid. The nurse turned to us and said, "it looks like you're having a baby today!"
We were admitted into labor and delivery, I was put on pitocin, and we waited... At first my contractions weren't strong enough or often enough, so they doubled my pitocin, and then they came on hard and strong, which sped up my labor a lot. I got an epidural shortly after. Later, they had to decrease the pitocin because the contractions were too strong and on top of each other. While we waited we watched the BYU vs UVA football game. The nurse was very interested in the game, and I think she checked on us extra so she could check the score and talk about the game... haha. Dr. Terry came in, and talked to us about our name choices- Paisley, Paityn, or Ruby. He loved Ruby, which was my front-runner, and Paityn was Matt's front-runner. Dr. Terry kept calling the baby Ruby, which I think made Matt like it more, hearing it in context.
My mom brought the kids in around 7:00 shortly before it was time for me to push. We gave them hugs and kisses and told them that baby sister would be here soon. When they left, I started pushing, and pushed for about 20 minutes. Our baby girl was born just after 7:30. She weighed 7 lbs 4 oz, and was 20 inches long. She was by far, my littlest baby, and easiest to push out. Dr. Terry handed her to me, and I just cried. She was so beautiful. She had a little bit of brown hair, chubby little cheeks, and she just looked at me. It was a beautiful moment. My mom left, and sent the kids in, and we spent some time together as a family of 5! We all decided that we wanted to name her Ruby. A little later, Matt left with the kids, and Ruby and I had a few minutes alone where we did skin to skin and nursed her. She was a beautiful little miracle. I was so elated to have my baby, and Matt was right, I did forget about all the things at home that weren't done. Life was perfectly beautiful at that moment.
