The short story

Just to say I think I have a problem. I am choosing blogging over a shower. It's been tough to stay away from the computer since home to opt for sleep or eating. Is this addiction?

Anyway, besides a crappy night thanks to my little one who eats like a bird, all is well. Kate eats great and has become "my favorite" in the moment at 4 a.m. when she is sleeping soundly and Madison is squawing AGAIN. But then I hold my squawker and fall in love all over and how can you have favorites? I just have two to love.

After much emotional angst last week I decided to agree to induction as NOTHING else worked to set my body into motion. I started out at 4 cm 50% effaced Wednesday and by Saturday no change. So we went on the waiting list Thursday and received "the call" Saturday at 5:15 p.m. It's what it must be like being on the organ reception list, every time our cell phone went off my heart just started racing.... Is this the call?

Anyway, we got to the hospital room by 6:30 and waited till 9:15 to get assessed by the resident. I wanted to know where we were starting at so I'd have an idea if I'd made any progress since Thursday's check. I was really hoping to have made it to 7cm and to have the kids by midnight. So they started all their stuff which really bugged me, the fetal monitors, the IV, hospital gown and no bra (that bugged me the most) and a nurse who should have retired a long time ago. After much drama with my crabby nurse, my favorite part being where she answered one of my questions by telling me that if I didn't do blah blah blah my uterus could rupture or I could hemmorage to death, her shift ended. Thank goodness Deanna was there. It was just wonderful to have someone I trusted who had perspective and heard my voice and my fears. I know she's disappointed to have missed the birth but I don't think Jon or I could have held it together without her watching over us.

So by 12:15 a.m my Doctor came to see if we'd made any progress. Apparently the twins heartbeats were all over the place and they were'nt sure if this was an accurate assessment of the syntocinon's effect on them. He broke Kate's water to put a scalp clip in to keep better track of her and I started to cry because it was just another thing I didn't want for my labor. I thought for sure the more interventions I have the more to come down the line. But as soon as my water broke, whammo contractions started about 5 minutes apart and quickly progressed to 1-2 minutes apart. We called the midwife at 1 a.m. because things were well on the way and I was putting off having the "non-negotiable" epidural until she got there to be my voice for a epi-block rather than a full going epidural. She took longer than I was expecting so by 2 a.m. my breathing was changing and even though I was only 5 cm I agreed to the epidural. And I must add was quite looking forward to relief being on it's way. My midwife got there shortly after and fed me ice chips between contractions while Jon held his post rubbing my lower back where the most intensity was. I labored the whole time just sitting on the side of the bed. I don't know if any of you can relate but getting a laboring woman to switch positions is next to impossible.

Well I think she measured me again at 2:15 and I was 7 cm and by the time the anesthesiologist got there at 2:25 I was already 9 c.m. and the nurse was able to feel the head. As soon as he heard about my progress more drama started as I had to be whisked to the OR room to deliver (that was the plan all along, in case an emergency c-section was required). So they had to get this uncooperative laboring woman to LIE DOWN on the bed to be whisked down the hall. No sooner had my last check been done than I started feeling the "pressure" and on the way to the OR room I screamed "I'm pushing I can't stop it" and with one push out came the head and the next push out came her shoulders. I remember hearing "THE HEAD'S CROWING WE NEED A DOCTOR IN HERE... OH THE BABY'S BORN" Jon was in the change room getting his scrubs on, so by the time he got into the room he heard Kate crying and they were cleaning her up.

The doctor got there fairly quickly and when he checked out the next twin, her head was already down and in position for another head first labor. The whole reason they wanted me to get the epidural was for the sake of the second twin in case it presented elbow first or something, so quite coooperative children I must say. So the resident tried to break my water with the second one and fiddled around for a while before my doc finally did at 3:04. Madison was born at 3:07 after the longest push of my life. Her head was smaller but she came out face up which makes for a bigger head diameter. I still feel this one, but thank goodness no stitches were needed. And no epidural which is what I was most afraid of. Not that I'm a sucker for pain but with Emma's labor being so quick I just wanted to let my body do what I knew it could and I figured I would go pretty fast. And I'm really really really afraid of needles. Especially ones insterted into my spine. An IV was bad enough. What a suck.

My favorite part of the story is that after I finally opened my eyes to look around the OR room I realized a doctor was holding my hand. There were blue clad, masked people rushing everywhere and one of them who was waiting for the next twin had decided to hold my hand. I said to him, "Thank you so much, I didn't know I needed someone to hold my hand and it's just what I needed at this moment". The next day I was recounting the story to Jon and calling this terribly sensitive, thoughtful, caring doctor "THE MYSTERIOUS STRANGER". At which point Jon said with a weird look on his face "that was me" he even went on to tell me he responded to my comment about it being what I needed, but apparently lala land has only one way communication!!! And then I looked back on that moment saying, "well he was tall like you, and thin like you, and he WAS wearing glasses like you..." but throw on blue scrubs, a face mask and an OR hat and all you have are eyes. Jon even asked if the big honking camera hanging around his neck didn't give his identity away, but I really didn't notice it at the moment, or didn't think it was weird for this sensitive doctor to pick up our camera so we wouldn't miss out on any pictures. I can't help laughing at this!!!

So there you have it, the short story. In the end it was just the way I would have wished it to go, quickly. But going into it with so much unknown was the scariest thing I've ever done in my life. God has been so good to me. What else can I say?

The girls are totally different temperments and definately are not identical looking. I really love that they are unique individuals right off the bat. I don't feel like they are twins, just two babies who happen to be the same age. It's been kinda like having a science experiment before my eyes with the absolute differences between them. anyway, sneaking off to have a shower. More to say but no more time... Thanks again for all the prayers and support. We have felt SOOO loved during this time. MOI.(that was a big kiss to you all)