Laykin's Birth Story

Laykin’s Birth Story:
Friday November 30th, 2012 (37 weeks 4 days):

I was getting groceries at walmart and began having some contractions, nothing too painful, but noticeable. I had been checked on Monday and was 3cm and 70% effaced, so I was excited to get things going. I got home and told Matt to start timing the contractions, they were about every 5 minutes lasting 30 seconds.

I had dinner and noticed that they slowed down and were getting weaker. After supper they picked back up. We called our midwife around 8:00 and let her know that the contractions were coming every 2-3 minutes and were picking up their intensity. She said to let her know how things were progressing as the night went on and when they became unbearable. I took a bath and they mostly disappeared. After everyone went to bed I began walking and they picked right back up, but again weren’t too painful. I walked for two hours and around midnight I decided to go to bed and the contractions stopped.

Saturday, December 1st, 2012:

I had a restless night with mild contractions coming when I would wake up. I woke up at 4:00am and couldn’t sleep, I was exhausted but had to get ready for Kinley’s 2nd birthday party. The midwife called Matt around 8am to see how I was doing, and said she was surprised we hadn’t had a baby yet. She wanted to check me to make sure I wasn’t sitting at 8-9cm without knowing it. We decided that we would meet her at the office after Kinley’s party around noon to get checked, because I wasn’t having any steady contractions.

We met Kim at the office and was still at 3-4 cm, where I had been earlier in the week. I was disappointed that the contractions that I had been having had clearly not done anything to dilate me further. Kim wanted us to be aware that I could continue having early labor and contractions at night, when I became tired, for many nights without going into labor. This was not the news that I wanted to hear. I decided that as soon as Kinley got up from nap we were all going to the mall to walk and get these contractions going.

We got to the mall around 4:30 and began walking laps. Contractions started to get more frequent and stronger the longer we walked. I began having to slow down or stop completely as the contractions hit, but at this point I was still thinking that these were just going to be my “nightly, early labor contractions” so I wasn’t getting too hopeful that this was labor.

We stopped to eat supper around 6:00, and the contractions once again stopped, and I became frustrated that as soon as I had stopped moving the contractions stopped coming, just like the night before. I decided we would do a few more laps before leaving, “just in case” we could get things really going. As we started the first lap I noticed that I had to completely stop moving and take some breaths to get me through the contractions. This continued for a few laps, as the intensity of the contractions gradually picked up. We got in the car to head home and I still doubted that these contractions were doing anything.

After we got home the contractions continued, Matt kept timing them, and we realized that labor may be underway. We put Kinley to bed around 8:00, and anxiously waited to see what happened. Matt went to bed around 9:00 (he had worked a super long day the day before and needed some rest if labor was coming). I laid down around 10:00 and had to begin really relaxing and concentrating to get through the pain of each contraction.

I headed to the bathroom to try to sway, sit on the toilet, anything that I could to help with the pain, as I was having a very hard time dealing with the pain on my own, and was beginning to doubt my strength and ability to have a natural delivery again. I woke Matt up at 11:00 and said I needed help with the pain, and I didn’t think I could continue on with a natural labor any longer. He began massaging my back as I laid and relaxed through the contractions, which were coming every 3-4 minutes at this point. Around 11:30, about 15-30 minutes after waking Matt up I told him to call Kim, I couldn’t deal with the pain anymore and I knew we needed to head to the hospital.

We called papa (my dad) to come down to be with Kinley at 11:45. After 5 panicked calls he finally answered and came down so we could leave. We left for the hospital at midnight and made the drive in dense fog (at least that’s what Matt said, my eyes were shut for the drive). Halfway to the hospital I told Matt to call Kim and have her meet us at the hospital, because I thought we were pretty far along (and secretly I was having the need to push already). Matt blew through the hospital parking lot stop signs, unlike last pregnancy, apparently he got the memo that I wasn’t pleased last time.

We arrived at the hospital at 12:26pm, and were taken to triage. I changed into my gown and got on the bed. When the nurse arrived back to check me (Kelsie- who was AMAZING) I told her that I didn’t think I could do a 20 minute strip because I was having pressure. She quickly did a check and said I was complete, at which point I remember Kim, our midwife, coming in and grabbing our bags for us. They said they were going to wheel me straight across the hall and wouldn’t let me walk because they didn’t want the baby to “drop out”. ;)

I moved over to the hospital room bed and nurses began fluttering around me with tables and equipment to get ready for the delivery. I would tell Matt when a contraction hit to come help me (as he was trying to get some of our things ready, music, etc). He massaged my back and gave ice chips as the contractions were giving me a lot of pain due to the pressure. Kim asked if she could break my water, which she said would relieve a lot of pressure. Once the bag of waters broke (apparently it was quite the tidal wave) I felt a few minutes of great relief. I finally spoke up around 1:00 that I needed to push… I’m not really sure what I was waiting for, maybe someone to say they were ready?

I asked for the foot pedestals to rest my feet on, and then began pushing. It was such a different emotion this time, knowing that the pain would be over quickly if I pushed through it, instead of holding it in in fear. A few pushes later the baby’s head was crowning, and on the next push the baby arrived, with a cute whimper. The relief was instantaneous and the joy was immense as I realized we had just made it through another amazing, and natural birth.

They put the baby on my chest, and began cleaning the vernix off while we spent some time staring at our new miracle. A minute or two went by and then one of the techs asked what gender the baby was supposed to be, we replied “a girl!”… a few seconds of time went by and she responded with “well it’s a boy!”.

We laughed, and smiled, and giggled in disbelief. Sure enough the ultrasound tech had been wrong (which apparently happens about once a year), we had a perfect and healthy little boy, born 12/2/12 at 1:04 am, 7lbs 13.2 oz, 20 inches long. We quickly became the talk of the staff as the “surprise” baby family.

We spent some time snuggling and then called our moms to tell them they had a new grandSON, and ask them to do some quick shopping for boy things. =)

We decided on a name later that day, Laykin Lynn. We used the same thinking as we did for Kinley, Ley (which we switched to A so people would pronounce it correctly) for Leymaster, my maiden name, and KIN for King. It was a huge relief to have a name for our little man, as we had been debating (and arguing ;) on a girl’s name for almost 5 months.