Happy Birth Baby Dallin {November 18, 2014}

I always love to read birth stories and I want all my kids to know all about the day they were born so here is the birth story of Dallin Bryce Pinder.

On November 17, I had a routine doctor’s appointment to listen to the baby’s heart beat, make sure everything was okay and see if I had progressed at all in the labor. I took Avery to Michele’s (a girl I met when we moved here whose baby was due 3 days after mine). After I dropped Avery off and was getting back in the car, I somehow tweeked my back and was in excruciating pain on the way to the doctor’s. I had been quite uncomfortable the previous weeks leading up to this day as it felt like there was no more room for Dallin to grow and he was smashing all my vital organs and breaking my ribs. At the doctor’s office, I was disappointed to learn that I hadn’t made any progress labor wise. I was getting quite anxious for this little boy to arrive. I texted Bryce and said “No progress since last week”  He replied “Bummer, looks like we’re having a Thanksgiving baby”. The remainder of the day was spent trying to alleviate my back pain. In the afternoon I went and nannied for Luke and Laura and was grateful for when it was time to go home. When it was time to go to bed that night I could not fall asleep. I finally gave in and took some tylenol and tried sleeping on the couch. I fell asleep at about midnight and returned to my bed later.

At about 3am November 18th, I started having contractions. However, I had been having contractions at night like this in the weeks prior and they hadn’t done a darn thing as far as progress goes. I slept in between contractions but noticed this time they were a little more painful and weren’t really going away. At 6:30 Bryce woke up to get ready for work. I told him that I had been having contractions and that they were about 8-10 minutes apart at this point. He didn’t really think anything of it since this was not the first time I had told him I was having contractions. He got up and started getting ready for work. I too started getting ready for the day and noticed that my contractions were getting closer together. By the time Bryce left for work, they were 5 minutes apart and getting quite painful. I felt pretty nervous about sending Bryce to work but didn’t think it was time to go to the hospital so I figured he might as well go. I also was worried that if I made him not go to work that it would just turn out that I was in false labor. As the morning went on my contractions were getting very painful. I called the hospital and explained to them how often I was having contractions and asked if I should come in. The nurse said “It sounds like your body is just getting ready for labor but you can come in if you’d like and we can check”. I don’t know why she didn’t think I was in labor but at this point I was in more pain and decided it best if I went to the hospital to get checked. I called Bryce and asked if he could come home (he had only been at work for maybe a half hour).  I told him if I wasn’t in actual labor he could always go back to work. He asked if he should take the bus or a cab. The bus takes about an hour but I felt like that was fine so he took the bus. I told him I was in too much pain to pick him up at the bus stop though.

I then called Chelsy who was going to take Avery for us. She lives about 20-30 minutes away from us. She offered to come pick up Avery but Bryce insisted that he would bring Avery to her. I also called my mom and told her I wasn’t sure I was in labor but I would keep her posted. However, I told her how long I had been having contractions and how close they were to which she said “You’re in labor, go to the hospital! Have Chelsy come pick Avery up”. I pretty much didn’t listen to her and still told Chelsy that Bryce could bring Avery to her.

For the next hour I finished getting ready and packing stuff for myself and Avery while we got ready for the hospital. I did all of this in between contractions. Towards the end of that hour my contractions were very painful so I would bend down and breath. Avery would come look at me and breath deeply with me. I guess she was my labor coach! She was so cute and patient with me while I tried to breath through contractions and get ready to go to the hospital.

Bryce finally got home at about 10:00am. We live at the top of a hill and he said “Whew, I ran up that hill, really put me out of breath”. I thought it was pretty comical…was he looking for sympathy? We rushed to the hospital and while I was in the waiting room I had a couple contractions and  at this point I wasn’t doing a great job of breathing through them…I was more yelling through them. When they finally took me back, the first thing I said to the nurse was “I want an epidural as soon as possible”. She just laughed and said, “Well let’s check you first to see where you are”. When she checked me I was dilated to an 8…an 8! I was shocked! I was hoping I was at least a 3. She said I would be having this baby within the next couple of hours. Bryce decided he better call Chelsy to have her come get Avery seeing as how if he took her then he might miss the birth of his second child. The nurse called to the other nurses “I have an immediate admit, her body just did this 20 months ago so she’s going fast!”.

Everything felt so rushed and chaotic and exciting! And painful. I still wanted that epidural. I had no intention of having this baby natural. By the time I got the epidural I was dilated to a 9 so I should’ve just sucked it up and gone natural but I was afraid of the “ring of  fire” that my sister in law had told me about. Bryce had to leave with Avery when I got the epidural. The epidural was great though because it took the edge off the contractions but I could still feel a lot. I could feel Dallin coming down, I could feel my legs and I recovered quickly afterward. When it was time to push Bryce was still gone…I asked if they could go looking for him. But right as I went to call him to tell him to get back pronto, he was walking in the room. Pushing was a little more work this time than with Avery. It took about 45 minutes but before we knew it Dallin was here! From the time I checked in at the hospital til the time Dallin was born was less than 2 hours. Bryce loved it! Definitely beat the 14 hours we were in the hospital before Avery was born…and the uncomfortable cot that Bryce had to sleep on. We stayed just 24 hours from the time he was born so we headed home the next morning. I may be biased but we sure make cute kids.