Baby #7 Birth Story

It's been so long since I posted on my blog, I nearly forgot how! But I like having all our kids' birth stories documented, so I finally got around to writing up Archer's!

Here is a picture of me 2 days before I delivered. 

Archer’s birth story is a little different than my other kids in that I was induced with all the other 6, but Archer came on his own! Kind of a fun experience since it was new and I’d never experienced that before. At my 36 week check up, I was dilated to a 2. I was nervous because Brian was heading to Las Vegas for the National Conference for work that following week. He left Sunday and got home late Wednesday night. Happily, I didn’t deliver while he was gone! At my 37 week appt, which was on Friday, April 24th, I was dilated to a 3. They also did an ultrasound to check the baby’s size and they guesstimated he was 7 lbs 10 oz. After my doctor checked me, she told me she stripped my membranes a little bit. I was scheduled to be induced on May 5th, but I knew I wouldn’t make it that long. I didn’t imagine I’d deliver him the day after my appointment! After I got home from that appointment, I had more contractions and they were slightly painful. I honestly didn’t want to deliver that weekend because our family water party was planned for that next day—Saturday—and Eliza and Libby had a school track meet that morning. As the day wore on, I had more contractions. Brian and I went on our weekly date night. We ate at Elephant Bar and did some errands. I went to bed, slept well, then Ezra came into our room around 3:30. Brian was able to take him back to his bed. As I was closing my eyes to get back to sleep, I felt this distinct movement. It was a pop, followed by the baby kicking. I remember thinking, “That was weird.” A few minutes later I felt some trickling and this time I thought, “This can’t be what I think it might be.” I got up to go to the bathroom to check things out and Brian asked if I was okay. I said, “Yes, I’m just going to the bathroom.” I wasn’t yet for sure my water had broken. What’s ironic, is that the past couple days before, Brian was a little phobic about my water breaking at home. He thought it was just a weird thing and the thought of  it getting on things was just a little gross to him. It’s only fitting that it really did happen since he was kind of paranoid about it. After getting up and changing my bottoms, I realized that yes, this indeed had to be my water breaking. I told Brian, “I think my water just broke.” He said, “OK—what do we need to do?” I knew we needed to get to the hospital quickly because usually after my water breaks, I go pretty quickly! Luckily, I had gotten most of my hospital stuff out, we just had to throw it into a bag. We also were trying to figure out what to do with the kids and the girls’ track meet. We called Brian’s dad on the way to the hospital, so a little after 4, and asked if he could take them to the meet, which he did. My parents came over and got the rest of the kids. Ruby had some kindergarten testing that day, too, so Kamy Cannon took her to the testing. A busy day! And now we were having a baby in the mix! So my water broke at 3:50 and we were off to the hospital a little after 4. Before we left, I told Eliza that my water broke and we were headed to the hospital. She gave me an excited hug and we left. I was a little sad because we talked about having her come and be in the room for the delivery. But it just didn’t work out. 

I started having contractions on the way, but I was still okay pain wise. We made it to the hospital around 4:15 and I went up to labor and delivery and told them my water just broke. They took me to triage where they had me change, give a urine sample, and then I got in the bed where the nurse hooked me up to a monitor. She checked me also and I was at a 6. They realized I was in labor and not just at the beginning stages! Ha! She calmly said, “We’re going to get you to a room.” They were going to wheel me in the bed to a room, but I was like, “I think I can walk!” Maybe they thought I was incapable! But just a few minutes earlier I did walk into the hospital and to that bed, etc. It was pretty comical. They couldn’t believe I was that far progressed and not screaming in pain. Once I got to the room, I asked how soon I could get an epidural because I didn’t want it to be too late and not be able to get one. Of course, they had to place the IV, draw blood and wait for the results before they could administer the epidural. I got my IV at 4:48 AM. By this point, I was having pretty painful contractions. I am not a screamer, but I did grab on to the bed railings and squeeze really hard and move my feet back and forth in my bed. Happily I was able to get an epidural. Dr. Metzel gave it to me at 5:35. It was hard to hold still when the contractions would come, but I just kept thinking how much better it would get soon. A few minutes later at 5:58, I was at an 8. The bad news was that my epidural was only working on my left side. I could feel EVERYTHING on the right side. I was hurting SO bad. I might have hurt Brian’s finger a little when I would squeeze it while I was in pain. They had me roll to my right side and the anesthesiologist came back and did something. It took a little bit, but eventually it started working on the other side, too. I was a happy camper. My bottom half was so numb—I couldn’t feel anything or move anything!! The nurse would move my leg and I would see my leg up high, but I had no sensation of that. It was quite funny.

 I was complete at 7:07 but had to wait for the doctor on call to get to the hospital. Dr. Austin wasn’t on call, so Dr. Rana delivered this baby. After she got to my room, he was totally out after 3 pushes. He was born at 7:56 AM. He was 8 lbs and 20 3/4” long. He got a 9.9 apgar score. Other things to note: I guess there was a ton of fluid! Brian even mentioned that, too. 

After they got him cleaned up and wrapped up, we held him and went through all the names on our list as we looked at him. The last two finalists were Judson and Archer. After contemplation, we decided on Archer Joseph. Archer was just a name we had heard and liked and Joseph is after my dad—it’s his middle name, too. My dad also has an April birthday, so we thought that would be fun, too.