Nathan- The "play-by-play"

Nathan Welling Kinser

8 pounds 9 ounces

19.5 inches

He has conjunctivitis like the girls did so that is why his eye looks kinda gross. Hopefully it doesn't last long!

Warning- this post is VERY long AND detailed- which is so unlike me, but I want the record of how everything went down!

So I think my children had a plan that they talked about before coming to life on this earth regarding getting Nathan here. Nathan arrived on Thursday July 23, 3 weeks and 1 day early and I'm sure that my girls had something to do with it. On Wednesday night Madylin was sitting on my lap (well, what was left of my lap) before bedtime and she said, talking to my belly, "Nathan come out." My mom was here for my baby shower which was scheduled for that night and had come a couple of days early to help me with some sewing and decorating projects. She was taking a shower and I was getting the girls dressed so we could take another trip to JoAnn's for some material. I had already gotten Madylin dressed and was working on Morgan who was throwing a tantrum about putting on some shorts. It was about 9:30 and I was sitting in a chair and bending over trying to control her kicking feet when I felt a strange disconnecting feeling from sorta behind my belly button. It kinda felt like a pop and it hurt a little. When I got up I started to leak a little bit of fluid and when my mom got out of the shower I asked her if she thought I might have just lost my mucous plug. She said it was possible but I was nervous because I had never heard of anyone feeling a "pop" like that. I thought maybe something had gotten dislodged or disconnected and I was nervous. I was in tears a little bit because I was panicking. I kept going into the bathroom and feeling more and more leaking out so I tried to call my dr.'s office and the phone just kept ringing and ringing with no message or anything. So I called the hospital and they told me that if I thought my water had broken I needed to come in. I nervously decided that mom better just take me to the hospital to check. As we were getting ready to go the contractions started. I was in total denial, but luckily my mom wasn't because she got some overnight stuff together for the girls quickly and we left. On the 30 minute drive to St. Bernardine my contractions were getting a little stronger and were about 4 minutes apart. I thought "this can't be happening- that's way too close together!" I called Russell at work and finally got ahold of him through his cousin Spencer who he was working with that day. Russell was up on a roof (he works for a steel company during Summer) and I heard Spencer yell up to him "hey your wife's in labor!" I was still in denial about the labor thing and was still trying to call my doctor. Finally I got through and the nurse told me that the power had gone out in the office and the phones had been down all morning. Of course they were! She told me Dr. Yang was already at the hospital (thank goodness) and to get there ASAP. My mother-in-law was able to leave work to meet us at the hospital and take the girls so that my mom could stay with me since it would be a little bit before Russell could get there. After I got checked in at about 11:30, Russell was able to get there and the nurse told me that I definitely had ruptured (I actually asked if that meant the baby was coming. Like I said- in denial) Dr. Yang came to check my progress (quite possibly one of the most uncomfortable things ever- it felt like he had to reach to my tonsils to tell me where the baby was). Anyhow I was only 1 cm and 90% effaced and that baby was still at -2 (it has to get to +2 before you start pushing). Dr. Yang thought at the rate I was going I would probably deliver sometime around midnight. Because I was attempting a VBAC (vaginal birth after ceserean) my Dr. required me to have an epidural which he wanted me to have at this point. So from about 12:30 on I was having contractions about every 2 minutes and not feeling a thing. I was checked again at about 5pm and found out that I was almost at 4 cm and the baby was at a 0. At 6:30 I was checked again and was at 9cm and +1! So in an hour and a half I had gone from 3 cm to 9 cm and was about ready. At this point I found out that Dr. Yang had gone to L.A. to visit his brother who had just had brain surgery and thought he'd be back around 9 or 10, in time to deliver. Well that was not going to happen so I was told that the on-call doctor would be delivering. I was a little upset at that point, but not too much. As long as I was going to be allowed to try vaginal, I didn't care who delivered that baby! So at this point I started to feel the pressure. It was mounting and mounting and I told the nurse it was just about to that point where I felt I had to push. And then she let me do a practice push which went fine. Then another nurse told me I had to stop pushing because the Dr. was not there yet. WHAT?! So for the worst 45 minutes of my life I had to not push! (It's much harder than it sounds, if you've never been in labor!) I didn't think I was going to be able to do it, but somehow got through those awful 45 minutes and when Dr. Udeh finally came in and was getting the gloves on he said, pointing to my "baby passageway"- "let's go- the baby is right there" Yeah I know!! Can I push him out already!! (He seemed to take forever to put on his gloves and get into catching position) So after pushing 4 times through 4 contractions- Nathan was out. Now why couldn't I have been allowed to do that 45 minutes ago!! The nurse told me that because I waited so long without pushing, it just meant less work and less pushing for me so she said I should be glad because that is why I only had to push for about 10 minutes (um okay if you say so). So anyhow that's the play by play. Nathan was born at 7:29 pm, only 10 hours after my water broke at home. I am very grateful that it went so quickly and extremely grateful that my children knew better than I did that Nathan needed to come out the day that he did. He was 8 pounds 9 ounces at 3 weeks early. The nurses said that if I had gone full term, I wouldn't have been able to deliver him vaginally because he would have been too big and it would have been too risky to try. So my 3 kids worked together, led by Madylin (the oldest) telling him to come out and helped by Morgan's tantrum that caused me to over-exert and brake my water! Thanks to the 3 of them I was able to have a healthy baby boy without another c-section. I am so grateful (though during delivery I though I was crazy!) to have been able to have this experience and that I can walk around and help Russell take care of the girls at this point instead of being laid up in bed. Thanks to all those who were helping with my baby shower and I'm so sorry all your work was wasted!! I was really looking forward to it, too.