Jefferson Luke Miller

After much waiting and anticipation Jefferson Luke Miller finally joined our family one day shy of being a full two weeks late.  The doctor had given up patience waiting for me to go into labor naturally and had scheduled an induction for first thing Monday morning.  

So when I woke up on Sunday just as Caleb was leaving for an early morning meeting and thought I felt a contraction, we were pretty sure it was just wishful thinking on my part, trying to avoid having to be induced the next day.

Thus, off Caleb went to the meeting, but within 30 minutes I had another contraction and could tell, 'this was it!'  I sent Caleb a text and told him to plan on coming home after his meeting and we'd take the kids to my mom's and head into the hospital.  

Another 30 minutes later and I was texting Caleb to forget the meeting and hurry.  

Another 30 minutes and he finally got home and found me on the floor in the hall.  I had gotten the kids bathed and ready for church, but they didn't have shoes or some of their last minute things packed.  I no longer cared about shoes at that point though and we jumped in the car and headed out.  

By the time we dropped the kids off I was like a crazy lady on the TV shows, begging Caleb to speed.  We got to the hospital and couldn't find a parking spot.  I had him pull into the ER, they came out with a wheel chair and took me up to labor and delivery.  

I was dilated to an 8, so they went ahead and admitted me.  I was GBS positive and was suppose to be on antibiotics for 4 hours before I delivered so that the baby would get enough medication to avoid getting sick.  By the time they hooked everything up, I was a 9.5.  They said my water hadn't broken yet and that was the only thing keeping me from delivering.  But my doctor was unavailable and so the resident at the hospital was the only one around and he said that we needed those antibiotics so badly (I think just to meet their standard procedures) we were going to have me wait for as long as possible.  

At this point I said I needed an epidural then.  The anesthesiologist arrived and poked my spine with his big old needle.  Nothing happened, I was still screaming like a crazy lady on TV.  He said it would take about 10 minutes to set in.  

10 minutes later I was still screaming like that crazy lady and he gave me a booster shot of medication.  Another 10 minutes later I couldn't feel my legs, but I was still being crazy lady.  

Repeat.  

He came back yet again and was about to pull the whole thing out and redo the epidural--apparently it was too low and was only blocking my legs--which have never been so numb in my life.  So basically, natural labor, fully dilated, but trying to hold baby in, while unable to move around or work through the contractions... it sucked!  

Thank goodness, my doctor's on call physician finally arrived at the hospital and walked in the room and saw me and told them no, we are not redoing the epidural, because, forget the stupid antibiotics, we are going to deliver this poor lady as soon as possible.  

5 minutes later all the pain instantly disappeared when he was born.  I had never been so relieved to be done with labor!  I went super fast, which was good, but it was also super intense compared to my other babies.

His official time of birth was 12:41 pm.  He weighed in at 8 lbs, 10 oz. and was 21 1/2 inches long.  So Seth still remains our biggest baby and by far our smallest toddler :)

Since he was so late, he'd already had a bowel movement so they were trying to deliver him carefully, so that he wouldn't cry when he came out... which sounded ridiculous to me, isn't the trip through the birth canal traumatic enough that how gently they catch you, wouldn't really make a difference?  

Anyway, they were trying so hard to keep him from breathing until they could suction him that he ended up only taking a tiny breath rather than a big screaming breath, which caused his lungs to only inflate halfway.  So he had to get oxygen pumped into his lungs for about 20 minutes until they fully inflated and then we were good to go.  

But that was his only issue, he didn't get sick, despite my lack of getting the full antibiotics and we probably could have skipped all that drama and just delivered him when I first got to the hospital, but oh well... everyone needs an interesting and dramatic birth story to tell, right? :)  And although during the labor I would have thrown something at you, had you tried to point it out... he was definitely worth it!  We are already completely in love with him and can't image our family without him. (In other words we can't imagine all the way back to a few days ago :)