I had been having Braxton Hicks (practice) contractions for at least a month, so I didn't think much on Friday when I was having contractions that were a little more painful. I thought the process was getting started, but it would be a few days, maybe a week even, before the real labor began.
I felt ambitious in the morning and did a little cleaning around the house, washed our bedsheets, and even decided it was absolutely necessary to attempt to paint my toenails. To make it worse, Jalen accidentally stepped on my big toe and stamped dark red nail polish all over the carpet, so I got to clean that mess and RE-paint one toe! During Jalen's nap, I also deemed it necessary to shave my legs in our stand up shower. (I can tell you that hasn't happened for about 3 months!) After that, I found myself laid up on the couch on the heating pad, where I had been the night before as well.
With Jalen asleep, I finally realized how much pain I was having and began texting a heads up to Devan. When he got home from work at 6:30 he asked if I had been timing the contractions, which I hadn't because I still didn't think it was real labor. They were 5 minutes apart for the next hour and a half, when I finally gave in and called the hospital. We packed up our bags, and took Jalen with us thinking we were just going to come back home. Outside, we noticed the huge moon, although luckily the full moon was the night before!
When we got to the hospital, I was already 5cm and in much more pain than I was at 2:00 that afternoon thinking I just had a backache. We were admitted to the hospital and I finally gave in to the notion that we were going to have a baby that night. In September. We weren't supposed to have a baby until October. In two weeks. I was not mentally prepared for that. All this time Jalen was very worried about his Mama. At every contraction, he would say, "hurt, Mama hurt" then "ok??" Devan's friend Matt came to the hospital to get Jalen, and he enjoyed spending the night with his buddy Grace.
I think we left for the hospital at 9:00, and at 10:30 I was finally wheeled in to the operating room to get my desperately needed spinal block and begin the process of bringing this baby out of the womb and into the world. If you don't know, I had a previous c-section because of Jalen not fitting through my pelvis, so we planned this one to be a c-section as well. Just two weeks later. After some surgical magic, Tessa officially came into the world at 10:53pm. After two nights in the hospital, we are now back home and have made it through one week with two children.
Tessa has been a very good baby so far. She sleeps 4 hours at a time at night and never cries except when having her diaper changed. Jalen has been a very good big brother. When she is sitting in a bouncy seat or swing, he always goes up to her to give her a kiss. He always wants to see her when he wakes up. So far we are all doing great and enjoying our new family of four.
*Oh and let me add to this by saying I think it is hilarious, and I didn't realize it until several days later, that I posted the belly picture and talked about my impatience in waiting on labor the DAY OF Tessa's birth! What a long day!
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