Thursday March 7th we had a scheduled induction, which also happened to be my due date! Our little boy was measuring big, so my doctor didn’t want me to go any later. Before leaving the house we had to get one last picture as a family of three! We dropped Adelyn off at daycare and headed to the hospital around 7:30am.
We checked in and went up to the 4th floor at the hospital. Our nurse, Jadie, met us & took us to our room. I put on the {ahem…very stylish} hospital gown and they hooked me up to the monitors for contractions & baby boy’s heartbeat. Dr Olson stopped in shortly after. She was hoping to break my water right away, but wasn’t able to because my cervix wasn’t in the right position. She said as I would walk & the baby’s head comes down it will help bring my cervix to the right position. I was 3 cm dilated at that time.
The lab stopped in my room next, around 8:15am, and drew my blood. I’m not very good with blood draws and have been known to pass out, so I always let the nurse/lab tech know this. While the lab tech was taking my blood she kept my mind busy by chatting about Hawkeye football and then all of the sudden I felt this cold down my arm and Kyle says, “Don’t look Darci!”. The tech said the vile didn’t close when she pulled it out, so all the blood she drew from me was ALL OVER my arm, the bed, the floor, the chair next me, etc! So she had to take my blood AGAIN. 
Not how I wanted to start the day, but I survived!
After the lab tech left Jadie put in my IV and started Pitocin around 8:50am. To get things going I wanted to walk, so at 9:30am we started the first round of what would be many walks on the OB floor that day! I still wasn’t feeling much of anything. We took another walk at 10:30am and Jadie also increased the Pitocin at that time. 
Dr Olson came back around noon and {thankfully} was able to break my water. At that time contractions were about 2 1/2 minutes apart. I could feel them, but they weren’t painful. Once again, we went out for another walk around 1pm. When we were back in the room Jadie offered me a popsicle! I was excited…something besides ice chips! Not sure why, but I didn’t get one when I had Adelyn.
As the afternoon went on the contractions got more intense and Jadie continued to increase my Pitocin. At 2:30pm I was dilated to 4cm. And once again at 3pm we took another walk. One of the nurses suggested that each time I had a contraction to hold the rail on the side of the hallway and squat as I breathed through the contraction. I took her advice, but didn’t quite squat as low as she demonstrated!
Throughout the day the main topic of discussion was what we were going to name our baby boy. We just couldn’t nail one down. Kyle likes simple names and I wanted something a little less common. We went over our list of favorites multiple times and Kyle got a “name book” from the nurses station.
Mid afternoon I started to get discouraged. I really thought things would be moving quicker by now. Kyle looked back to my labor with Adelyn and I was at about the same place now as I was with Adelyn. Everything I had heard said the 2nd one goes quicker and I just wasn’t feeling that way. Thankfully I had a great “team” and both Kyle & Jadie encouraged me and I was able to re-focus on the goal…getting our baby boy here!
Dr. Olson came back to check me at 5:20pm. I was dilated to 6cm and 60% effaced. At this point I was focused and breathing steadily through each contraction {and if I was up I’d grab the rail on the side of the hallway, squat, & breath through each contraction}. I wanted so bad to make it as far as I could without the epidural {but of course had plans to ultimately get one}.
At 5:50pm we went for another walk. It felt SO much better to be up during contractions rather than sitting in bed. But the contractions were starting to get more intense. At 6:10pm I had to get back in bed to be monitored again and Jadie checked me, I was dilated to 7-8cm. This is when I decided it was time to get the epidural. If I could have walked/stood longer I could have made it longer, but sitting in bed was a completely different pain.
At 6:30pm Colin showed up to do the epidural. Colin was not only our nurse anesthetist, but he is also a family friend and he did my epidural for Adelyn as well. I was so thankful he was able to come do the epidural for me!
Post epidural…feeling good! Dr. Olson came back around 7pm to check me and I was 8cm dilated and 70% effaced. Unfortunately our baby boy didn’t make his arrival before 7pm, which meant our awesome nurse Jadie didn’t get to be there for his birth. Our new nurse, Jess, was awesome though! I had actually met her when I had Adelyn and she did the pre-natal classes at our hospital as well.
Once I had my epidural I felt almost drugged, so I took advantage of feeling good and tried to take a nap. At 8:15pm Jess checked me and I was almost 9cm and 80-90% effaced. About a half hour later she increased my Pitocin to 12 and again another 20 minutes later to 13.
At 10pm Dr. Olson checked me again and said that when I was contracting that I was “complete”, but when I wasn’t contracting I was still at an 8. She said I needed to “labor down” and let my body do the work before I could start pushing. However, I had that strong feeling that I wanted to push. For the next half hour I was, once again, focused & breathing through each contraction, holding back the urge to push.
Jess checked me at 10:40pm and determined that I was now complete, even when I wasn’t contracting, and was ready to push. At 10:45pm Dr. Olson came into the room and quickly realized she needed to gown up. Another nurse quickly called the the nursery nurse and I began to push. Kyle, Dr. Olson, and the nurses were all encouraging throughout each push…but for some reason I didn’t let myself believe them. I remembered all too well that encouragement I got when I pushed for 2 1/2 hours for Adelyn’s delivery and didn’t want to get too excited knowing that this could be a long, hard part of the labor.
Little did I know, but after only 15 minutes of pushing our sweet boy made his arrival at 11pm on the dot! Dr. Olson placed him on my chest and they rubbed him down and he made his first cry! Love that sound! Kyle and I cried and embraced each other. A complete miracle, a healthy baby boy! Dr. Olson had Kyle clamp the cord and cut it!
They took him across the room to get him cleaned up, weighed, measured, checked, etc. And the guesses began as to how big he was! I was SO curious!
Before long, the nursery nurse announced 9lbs 11 3/4 oz and 22in long, big boy!
Once the nurses were done with him and Dr. Olson was done with me, Kyle and I had some sweet time to get acquainted with our son! I was able to nurse him right away and he latched like he knew exactly what to do, an answer to prayers!
At this point we still hadn’t chosen a name yet. It wasn’t until the following morning, before we sent out the announcement, that we chose Avery James as his name. It may have taken a while, but it fits him perfect & we love it!
We couldn’t be more smitten with our sweet boy and we are so thankful that God has given us the opportunity to be his Mommy & Daddy!
