Heading to the hospital

I started having contractions on Monday (7/27) night at about 7:30 pm. They felt very real but were only about 30 minutes apart so we weren't too worried.

By the morning the contractions were still there and were significantly closer. I called my OB and she advised that I eat and rest for an hour to see if they slow down and if they didn't I needed to head straight to labor and delivery. My mom came right over to be with Benjamin (Jack was at school) so that I could rest. I rested for almost 2 hours with very little change. At 1:00 pm I called Branden to let him know that my contractions were 6 minutes apart and pretty strong. So, off we went to Long Beach Memorial Hospital to possibly have our baby girl.

I was feeling VERY scared since I was only 35 weeks, 3 days along. My mom snapped this picture right before we left.

This picture was taken around 6:00 pm on Tuesday after my contractions had significantly slowed down and we truly thought I'd be able to go home the following day.


Upon examination they determined that I was indeed in labor. My contractions were 3 minutes apart, I was dilated 3 cm and 80% effaced. They also determined that I was slightly dehydrated and hoped they could slow labor down for for a few days with LOTS of liquid. Over the course of my stay I received 4 bags of IV fluid. I was moved to a private room in labor and delivery with the intentions on being monitored until the morning. Unfortunately the continued to get stronger and closer. Kudos to you women that have had to labor for 24+ hours / days. I will be the first to say it was rough! Very painful especially because I knew that ultimately I was having a C-Section and the laboring was for nothing. By 1:00 am (Wednesday, July 29th) it was apparent that things were not slowing down. They checked me again and the contractions were about 2 minutes apart and I was dilated to 5 now. At this point everyone (nurses and Dr.'s) start scrambling "call the OR, call this person, that specialist, etc..." It was a rushed mad house. I'm laying thinking I've been here since 2:00 pm people maybe we should have moved on this a few hours ago. I write that as if I was calm - yeah right! I was super scared. I was crying and shaking :-( Branden however, was wonderful. He was right by my side the whole time trying to calm and reassure me that everything would be fine. Although those last few minutes were super crazy I know everyone had the baby's best intentions in mind and now it was GO TIME! Off to the Operating room I was rolled.

There were a lot of doctors in the delivery room when Jack was born but this was crazy. Branden could not get over how many people were in the operating room. There were teams of people in every corner of the room waiting to do their part. Although Spina Bifida is one on the most common birth defects in the US it doesn't seem that a lot of nurses here have actually been in a delivery or seen the lesion on the back prior to surgery. Branden tried to capture the amount of people in the room but this video doesn't actually show about half of them.