And Baby Makes....FOUR!

So, I should have written this post about a month ago, but..I've been busy with a newborn and a rambunctious 2-yr-old...plus we've already established that I am not the most dedicated blogger. Again, I apologize.

Jack William Justus has arrived!!! He was born October 6th, 2009 at 2:58am via the natural child birthing process! He weighed in at 8lbs, 5oz and was 20 inches long. We are all doing great now, a month later! Wow, how time flies.

Nathan and I were amazed at how radically different this labor and delivery was compared to Keagan's! Everything happened so fast! I had had a few contractions early Tuesday morning, but then nothing else all day. Just notably more uncomfortable than usual. Then after dinner that night I laid down on the couch (pretty much the only place in the universe that was comfortable at that point) with Keagan and watched some cartoons with him and checked FB. It was really nice, but the whole time I was having mild contractions about 10 minutes apart. I kept waiting for them to get worse, but they stayed fairly mild. I even gave Keagan a bath while having them, and lost track for a little while. At 10:30pm I climbed into bed wondering how much longer it could be before I had this baby....I sure didn't have to wait long. As soon as I got cozy under the blankets my water broke! Figures!! ha ha. So, Nathan and I gathered up our things, informed my mother that we were off to the hospital and got in the car. All the while my contractions were getting stronger and closer together. They were now 3 -5 minutes apart and very uncomfortable!!

Since we had only been to the hospital once before, it took a few extra turns to find...not cool when you're in labor! I'm pretty sure we broke a few traffic laws....but I'm not losing sleep over it! Checking in was super fun through contractions... and no one offered me a wheelchair either! There was no racing down the hall to the delivery room like in the movies. There was me pounding my fist on the counter through each contraction as they copied my insurance info and then having to stop and kneel in the hall on the way to our room through yet another contraction. After I got up I shuffled as fast as possible to our room before the next one hit.

As soon as I got into the bed the contractions got even worse and I was begging for drugs!! Lol! Not something I had pictured myself doing, but everything was happening so intensely fast! When they checked me I was already at 6-7cm!!! I was in labor with Keagan for almost 16 hours and never got past 8cm! So, this was going incredibly fast by comparison. My begging got me a dose of Fentanyl which helped ease my suffering for a little while.

Then came bath time...they say that laboring in water helps ease the discomfort and pressure....yeah, sure, whatever! It may have helped a bit, but once the drugs wore off I was right back to begging again! Lol I got one more dose. The bathtub I was in looked kinda looked like a spacecraft. You fill the base of it, get in, sit down and then it tilts and locks back and you fill the rest of it up. I looked at the dinky little release lever when I got in and thought to myself "I am going to hit that at some point, I just know it." And sure enough, during a doozy of a contraction I tapped it with the side of my hand and the whole tub sloshed forward threatening to spill the ocean of water onto the floor and into the hallway! Fabulous. Did I mention I was having a freaking contraction??? Of course this happened when the only 2 people in the room who knew how to lock it back in place had stepped out! So here is poor Nathan struggling to keep this thing upright to keep the water in, me in the throws of an awsome contraction and the midwifery student scrambling to find someone to help us! Anywho, good triumphed over evil and we got everything back in place just in time to find that I was ready to push!

Somehow I managed to get out of the bathtub and back onto the bed. My pleas for more drugs had fallen on deaf ears since at this point they would have gone straight to the baby and done me no good. Couldn't argue with that one. It took only an hour of pushing and screaming for me to deliver Jack! And he came out perfect!!! It was soo nice to get to hold him straight away because with Keagan it was about 30 to 45min later because they had to close me up and then I was shaking so bad I was afraid I would drop him. So, to get to hold my baby as soon as he was born was amazing!!

Now Jack is one month old and thriving!! Big brother Keagan is not as jealous as I had feared and is very sweet when he acknowledges his little brother. Calls him Baby and kisses his head! He loves to hold him too and sometimes even tries to take him from me while saying "here you go." Keagan seems so huge now at almost 2.5 years old! I can't wait until they can play together. They are going to have so much fun!!!

Anyway, that is our story. We are a very thankful and blessed little family!!!!