That night my mom decided to take my son Caelan so that in the morning she could bring him to school and I could go directly to the hospital with my husband and she would come later. I went to bed like normal around 10:30 or 11 and slept until around 12:30. I woke up then to go to the bathroom and realized that I wasn't tired enough to go back to sleep. I decided to play around on the Internet and so I stayed up. Around 1am the contractions started. They weren't too bad, just uncomfortable like gas pains. Around 2am they were regularly 3-4 minutes apart and getting so I had to concentrate during them. I called the labor and delivery section of the hospital and they said that my midwife had filled them in and it sounded like I was going into labor on my own, and that I should come in. So I woke my husband up and he took a shower. We got to the hospital around 3am.
The nurse checked me and said I was 3-4cm dilated and 100%effaced, looks like this is it. So we made our phone calls. It's amazing how many people want to be there for the labor and birth during the day but when you call them at 3am they find other things to do! The contractions were certainly uncomfortable but not unbearable. The midwife still didn't plan on coming in until just before office hours, probably not until around 8 or so. So I walked the room, watched some late night TV with my hubby and panted through the contractions. Baby's heartrate was great and everything looked good on the monitors.
Suddenly, around 4:30 the contractions were getting very uncomfortable, I was getting nausous and my bowels decided they needed to be empty, fast. I spent the next miserable hour on the toilet throwing up in a bucket. I will never forget that feeling, it was the most miserable thing in the world. The pain was really getting intense and it was almost all in my back. I begged the nurse for some nausea medicine and something for the pain but she said she couldn't give me anything until the midwife OK'ed it and that Ginger, one of the midwives, was on her way now. Finally around 5:30am Ginger came into my room. She ordered Phenergen for my nausea and Nubaine for my pain. I had to get off the toilet for her to check me and for the shots. She checked me and said I was still at a good 4cm. She broke my water at 6:15am and I immediately went to 6+cm. I stood up because laying down was too painful on my back. The nurse gave me the Pheregen in my arm and the Nubaine in my hip around 6:40am. They hurt but I didn't mind. The Nubaine made me fuzzy around the edges but didn't do a darn thing for my pain. Luckily the nausea went away. My friend Paige was there, along with my Mom and husband. Paige had a son a year and a half ago and had all back labor. She had taught my Mom and Brian how to push my hips together during a contraction earlier to help with the pain. I loved her so much right then! So we endured a few more contractions with Mom, Brian and Paige all taking turns pushing on my hips. I was bent over the bottom corner of the bed holding onto some pillows for support. Ginger stayed with me and helped by rubbing my back and pressing on certain points to help. I started begging for an epidural around 6:45am and Ginger checked me to see how far I was. Apparently I was only 7cm so Ginger went out and ordered my epidural. While out there she got a call from another patient so she stayed out at the desk for what seemed like a while.
All of a sudden I had a major contraction and I felt the strongest urge to push. The nurse patted my back and said "Oh, that's just the baby moving down and getting ready, push a little bit if you have to." I said I already was, I had to! The nurse then realized I was serious and had me get up on the bed. I managed to get up on my hands and knees and then I had to push again. That's when the nurse truely realized just how serious I was because the baby's head started crowning just then. She ran out of the room and grabbed Ginger off of the phone. They had me lay on my back (they had to push me over during a push) and I kept pushing, this time Elli's head came out! Ginger asked me to slow down so she could suction the baby's mouth and then said that I could push. One last push for a total of four pushes and Elli was born at 7:08am on January 10, 2002. She wieghed just 6lbs and 13oz and she was 18.5 inches long. I never did get that epidural. As Elli was laying on my belly the epidural team came to my door and asked if we still needed that epidural and Ginger told them no. I tore a bit so she sewed me up and Elli and I got to bond for a good 15 minutes after Daddy cut the cord.