"Third Times a Charm"

***WARNING!!!*** This blog contains info about labor and/or delivery. :) Feel free to skip if you think you'll have a TMI reaction.

I really wondered if he'd ever come. All 3 of our boys have been "late," but I was SO huge with this one, it stopped being blissful at about 30 weeks :).

We had set an appointment to induce Monday, November 17th. Due to expense and other factors, though, a troupe of friends and I were praying we'd "go" on our own. Dusty and his team (LOL) were also praying we wouldn't "go" on Saturday, being as every meeting is a milestone for our very young church plant.

Well, he decided to show up in PERFECT timing... trying to make everyone happy, sweet boy.

Contractions started at 5:38 Sunday morning. By contraction #4 we had gone from 7 minutes apart to 2! 

"Dusty, it's time to go."

"Should we call the hospital?"

"You can, but I'm going regardless of what they say."

So, we called them on the way :). It's funny how quickly the tone changes from "assessment" to "business" once they find out this ISN'T your first.

Upstairs, went like this:

"Umm, we need to move her to delivery."

"She's not finished admitting yet."

"Well, she's at an 8-9, we'll have to finish the process there."

I've never wanted to be mean or rude or yell at my husband during this time, so I always pray God will give me an extra measure of grace. It's funny how you can want to put your head through a wall one minute, and feel so completely euphoric, even humorous the second the pain's gone. Given as the contractions were every 2 minutes, I felt a little like Jekyll and Hyde.

Still, God gave me grace. I did really want to break my husband's thumb... not to hurt him, per se, breaking something just seemed like it would help. Dusty disagreed :)

The doctor on call wanted to break the water. But Nancy (SUPER NURSE EXTRAORDINAIRE) literally stepped in front of him and said, "Let's wait for her intrathecal." Gotta love Nancy. If you don't know, an intrathecal is a shot they administer similar to the epidural, but it only lasts for a couple hours. Being as we were so close to delivery and an epidural takes 30 minutes or so to set up, Nancy thought it wise to go this route. AND, I think it's probably less expensive too... did I mention we LOVE Nancy? So, George gave me my shot and the pain went away almost immediately. LOVE George too. 

Just then my real doctor got there - LOVE her too. They broke the water, we pushed for "less than 20 minutes" Dusty says. And our 3rd little man was born!

He was 10 lbs 11 oz. - none of us believed it. The nurse even reset the scale to be sure :)

He was 23 inches long. That's the biggest baby on my side of the family. Dusty still holds the record on his side, having been 11 lbs 25 inches! :) And I gladly leave that trophy in his mother's very worthy hands. I'm pretty sure she did it withOUT pain meds too. CANNOT EVEN IMAGINE!

They also told us, our new baby had a KNOT in his cord. They all seemed surprised and not many had seen one. I guess it means he moved around a lot - enough to swim through his own cord at some point. 

So, in less than 3 hours we went from a family of 4 to a family of 5! What a blessing. Dusty and I marveled at how tired we WEREN'T that first day. So many prayers were answered, so many details worked out. And I wonder why I ever question, why I ever fear. This is definitely one of those "ebenezer" moments in my life. "Look what God did here."

Most of you know this little man was a surprise for us. One that I often questioned God on - not the precious life, but the timing. And his birth alone has already begun the answer... not that we deserve one... but in accordance, we named him Dezdin Nathaniel. Dezdin is our concoction of a masculine form of "destiny" and Nathaniel means "given of God." All our children, to me, have held a purpose and message from God. Dezdin was completely God's idea... so I'm especially excited to see what other surprises God unfolds through him. Thank you for all your prayers. They were answered. We are very blessed.