On Wednesday August 10^th 2011, I had my 39-week appointment with a mid-wife. She updated my physical chart that the doctors had been neglecting. It seems that they had been updating my computer chart but not my actual physical chart. She told me that because of all of this work she was doing that I needed to have the baby while she was on duty and that she was one duty Friday and Saturday night from seven pm to seven am.

            I went into labor with Clara at one am on August 12^th 2011, at first the contractions were off and on and I was able to sleep until three am. At that point the contractions were intense and were about ten minutes apart. I let Jeremy get some more sleep and went to the living room to watch some television and time my contractions. I had and app on my phone that allowed me to time how long the contractions lasted and how far apart they are. I do have to say that the books lied, they said the contractions would increase in intensity, well they did not they started out strong and stayed strong.  At about nine am my contractions were three to four minutes apart, we decided to head to the hospital.

            At the hospital we went to the women’s health center, and were at the wrong part of the hospital. We walked through the hospital to find the bank of elevators that would take us to the second floor and the labor and delivery floor. Once we found the right spot we went to check in, they sent me to the waiting room as they were to full to even check me at that point. There was one other person in the waiting room with me who was also sent there by the admitting staff. While in the waiting room my contractions were still super intense and the birth certificate ladies called down to the admitting room and told them they needed to take me now. They finally decided that I needed to be checked to see how dilated I was and if I was in active labor. Once that was all finished they brought me back to the admitting office and tried to tell me that they would have to send me to another hospital. However, the finally asked me if I was active duty and I said yes, well being active duty they were unable to send me to another hospital and had to admit me there.

            I was admitted and finally in my room where I would deliver Clara, they were trying to ask me questions to finish my admission that Jeremy had to answer for me. Finally they brought in the Anesthesiologist, who gave me my epidural. I was in such pain that Jeremy asked if he could sign the consent form for me. The doctor laughed and him and told him I had to sign it.

             Once I had my epidural I was fine, just read my book, watched TV, and played with my phone. At 4:45 pm I was told that it was time to push.  I pushed for about 2.5 hours and Clara Lynn Gray was born at 7:11 pm (just in time for the midwife who fixed my chart to deliver her), weighing 7 lbs 7 ounces and 20 inches long.  Once she was born my nurse was told that had to hurry up because they needed the room. My epidural did not get a chance to wear off before I was in my post-partum room. The one nice thing about them being busy that day was the only post-partum room available at that time was a single room so I did not have to share with a roommate. 

 Clara's stats on the monitor

 Clara getting cleaned up

 New mommy

 New daddy