Birth Story Week: #5, so, um . . . THAT was fast

As baby number seven's due date fast approaches, I figured I ought to do a Birth Story Week of all six births so far.Need to catch up? Here are birth story #1, birth story #2, birth story #3, and birth story #4.

Here's birth story number five:




After an easy-peasy pregnancy under difficult circumstances with number four, things got back to normal with number five. Well, worse than normal actually.

I had had some nausea and, very rarely, vomiting with my other pregnancies, but it got worse with this one, and was compounded by the fact that my oldest was now in Kindergarten, so I actually had to accomplish things at particular times of day.

Trying to get four kids under six dressed and to the car and find a convenient place to barf on the way was . . . taxing. So was listening to the other moms discuss vasectomies. And then there was the parade of inappropriately sexual Halloween costumes. So we dropped out and started homeschooling. Without the barfing in the sink, maybe I would have lacked the motivation to give it a try. So, we probably have Anita to thank for being a homeschooling family.

Anita was due July 8th. Usually we spend our summers in Chicago with the husband's parents, but with a July baby, we decided not to make the trip. But we couldn't just sit around looking at each other all the time, so for the Fourth of July weekend, we went down to San Diego to my parents' house. We were supposed to drive home on Monday, but I got antsy to be back home and we ended up heading back to LA Sunday night, July 5th.




Which ended up being a good idea.

Because I went into labor that night. And my labor with her went fast. FAST fast.

I'm really not scared of many things. Spiders, heights, zombies . . . no problem, bring 'em on. But I am ridiculously scared of creating a fuss, especially a false alarm fuss. If I were faced with a boggart I think he would probably take the form of a disdainful nurse shaking her head and saying to the people of the delivery ward, "She's not in labor at all, it's probably just gas."

So, I really like to be sure I'm in labor before I alert everyone, even just my husband. I also have a pretty high pain tolerance and a pretty bad memory. It was a little after three in the morning when I started having contractions, two days before my due date. While I was having them they seemed really intense and I thought for sure we should leave for the hospital immediately if not sooner. But then, in between them, I would start thinking that it had been less than an hour since it started, and they couldn't possibly be that bad and I must just be being a wimp and if I got to the hospital too early everyone would laugh at me.

But, fortunately for me I married a very sensible husband who knows when not to listen to me.

So, as my parents were doing the drive from San Diego to LA, our neighbor came over to be with the kids while they slept.

When we got to the hospital things were pretty serious already. They didn't have time to hook me up to anything, and Anita was born at 4:46am. At least this time I made it into the delivery room. Labor was about an hour and a half start to finish. So, good thing we didn't get stuck in traffic. She was 8 lbs 1 oz. And we went home from the hospital that afternoon.




Betty was really, really happy to finally have a sister!