ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL

[CAUTION: This story contains explicit birthing terminology; it is NOT for the squeamish!]

I am typing on my PDA so that I can be on a "comfy chair" AND still get this story down in a timely manner.

This story really begins three-and-a-half years ago, with the birth of our daughter, Joanna. My labor with her lasted about ten hours total. Things went really slowly until my water broke; then Joanna was on the scene within forty minutes of my water breaking.

Based on that experience, I was kind of apprehensive about going into labor THIS time around, for Michael Joseph. After all, with Joanna's birth going *so* quickly I was kind of paranoid about getting to the hospital on time. And, after you read this, I think you will agree that my fears were justified.

This past Monday evening (May 15th), I started to have contractions at around 5:30 in the afternoon. They were not very regular, but Mark and I figured – since things could change so quickly, and Monday **was** already my due date – that we had better get on over to the hospital. Now, Mark had to get home still; we had to get Paul and Joanna to my sister's house; and THEN we could drive to the hospital, which is about 40 minutes away. This particular hospital (St. Francis in Bartlett) has what I consider a rather odd practice for laboring moms: they have to be admitted through the ER with everyone else and *then* be moved up to the second floor Labor and Delivery unit. That whole process took about three hours.

It turned out that Monday's contractions were what is termed a "false" labor, so I was sent home: at 5 cm dilation, 70% effacement, and a -1 station. Just for comparison, when I was in real labor with Joanna I was only dilated at 2 cm for those first nine hours of her birth, and then went from 2 cm to 10 cm and "crowning" (as in, ready to push the baby out) in 20 minutes. So I was even MORE ready than before, but being sent back home – did I mention 40 minutes away?!! – and REALLY, REALLY getting nervous now.

Fast forward to Wednesday morning at 5:30 a.m. The contractions had started up again, and – since I had been quite chastened by the nurses for coming to the hospital in false labor – I was determined that I was going to be able to answer all their questions in the affirmative. So I “walked around,” which is supposed to suppress the contractions of false labor - no change. I tried to “take a soothing bath,” another false labor suppression technique - no change.

The final test was how far apart the contractions were, and whether they were "regular." They were ten minutes apart at first, very regular, and in fact getting stronger. By the time I had all these checked off, it was about 7:15, and the contractions were now six minutes apart. Mark had gotten the kids up and made sure they were ready to go. We called Margaret (my sister) and arranged to drop off Joanna after taking Paul to school. And since we had the kids with us, I was in the front passenger seat with the seatback mostly upright (that became a major obstacle later on).

We dropped off the kids, and the contractions were getting pretty fierce, but holding steady at six minutes apart. And at six minutes, we really figured that we still had at least an hour to go before Baby Michael would be making his grand entrance. We might be cutting it close, but we would at least be SOMEWHERE in the hospital when the time came.

We were apparently on Summer Avenue (taking Mark’s word for it, because I had brought along a sleep mask. Initially, it was to wear at the hospital during the night – you know, for when the nurse’s have to come in every two hours to check on you – but the early morning sun blinking through the trees was NOT helping the contractions, so I had put it on) when suddenly the contractions ramped up to three minutes apart and the strongest yet. It was at this point that I had Mark call the hospital and ask if an ambulance could meet us on the way. He called, but they said that since we were so close that it wouldn’t do much good and we should just keep driving.

Even in the midst of the pain, I had a moment to feel some sympathy for Mark here. I mean, yes, I was in excruciating pain, but *he* had to remain calm and watch the traffic, trying to act as if his beloved wife wasn’t screaming in agony beside him. Of course, moments later I didn’t have brain capacity to think about *anything* but the baby coming out; but at *this* moment, I did feel for him.

And then it happened: my water broke! All I could say was “Oh, dear – oh dear oh dear oh dear oh dear …” just repeating that over and over – and louder and louder. Part of the panic that was threatening was that I could feel Michael starting to try to push his way out, and not only did I still have clothes on down there, but I was still sitting upright with my legs together!! And I was in such pain that I could barely move to find the mechanism to let the seat down!! And we were still a few miles from the hospital!!!! (Yes, I was thinking in multiple exclamation points!!!!!! That’s always a bad sign.)

I don’t know how many people reading this have actually gone through childbirth; but the point here is that once you reach the “pushing” stage, you are at the point of no return. There is NO allowance for “holding back.” You just have to go with it, and hope that you make it through to the other side. I started screaming at this point for Mark to pull over so that I could get the chair down and get out of the seatbelt, but Summer Avenue (at the point where we were) is wooded and doesn’t have a shoulder area so we couldn’t. Like me, all Mark could do was keep going and pray. Funny, though, *he* wasn’t screaming… Just as an aside, I was really unnerved by the sounds that I was making: I did not sound human. I hope I didn’t scare Mark too much.

Anyway, I *was* able somehow to get the seat down (I couldn’t release the belt, which was probably for the best) and out came Baby Michael, after only four pushes – right into my pants!! It’s a good thing that maternity wear is so ROOMY!!!!!

This is where all the prayers that people have been saying for me during the pregnancy paid off. True, I had been upset before, but I was about to go into hysterics because now Michael was out! SOMEONE had to cut his umbilical cord and suction his airways and get him breathing – and *I* still couldn’t move and Mark was still driving and we were still too far away from the hospital!! My sweet baby was going to die only moments after coming into the world because he was going to suffocate!! My heart was on the verge of breaking at the scenario that was unfolding.

Or so I was thinking. What *happened*, though, was that Mark had pulled into a muffler shop next to a gas station (Mid-South Muffler & Automotive next to the Mapco at Summer and Stage). And there, at the gas station, there just “happened” to be an ambulance!!!! They were not on a call; they had just stopped in to get their morning coffee, and were pulling out of their parking space when Mark flagged them down and got them to come over.

So they were able to cut my pants off, get Michael out, cut his cord, get him breathing, and get him and me into the ambulance for the rest of the ride to the hospital. Mark resumed his car-driving duties and followed behind (although far behind, since the ambulance flicked its siren on and was able to clear a path).

Oh, and here’s another interesting thing: the ambulance technician’s name was Michael, and the driver’s *middle* name was Joseph. And yes, we had already chosen Michael Joseph as his name. Granted, those are common names, but what are the odds of that happening? It seems that would be pretty small.

So we are very grateful to God and to all those who prayed for a safe delivery for Baby Michael. Although this was probably not what ANYONE had in mind (don’t tell me if it was, okay? I just wouldn’t want to know that), it turned out for the best. Michael recovered valiantly and I am doing pretty well, too, and so we return to the beginning: ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL.