Tyler

Aaron asked me the other day if I was nervous to give birth. I actually haven't thought too much about the pain part of it. I think the whole hospital birthing experience is so exciting- that I mainly focus on that and forget the hard part! Maybe that's a bad thing! Anyway, it got me thinking and I decided that I wanted to dedicate a post to each of my "labor stories." Many of you may stop reading right there and that's ok. I happen to love hearing my girlfriends labor stories. Everyone's is so individual and exciting- I never get bored of them! I wanted to have all the details written down, so here goes. . .

Tyler was due at the beginning of February. On January 10, 2003, while living in Lehi, UT, I had an appt, with my OB, Dr. Robert Richards. I woke up, showered, SHAVED my legs, did my hair and make-up, had breakfast and then watched A Baby Story. I left for my appt. only to find out, when I got there, that Dr. Richards had gone out of town but I could see the nurse practitioner. (this was a friday) I went on back and got on the scale. It's important to know that to this point (37 weeks) I had only gained 19 pounds, so when the nurse looked at the scale and figured out that I had gained 9 pounds in a week, she was a little alarmed! She checked it again and it was correct. Yikes! Then she took my blood pressure and it was up also. It was just over 140/90. So I had my normal appt. and then they retook it and since it wasn't down she sent my over to American Fork Hospital to be monitored there. On the way there I tried calling Aaron to let him know what was going on, but he was on his lunch break- on a run- and I couldn't get a hold of him. When I got there, I changed into a gown, they hooked my up to a BP machine and started doing regular BP checks. Finally Aaron called and then came to the hospital. After a few hours my BP was not going down, so the doctor on call (Dr. Wuld) came in and said that he would recommend being induced. I kind of freaked out because I was SO not ready. I thought I had 3 weeks left. We thought and prayed about it for awhile. We called Aaron's brother who is a doctor and he agreed that if it was his wife, he would recommend getting induced. My only other option was to stay in the hospital for 24 hours and be observed and if it went down I could leave. But they figured that after a few hours, if it hadn't gone down, then it wouldn't. We decided to go for it. We quickly called my family and they caught a plane and were on their way! (funny side note: my mom had come out from CA a few days before to help me get ready for the baby. We did some shopping and cooked some meals to freeze. I had dropped her at the airport on Thurs. morning to go home! When she came back to my house on Friday, the dishes that we had used for the dinners were still in my sink!)

The Dr. admitted me and within a few hours I was in a room and started on petocin. Things went pretty slowly. Aaron went home to get our bags and during that time I got my epidural. It worked great and I was very comfortable. My family showed up around 10 pm. At that point I was only a 4 or 5, so after visiting for awhile, Aaron walked my Dad and brother out to the car so they could back to the hotel. We figured it was going to be a long night! He took my mom on a walk around the hospital- there is an amazing view of the AF temple from the hospital. When they got back to my room, the nurse had just checked me and I was an 8! Things started hopping after that. They called my dad and he turned around. Within a hour or so I started pushing. I pushed for 45 minutes. The one thing I remember, besides the pain, was my mom being able to see his head and saying "He has lots of hair!" I was so excited about that. After a some hard work,Tyler Wade Edmonds was born at 1:06 am. He was 7 pounds and 2 ounces and he definitely had lots of dark brown hair. Aaron, my mom and my sister were all there when he was born. My labor was about 8 hours or so. Right after that my Dad and brother came in, also. It was so exciting and a day I will never forget.

Up next- Jacob's story!