The Heatons: Welcome Owen Fred Heaton (birth story.) 6.23.17

Like I have mentioned previously, this pregnancy with our little Owen has been a little different. I had been telling everyone he has just always felt bigger than my girls, especially at the end. He had also been measuring 1 - 2 weeks ahead my whole pregnancy. I started contracting around 30 weeks just like normal for me. Some of my contractions would come consistently, some would hurt, some wouldn't. It all seemed pretty normal for me, but as my due date got closer and closer I was having more and more good hard contractions every day. Dr. Ott checked me before Chris left for Youth Conference like I had mentioned previously, while Chris was gone I was advised to take it really easy to keep myself from progressing into active labor. I made it through Chris being gone and it was definitely a relief when he was home and around the area. If he ever left Kanab for work he would send me a phone number of someone to call who knew where he was if he didn't have service. He always had a plan and a way to get ahold of him, which was comforting to me. Well one random wednesday (I was 38.4) I had taken the girls swimming that morning, then I came home made them lunch, laid Ellie down, did some light cleaning, and I hoped in the shower. While I was doing all those things I noticed I was contracting consistently. I tried to just brush it off, but once I got out of the shower I felt like they were coming with about the same amount of time in-between them. I started timing them, they were coming every 4 minutes on the dot. I kept timing but ignoring them as best I could. They felt strong and productive but I didn't want to get worked up about it and worry everyone. I started cleaning up a little then I decided to text Chris, I kept timing them and keeping him updated. They started coming every two minutes and I couldn't talk through some of them so I started to get nervous. I started worrying because the girls were noticing I was struggling and Kinley kept asking if I was okay. I told Chris to stay at work until they started coming every minute and a half and they were really hurting. So Chris told me he is coming home, I still felt like I wasn't in active labor but once he told me he was coming I was relieved. I started really cleaning like crazy to get my house picked up if this was really it. Chris got here and we chatted for a bit and I continued to clean, then I asked him to do the dishes. :) I think he thought I was crazy because my contractions were still coming, hard. He did the dishes, and I finished cleaning up and we talked about going up to the hospital. I kept going back and forth about it and finally we decided we better go. I sat down to see if the contractions would stop, and they did slow down a little but didn't stop completely. So we packed the girls a bag called our moms and we were off to the hospital. After monitoring for an hour my contractions had slowed down but were still coming, I was at a 4+, so these hard contractions just weren't really productive. Dr Ott gave us the option to stay and have a baby or head home and labor at home and come back. I had already had my weekly appointment scheduled for the next day and I was starving and I really wanted my mom to be here so I decided to go home. I continued to contract all evening, all night ( I had a few wake me up) and all the next day before my appointment. I felt anxious about him coming early, I didn't know what the best thing to do was but all I wanted was what was best for baby Owen. When we went to my appointment not much had changed overnight, even with all the contractions. I was a little teary eyed during my appointment and I was grateful Chris offered to go to my appointment with me. Dr. ott told me I could literally contract like this for another week and not progress. I really worried about Owen coming early, but Dr. ott assured he is ready when we are and he really left it up to Chris and I to decide when we wanted to have him. He told us we could get going that day or anytime the next two days, but it was really up to Chris and I. I decided I didn't think I could keep contracting that long and we better have our baby the next day. We got out and I called my mom and she left to come to Kanab two hours later. I instantly had a weight lifted off my shoulders. Chris and his dad gave me a blessing that night, it was beautiful and the spirit was very strong. Our girls were completely reverent and they listened to the words being spoken. My nerves had settled after that, and I felt ready to have our baby. The next morning Chris had to run into work to do one thing then he went and got us Houstons breakfast, we got all our stuff together then we left to check in at 10 AM! We got all checked in and hung out for a little while waiting for Dr. Ott to come break my water. He texted the nurse and told her to put me on Pitocin at a low dose, it had been a couple hours since we had been there so I was grateful things were getting going. They hooked me up and I started having more contractions, but nothing too bad. We walked and walked and walked.....we came back to the room and I fell asleep for 40 minutes. Dr Ott showed up a little after 2:00 I was still a 4 and he broke my water at 2:12. My contractions got a little more uncomfortable and I started getting a few more, we walked some more and I started being able to not talk through them. I told Chris I just wanted to stay in our room because there were a lot of people walking the halls. I just sat on the edge of the bed and they were getting stronger, Chris started timing the contractions on his phone. I told him thats what the machine over there did, and he was sure the machine wasn't picking them up correctly. :) The contractions were coming hard now and I was having a harder time breathing through them. I started getting light headed and shaky because while trying to breath through them I was mildly hyper ventilating. I finally asked for a little pain killer and some zofran to help me calm down. They had me lay down and set me up with all that in my IV and I instantly felt so much better (this was around 4:10 & I was only a 5+) I didn't realize how tense I was until I could finally completely relax in-between contractions. One thing about this birth that I loved is I felt more intuitive, since I kind of had a better idea of what to expect this time around. I could feel my body working on its own, because it didn't take long after that point that I started feeling the urge to push. At this point I had asked to bump the pit up, I knew it would hurt either way and I would rather get him here quicker. Dr Ott said it was fine so they bumped it up just a little. This part is all a little hazy for me but, I remember feeling like I was saying weird things from the pain killer and I kept asking Chris "Am i saying weird things?" Because I would be talking and then in my head I would think "i'm talking right now and I have no idea what I'm saying!" It was weird and I hate pain killers but this helped me so much. Anyway, I started to feel some pressure after a few hard contractions and I told Chris it was getting close to time to push. The nurse came back and I was a 7+ and she said "yeah a little longer." At this point I had asked to turn the Pit completely off, which they already had. :) But, only a few short contractions later and my body was starting to push after contractions on its own. I was kind of yelling at everyone at this point, asking for the Dr, telling the nurse she's going to be delivering this baby if she didn't get the Dr here asap. Etc. I felt like no one believed me that it was time to push (other than Chris) because literally minutes before I was only at a 7. She got Dr. Ott here and they didn't even check me, he just got suited up and told me to start pushing when I needed to but to push productively. I kept thinking in my mind "every push I'm going to push as hard as I can so this can be over as quick as possible." I pushed through one contraction and dr ott said "here's his head! baby has lots of hair." then I pushed through another and out he came! He was born at 4:51pm. I always close my eyes at this point, I've never watched Chris cut our babies cords which makes me sad. But then they put him on my chest and I felt so much relief. I was just happy to have him here, I asked if he was still a boy, and I remember thinking he looks just like Ellie. I looked over at Chris and he had little tears in his eyes and I was just grateful for him and our baby I couldn't help but just cry too. I needed a little stitch and they offered to let me hold Owen for a little while but I was still in quite a bit of pain. I wanted to get all the necessary stuff over with and then I could love on him. So they took little Owen off to get measured and weighed with Chris and I waited patiently. After I got all cleaned up Chris was texting me pictures of him from the other room and then he brought Owen to me and I was able to feed him. We were excited for the girls to get to the hospital and meet baby brother!