- 5:00 am - Brendan wakes up and prepares for work and school.
- 5:30 am - Brendan heads out the door and wakes me up to say "I love you, goodbye" and "lock the door after me."
- 5:35 am - Jessica gets out of bed and locks the door and climbs back into bed.
- 8:27 am - Jessica is awakened by lower abdominal pain. 'Could this be a contraction?' she wonders.
- 8:32 am - 2nd contraction.
- 8:36 am - 3rd contraction...you get the picture. Contractions continue consistently every 3 - 6 minutes apart.
- 9:00 am - Jessica calls her Mom in Tillamook saying "I think the baby is really coming!" Mom quickly packs up and heads over to Portland to watch Hobbes (11/2 hour drive).
- 9:04 am - Hobbes wakes up, Jessica gets him feed, clothed, starts some laundry and has more contractions.
- 9:17 am - Jessica texts Brendan that he should probably ask work for the afternoon off and he should probably skip classes today.
- 9:30 am - Brendan gets home from school and helps Jessica finish packing up a bag for Hobbes, wash dishes and do laundry.
- 9:45 am - Jessica takes a warm bath that slows the contractions down for 10 minutes but then they start up again.
- 10:15 am - Jessica and Brendan start to panic, what if Mom doesn't get here in time. They try to reach Brendan's sister to see if she can watch Hobbes. They text Brendan's Mom to let her know the baby is coming, she's super excited because she's going to be in the birthing room with them.
- 10:57 am - Jessica finally calls the maternal clinic and they say she should probably get to the hospital in the next hour.
- 11:00 am - Jessica's Mom arrives and gets settled in with Hobbes.
- 11:28 am - Jessica and Brendan leave for the hospital. The ride was pretty uncomfortable for Jessica but thankfully it was only a 2 mile drive.
- 11:32 am - Brendan helps Jessica walk in between contractions every minute or two. Someone gets them a wheelchair and they are pointed towards the Labor and Delivery area.
- 11:34 am - (it's no fun having contractions in an elevator full of people)
- 11:44 am - A nurse escorts us to our room and Jessica gets dressed.
- 12:00 pm - Nurse comes back in to check how dilated Jessica is. She's flabbergasted that she is already to a 7. She says, "I better go and call Mary (the midwife)" and quickly leaves the room.
- 12:10 pm - Brendan's hand is getting pretty sore by now with Jessica squeezing it hard with every contraction.
- 12:15 pm - Midwife Mary arrives and Jessica informs her she really wants to start pushing.
- 12:20 pm - Mary says Jessica is dilated to a 10 and breaks her bag of waters.
- 12:21 - 12:40 pm - Push, push, push.
- 12:41 pm - Desmond Locke Toliver is born!
- 1:20 pm - Brendan's Mom arrives. Sorry Debbie, we really wish you could have been there. Maybe our next child won't come so fast.
So the times may be slightly off but you get the idea that everything happened really quickly. This was a drastic change from our experience at Hobbes' birth. I was 2 weeks late so they induced me and it took a couple of days of induction before things got going. We were exhausted and drained after days of being in the hospital. So having a labor that lasted a little over 4 hours from the first contraction to the end was a nice change. There wasn't any time for pain medication which was nice since I've wanted to have a natural birth, but with Hobbes I was so exhausted and things were progressing so slowly that I gave in and got an epidural. Desmond came fast and although the pain was intense it was nice knowing how fast things were progressing so I could see the proverbial light at the end of the tunnel and knew I would just have to endure it a little longer before I got to hold my sweet angel in my arms and have the pain disappear.
We didn't have a name picked out for Desmond yet when he was born. We had a list of names that we agreed. Life was just so busy. Brendan had to get back to work the day after Desmond was born and he had a midterm that day as well that his teacher wouldn't move back for him. So a few hours before it was time to check out we had to finally decide on a name. Desmond Locke Toliver was the winner.
The next day I realized that everyone was going to think we named him after the 2 Lost characters, oops. We do like the show but that is not the reason for his name. Brendan and I just both like the name Desmond and Brendan likes to name our children after philosophers. Hobbes' name came from Thomas Hobbes as well as the comic character Hobbes from Calvin and Hobbes. I'm just glad I talked Brendan out of Tocqueville or Rousseau as a middle name.
Here are some pictures of our beautiful baby boy!
