Early Labor

After worrying about waiting to be induced and the knowledge that inductions can lead to an increased rate of c-section, I decided to do everything to encourage Bella starting with a fabulous 60-min massage on Wed. Wioletta from Poland is one of the best masseuse's ever - she has a studio on base at the gym. I had hot stones on my back, aromatherapy and she hit all the pressure points that you normally worry about during pregnancy in my feet. She also was able to loosen my lower back which was great.

Wed night contractions started spaced about 10-15 min, and then a 30 min, back to 10-min apart. Jeff and I both took Thursday off work and took Morgan into daycare, and tried almost all the wives' tale tricks for going into labor and by about 6 PM contractions were getting stronger.

By about 9 PM contractions were very intense and about 5 minutes apart. We called our babysitter Rose and when she arrived we decided to walk to the hospital. It's really close on base and I was still worried that we might be sent away. After walking into ER and into Labor and Delivery, I must have looked pretty calm and comfortable because the attending nurses asked why we were there. We were kind of shocked and said "To deliver a baby!!". I then explained about the contractions being 5 minutes apart, lasting for 1 minute and that this had been going on for an hour. The Dr. happened to already be at the hospital and sure enough when she checked my cervix to all of their surprise - I was 5 cm dilated. Then they watched how Jeff helped me breathe through a contraction and were all quite impressed, though I did tell them that anytime would be great to get the epidural! :-)