Double Digits!

Hello Double Digits!!  The twins are 10!  A decade!  Hard to believe it’s been ten years since Lael decided it was time to enter the world!  I have recorded their birth story in scrapbooks but not here on my blog, so here goes.

I had a textbook pregnancy, it was so easy and everything went according to plan.  I was worried when I started getting really really big in my 6th or 7th month that I was going to have to go on bed rest or something like that.  But, that wasn’t the case, hurray!  I remember buying a maternity dress in my 6th month and the sales clerk saying something like, Oh honey – that’s a beautiful dress, but it looks like you won’t be able to wear it much longer.  She was either implying that I was about to drop the babies that week or that I was already as big as the side of the barn and would need a much larger size very soon, lol!  Not exactly what you want to hear when you are only 6 months along!!  We had a midwife/doctor team taking care of me and the babies.  They were both really fabulous, I couldn’t have asked for a better experience with the doctors and hospital.  They had told us that as long as everything was still going well and that we made it to 36 weeks, the delivery would be at Madison Hospital (about 5 minutes from our house.)  I really wanted it to be there instead of the other option in Albany, about 45 minutes away.  It was also a much smaller hospital and I already knew all the nurses because I was going weekly for those blasted stress tests.  Once a week I had to go in and lie there while they monitored my belly for an hour at a time – BORING!!  But, a fair price to pay to know that everything was going well.

Ok, so on day one of Week 36 around 2 am, I started feeling those twinges of real pregnancy.  Ladies, you know what I mean, they feel different than the fake ones you’ve been sweating over for the past few weeks!  I woke Todd up and he was immediately wide awake as if he had just downed a whole pot of coffee.  He said, Is it time?  How do you feel?  Should we call the doctor?  Where’s your bag?  Do you want me to call everyone? Ummmm, I didn’t know!  So, we started with calling the doctor.  They told us that we could wait around the house and work through the contractions there.  But, I really wanted to be at the hospital where they could watch over us and tell me exactly what was going on.  We got to the hospital and they showed us into a room, I got settled in to wait and wait and wait a bit more. Nothing much happened for a while, labor progressed a bit slowly, but any progression is good!  When daylight finally arrived, Todd started making phone calls to the family.  Chace was already there with my parents, he was supposedly going to stay there until the babies arrived in a few weeks, but since they decided (or Lael did) to come early he was only there for about a week.  They started making plans to come back along with my sister and her girls.

As labor progressed the midwife wanted me to walk around and work through the pain of the contractions, I was really just counting down the minutes until I could get the epidural!  I’m not a big fan of pain, and childbirth pain is some serious pain!!  Finally, I was far enough along and the anesthesiologist was called in.  Hurray!  But, getting it even hurt, I guess I’m just a wuss!  Anyway, soon after the epidural the contractions started coming faster and stronger.  The doctor and midwife agreed that it was time and we were moved into an OR in case of complications.  Todd was given scrubs and I was rolled into a room FULL of people!  There were several nurses, the doctor, midwife, 2 pediatricians and anesthesiologist.  It was really cold in there too, I remember that distinctly!  It was finally show time, Lael was in position and we were ready to meet her.  I started pushing with each contraction and everyone kept saying push harder, keep going, you can do it!  Ummm, not sure about that – it just wasn’t happening.  Time for an episiotomy.  After that, Lael just popped out, 12:09 pm!  She was swept away to be checked out by the pediatricians and everything was great.  Todd then brought her over to me and placed her on my chest.  I was surprised by all the hair, and how dark she was, she definitely has her daddy’s skin!  I didn’t have time to marvel over how perfect she was because it was Caeden’s turn.  Since Caeden’s delivery was going to be a bit trickier the doctor had already planned to deliver him.  Through all the previous ultrasounds, we knew that Caeden was breech.  The doctor tried to turn him after Lael was out and he had a little room, but it wasn’t working.  A lot of doctors would have insisted on a C-section, but not him.  He was willing to deliver Caeden anyway, whew!  I didn’t want a C-section at all!!  A few contractions later and Caeden met the world hiney first at 12:20 pm!  He was having a tiny bit of trouble getting a good breath, his little lungs weren’t quite fully developed but it all turned out fine.  The size of both of them was shocking for most everyone in the room.  Lael was 6 lb 5 oz, Caeden was 5 lb 14 oz.  Quite large for twins!!  And this was at 36 weeks!  I can’t imagine how big I would have gotten and them too if they had waited a couple more weeks!

Now, ten years later – after entering the world big for their gestational age and being twins, they are small for their age!  Both of them are probably one of the shortest kids in their classes.  Also, Lael was biggest then, but not anymore.  Caeden has her by about 5 lbs and a couple of inches.

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