A Baby Story: Part 1.

I've decided to make this a little less overwhelming and break it up into sections. This particular excerpt will highlight water breakage to triage check-in.

Tuesday, April 14 was my first day off work. You might remember that I planned a leisurely week-ish off work prior to my due date to enjoy some much-needed "me" time. Weeeeeeeell, Alex obviously had other plans for Mommy.

It was a grand day. I slept in, watched some ellen (now programmed on DVR, thankyouverymuch) and then had a friend over to visit and practice her makeup for her wedding day...which is seriously right around the corner!

She left about 4 pm, so I klassed myself up and headed to Wal-Mart to gather some groceries for the week. There's truly nothing like a mid-afternoon Wally World run. I could dedicate an entire post to the types of creatures that come out that time of day. Yipes!

I digress.

I got home about 5:30 (entered the checkout line at 4:45 if that tells you anything...we live 2 minutes away). Joe got home from work about 6ish and we just chilled for awhile. As wife of the year, I spent all day slaving over dinner (frozen pizza) and popped it in the oven about 6:45. When the timer went off, I asked Joe to get the pizza out of the oven while I peed. I actually forgot about all my crazy trips to the bathroom until now...cool.

I did my biz-nass and headed to the kitchen to get some cheesy deliciousness. But about 2 steps out of the bathroom I felt a crazy warm sensation in my pants. Oh, Kristi. This is so embarrassing. You JUST went. Did you seriously pee your pants?

Silently, I kicked it in reverse and hopped back on the toilet to asses the situation. Holy shit. This is not pee.

I screamed at decibel 100 to Joe (which was slightly unnecessary since the kitchen is honestly 10 feet from the bathroom), "JOE, MY WATER JUST BROKE AND I AM NOT SHITTING YOU!" Threw in that last part in case he thought I was jesting.

He screamed like a girl, dropped the pizza and ran to the bathroom. I was laughing hysterically at this point because I was oozing warmness out of my girlie parts uncontrollably. Seriously, no one tells you this. Your water doesn't "break." No. That makes it sound like a one-shot deal. It OOZES for hours and hours and hours and is gross, gross, gross.

I had Joe grab the "who to call when your water breaks/you go into labor/something else baby-related happens" sheet of paper and dialed the OB from the toilet. As expected, she told me to get myself to triage ASAP. Breathe in. Breathe out. No turning back now. Once your water breaks they do NOT send you home from the hospital without a baby. Ahhhhhh screaming on the inside. Ok. And the outside too.

I put on a pad and scampered around the house to get all the last minute things together. What? I thought I was going to have at least a week to accomplish all these things! By the time we got in the car (felt like an hour, was probably 10 minutes), I had soaked through about 7 pads. The super-duper absorbent ones. Joe grabbed me a towel to sit on in the car and we were off!

It is at this point in my post I would like to implore Jennifer Granholm to consider funding a road repair project for 14 Mile Road from Warren to Royal Oak. Every single bump (roughly eleventy billion) made more oozing occur. Ew. Ew. Ew. Really wish someone had warned me about this.

It should also be noted that it was during this ride that we called and texted friends and family to alert them of the situation. The same, "My water broke and I'm not shitting you," verbiage was used. Oh, and Mom and Dad? Way to pick up on the SIXTH time I called you. :)

ETA: Joe just reminded me that I forgot to add the part about how we GOT LOST in the hospital parking lot. The place is under construction, so everything is a one way or a no way. What's funny is that we'd been there THREE times already (tour, triage trip #1, triage trip #2...which was the DAY BEFORE). There is only one drive that gets you to the parking deck, and one drive that takes you to valet. We couldn't find the valet one to save our souls. After a few minutes of laughing hysterically (causing further oozage) and turning down every. single. street. We finally found it!

We valeted the car (greatest service on Earth) and I waddled up to the 3rd floor. Well, not before stopping in 2 bathrooms to replace my pad...again.

We filled out all the paperwork and the nice lady at the check-in table encouraged us to have a seat in the waiting room.

"Ummm, pretty sure you don't want me to sit on your chairs, lady."

And so, I sat on the toilet in the one-seater public restroom outside triage, oozing for 10 minutes until the nurse came for me. Joe knocked on the door to let me know they were ready...so I pulled up my britches and flushed the toilet for the last time as a pregnant woman. (Yay for catheters.)

Next up: from triage to epidural. That's gonna be a looooooong one.