Saturday: 2 days until induction

On Saturday morning, I woke up Benny and told him about my plan to get the baby out by talking to it.

He started to rub my belly and repeat the message of “We are ready for you baby.”
Around 6:45 a.m. I felt my first contraction.

The way Benny moved around the house, I think there was alarms going off telling him “Baby is coming.” He sprung into action putting the bags in the car. He was ready in minutes to go to the hospital.

I turned to him and said “I don’t think we go to the hospital at the first contraction.”

I called Labor and Delivery at Lester Navy Hospital. The nurse told me to monitor my progress and call again when my contractions were less than 5 minutes apart for at least 30 minutes.

So we ate breakfast. I practiced breathing through the contractions. We watched “Happiest Baby on the Block” video and reviewed how to swaddle our little one. I took a nap. Benny reorganized the kitchen. I took a shower. Benny repacked the car. We took a walk in the rain at the seawall. Benny ate dinner. I watched The Apprentice finale. When Donald Trump said "You're fired," I was ready to go to the hospital.

I called the hospital and the nurse told me that if I wanted to have this baby without any drugs I needed to stay at home as long as possible. Sleep and call back in a few hours.

I told Benny I really wanted to go to the hospital and get checked out, so we went to the hospital.

I walked to the second floor delivery section, which was quiet. Apparently I was the only one having a baby that day.

I checked in at 8 cc dilated and the nurse said I wasn't going home and I was going to have a baby that night. Wondeful!!! This was at 11 p.m. I thought the baby would be born by 1 a.m. Foolish thoughts.


I wish we had a photo of Benny carrying the 5 bags of stuff we had to the delivery room. He was on top of everything, including setting up the iPod with my "Contraction Relaxation" playlist that we made for this moment. The nurse walked in to check on us and said "Jack Johnson. You are the coolest couple we've ever had in here."

With Jack Johnson playing in the background, I tried to laugh through the contractions and think of the prize: the baby.

The doctor arrives and I'm surprised that the doctor is a woman (The nurse said she would call Dr. Leonard and I had met a male Mr. Leonard before). But turns out that the two Dr. Leonards in the Navy are married. Dr. Leonard reassures me that I can have a drug-free delivery. She did it with her two children. I'm in good hands.

At 2 a.m. I beg Dr. Leonard to break my water. I want this baby out NOW!

At some point Benny asks if he can turn on the television. There was some kind of sporting event on that he wanted to watch. I said no in a firm tone.

Benny starts to nap inbetween contractions too. I'm not happy, but I don't have the strength to yell at him.

At 4:30 a.m., Dr. Leonard said it's time for this baby to be born. The entire staff is excited to find out that sex of the baby along with us. Dr. Leonard said "Let's see if we have an Olivia or a Jack. Dad, do you want to tell Mom want it is?"

Benny nods eagerly and we begin the final pushes. Push. Push. One more push.

"It's an Olivia," Benny yells at 5 a.m. on March 8.

Dr. Leonard places Olivia on my stomach and I start crying. "She is so much bigger than I thought she would be. She's huge. How was something that big inside of me?"

Dr. Leonard said Olivia was bigger than they expected too. But she is happy and healthy and cried right away, so all was good.

We call our families from the phone in the room. Olivia is cleaned up, dressed in her V-Team Baby onesie made by Benny's family and wrapped in a blanket. She falls asleep. And so do we.

After moving to the post-delivery room, Benny goes to the gym to use the wireless connection to send the email announcement that he wrote 4 weeks earlier. He leaves the video camera with me "in case she does anything cute while I'm gone."

I look at Olivia and think I'm a mom. Am I ready for this? I have a daughter. I can't believe I have a daughter.

And now you know the rest of the story.