The Arnold Family: The Birth Story

On Friday morning, the 7th, my parents and younger brother Mike started on their drive out here to South Dakota from New York. They were supposed to come here earlier than Friday, but plans got changed around. I was a little worried that they wouldn't get here in time for Camden's birth, but part of me felt like he would NEVER come out! Haha. Well, on Saturday morning (the 8th) I started having painful contractions. They weren't too painful though, because I could still talk/walk through them. All day long I had them around 15 minutes apart. Well at around 10pm they were getting closer and closer together and so I called my Mom to see where they were at on their roadtrip. They were only a few hours away! I was relieved.

I called my doctors office to see if they thought I should head to the hospital, even though my contractions weren't 5 minutes apart yet, because they were SO painful. The doctor on call said to wait it out until they were closer. So I did. Sure enough, at around 11pm, my contractions were 5 minutes apart and were SUPER painful so I called my Mom. She told me to head to the hospital and that they would just meet us there. I woke up Jeremy who had fallen asleep on the couch next to me while I was timing my contractions haha, and we started packing up the last minute things and putting the dogs in their kennel so that we could leave.

On our way to the hospital, before we could leave base, we were stopped by the security forces at the gate doing random DUI checks. I couldn't help but laugh about how crazy it was that we were being stopped for this while I was in labor, since it had never happened to us before. We quickly told them that I was in labor and that we were on our way to the hospital so they let us go pretty fast :)

Once we got settled into my room in Labor & Delivery, my contractions were 3 minutes apart and getting more and more painful with each one. After only about 10 minutes of being in the room, my parents and Mikey arrived! Talk about good timing! I couldn't believe how close they were to missing the birth.

My nurse came in and checked my cervix, and found that I was only 1cm dialated! Insane. I thought for sure she was joking, with how close together and painful my contractions had been! She did an ultrasound to see how Camden was positioned, because she couldn't really tell by just feeling around. She thought he might be breech, so she called my doctor who was in surgery doing a C-section at the time, to get him to come and do an ultrasound himself to make sure how Camden was positioned. Once my doctor came (which felt like an eternity of waiting), he did another ultrasound and found that Camden was actually transverse (sideways). This explains why I wasn't dialated.. he wasn't pushing down on the right place!

He gave me two options. Either get an epidural and try to turn Camden around with his hands (a "version"), or opt for a C-section. Well he didn't want to pursuade me either way, but he did say that when women get versions, it doesn't always work and they'll end up having to do an emergency C-section anyway. He gave me a few minutes to think it over. I asked Jeremy what he thought, and he had absolutely no idea. So I asked my Mom what she thought, and she looked at me and asked what did I feel in my heart and in my gut, was the right thing to do? I immediately said I wanted to do a C-section. Some might think I'm nuts for not trying to turn him around first to see if I could still delivery naturally, but I honestly felt that a C-section would be safer for myself and Camden.

So the nurses started prepping everything for the surgery. They put and IV in my hand (which took forever because the one nurse was really dumb and made my blood spurt everywhere), and gave me some meds before getting my spinal (even better than an epidural). They also put a catheder in, which I don't understand WHY they couldn't have waited until I was NUMB to do that.. It hurt SO bad and took entirely too long. Then they finally wheeled me into the operating room. My contractions were so painful and took so much out of me that I was literally falling asleep in between them. I wanted to hug the anesthesiologist when he came into the OR to give me my wonderful, wonderful spinal! Once I was numb, I was beyond happy, and could actually relax and focus on what was about to happen - meeting my baby boy for the first time! Jeremy came in dressed in his scrubs, hat, and mask :) I was so happy to see him.

I'm so grateful to have a husband who stays extremely calm and collected in situations such as this. While my doctor was cutting me open, I just stared at Jeremy and seeing him be so calm yet so excited, really gave me the strength to not freak out.

After about 10 minutes, we heard him cry for the first time. At 3:53am, Camden Matthew Arnold was born, weighing in at 6lbs 15oz and 19 inches long! It was the most amazing yet surreal moment of my life. We were finally parents. Our son was finally here. Finally. I never knew this kind of happiness existed. We are so truly blessed with this little boy!

Recovery was not as bad as I thought it would be, but.. it was still pretty awful. I couldn't go to the bathroom or shower by myself for a good couple of days. My nurses, my Mom, and Jeremy were so incredibly helpful and I am SO thankful to them. Anyway.. here are some pictures from our stay at the hospital.

Jeremy changing Camden's diaper.