Baby Mac.

When your water breaks you aren't having contractions, your bag is packed, and the house is cleaned your mind tends to think of important things like, "man I really want a cheeseburger" on your way to the hospital. This was my experience when my first born, Ford was born. I should have known something was up when, at 9:30 pm, while watching your favorite basketball team play you crave greek yogurt chicken salad with almonds and grapes.

(Sidebar: I cleaned up my eating habits immensely between pregnancies, can you tell?)

Seeing as I had no progress at my appointment earlier that day and I was 37 weeks 4 days along, I didn't think anything but, "weird pregnancy craving for protein," made my snack, enjoyed it, then off to bed I went. Somewhere around 2AM my stomach was in fits & my brain was saying "DARN YOU STOMACH FOR CRAVING CHICKEN SALAD AT 9:30 AT NIGHT." I was so uncomfortable that I got up, went into the den to watch some garbage TV & pinned spring & summer clothes for Ford. It took me a little while to realize these stomach cramps were coming at regular intervals. You see as I mentioned before, no natural contractions with Ford so even though I was a more seasoned pregnancy veteran this go round, it took me a little while to realize the discomfort I was feeling was real deal labor. They kept coming & when I had the ah-ha moment to time the suckers, they were under 5 minutes apart, after of course the OB had told me mere hours before with my second baby to give them a call when contractions are 6-7 minutes apart. Oops. So I awoke the husband around 5AM & said I thought it was go time, I was going to take a shower & pack my bag. 

(sidebar: don't wait until your contractions are under 5 minutes apart to pack your bag. that was painful, "real real painful" said in my best rap voice.)

At six I called the doctor & he said I could head to the hospital or wait until the office opened at 8 to get checked, just go with my gut since it was my second go round. So in true bird fashion I waffled. I called Grandma CC & asked her to please go ahead & come I thought it was go time, but I still left the asterisk that "it's still pretty early, I bet these will go away." 

(sidebar: ha. labor brain is way worse than pregnancy brain.)

So she arrived, I struggled with if I should wake Ford or not since he wasn't up for the day yet, & then it hurt so bad I could tell the tears were going to start flowing any minute now. We gathered our gear & headed for the husbands ride that needed gas. Seriously. 

(sidebar: my last labor the back glass was taken off his car to repair, this time no gas. I should have seen this coming.)

As soon as we hit the highway for the 10 minute (anticipated to be excruciating) trip to the hospital the contractions slowed down. So we went in search of gas which was in itself a comedy of errors. Gas does not seem to exist near my hospital before seven am. But folks who clearly haven't been to bed yet do. If those contractions hadn't come raging back with a vengeance I would have found this all hysterical.

(sidebar: i didn't. it hurt.)

So we get to the hospital & check in, stopping every 2-3 minutes for said doubling over pain, and I still believed they are going to send me home. (dummy.)

It was the real deal & I got admitted to a L&D room pretty quickly. I labored a while longer before asking for the good stuff & then came the real big stick (that was nothing compared to those contractions.) Well the epidural didn't work. Some mambo jumbo about about a void from last time & nerve endings yada yada... I really don't remember this part because it hurt. Screaming cursing hurt. So the anesthesiologist came back, gave me a bolus to see if that work work and guess what, it didn't. There were more tears & more technical descriptions or what was going on of which I could care less. He finally decided to replace my epidural much higher in my back & within minutes sweet relief. It was a good thing too because about 10 minutes later it was time to push. 

And 10 minutes after that, he was right there, hanging on my chest. And all that pain? Ehh, no big deal. We had our second little miracle.

John McDermott, named for my Dad & Grandfather, was born on March 4, 2015 shortly after 11 o'clock in the morning. Baby Mac was 7 lbs 3 oz and perfect in every way.  He is loved by so many, including his big brother. I am filled with gratitude every single day for our little family of four.

Baby Mac + Me. 

A head full of dark hair.

Hello world.

(sidebar: five if you count Pete, which I do of course.)

Party of 5.


{All of the beautiful photos are from the lovely & talented Laura Simson Photography. If you are in NC or VA you should check her out, she's pretty amazing. I'm so very lucky & blessed to call her my friend & godmother to Ford.}