Bodhi was born 8 days after my contractions started. I was technically in “pre-labor” for over a week and the only word I can use to describe it is “miserable”, but I dealt. I’m definitely one of those chicks.

 

The day he was born is a rather different story.

 

I went to the hospital two times over the weekend before my son was born. I was definitely “in labor”, but I was only dilated to a 3. You have to be at a 4 before they’ll admit you. They gave me something so I’d feel “more comfortable” and sent me home.

 

At the time, I was still a full-time substitute teacher. I had jobs lined up for at least two more weeks. It was 10 days until my due date.

 

I woke up at 5:30 AM on a very cold January morning, a little earlier than I actually needed to. All of a sudden, I felt very different from how I’d been feeling the past couple of days. It was go-time and I knew it. However, I’m the most stubborn human being on the planet. I was angry that they’d sent me home twice, so I wanted to wait until I knew for sure. I wanted to wait until my water broke.

 

At 11:00 AM, my mom said it had been long enough and we needed to go ahead and go to the hospital. I listened, but it didn’t actually matter. Even though I was having contractions about 5-7 minutes apart, I was still only dilated to a 3. They still couldn’t admit me. I ended up staying there for 5 hours because they were unsure as to whether they should send me home or not. I didn’t see any point in staying, so I left.

 

That was a terrible idea.

 

The moment I got down to the parking lot and  into my mom’s car, the contractions turned into something completely unlike what I’d been experiencing previously. I was even more ticked than before. I went home anyway, thinking I could handle it.

 

Oh, how wrong I was.

 

After getting all the way back to my parent’s house, screaming for an hour until my mom cried and I scared my dad out of the house, I let my mom take me back. Good thing too. In less than an hour, I had dilated from a 3 to a 6. Go me.

 

They told me that I had progressed so quickly that they were worried they wouldn’t have time to get me my epidural. They were wrong. I was there, in labor, for 5 more hours before they had to break my water to get the real process started.

 

Everything seemed to happen so quickly after that. The doctor had only come into the room to literally catch him. My fantastic nurse had done everything else. After only pushing for about 30 minutes, Bodhi was born at nearly midnight.

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I was told that (besides the amount of time it took) I'd had the perfect labor and birth. My OB/GYN said that my pregnancy had been "as close to perfect as he'd ever seen". I guess that means I did pretty well.

 

He was absolutely perfect then and still is now. At birth, he looked ridiculously like his father, but I liked that. I had pretty much cloned my favorite person. Now, as he’s gotten older, he looks a lot more like me (well, my father to be honest). Just about 18 hours of labor was pretty darn worth it.