Happy Birthday Walker!

Today is Walker's second birthday. With my older boys I have a tradition of telling them the story of their birth before bed the night before. I realized this morning that I didn't get that chance, so I thought I would blog here about it.

My pregnancy with Walker was planned. Maybe a little too planned. Ramiah and I were married on 12/31 and we began trying in Feb and March. I wanted to try and calculate his birth in between semesters, since I was planning on returning and getting my Masters in the fall. Well, since our family is full of fertile myrtles, I was pregnant sooner that we thought. The pregnancy went well. No major complications just the annoyance of gestational diabetes that I controlled with my diet.

The due date was 11/25/07. I was pretty excited and so was Ramiah. This was his first child and first pregnancy! We marveled at how my body changed, and enjoyed all of it! As the due date came closer I began to be more anxious. I wanted to have a completely natural childbirth and was preparing with Lamaze classes and essential oils.

The week of thanksgiving my doctor told me that she would not let me go much past my due date because of the diabetes. But she was fully aware of my feelings for keeping things natural so i convinced her to let me try my own holistic processes.

On Monday November 26th, I was still pregnant. I was ready to have this baby!!! I went to visit my ob/gyn and convinced her to strip my membranes and then she sent Ramiah and I home with strict instructions for nipple stimulation for an hour. Needless to say Ramiah was quite excited, (me... not so much) On our way home I started feeling some cramps, but decided to follow through with the Dr's orders and maybe get in a nap! The nap never came, because after just a half hour of nipple stimulation I was having contractions!! I got up and put everything in order to go to the hospital but never checked to see the timing of them. By the time my older boys got home from school and left with their dad i thought maybe I should time my contractions. They were 2 mins apart!!!

When we got to the hospital I was very uncomfortable but still determined to trust my Lamaze and oils to help me through it. My mother and sister were also there to support me! I was checked in at 5:30 and Walker was born at 7:35pm!!