Apologies out the gate if this post is a little haphazard and seems like it was written by a sleep-deprived, walking milk truck who can’t remember anything unless it’s written down on a piece of paper or emailed to herself. This post may seem less coherent than my others, but I wanted to write down Evie’s birth story soon before all the details get lost in this brain of mine and I forget the pain, guilt, and sheer joy/love of welcoming my third daughter into this crazy world we live in right now.
Evangeline’s birth story is a song of sun and water. I wish I could say ice and fire because then I’d be like Daenerys Targaryen in Game of Thrones with my three offspring…but, that bitch went crazy in the end and most of her “kids” died so I guess I shouldn’t try to compare.
Anyways, this is the story of Miss Evangeline Maeve’s birth – 3 weeks earlier than planned.
At the Beach
Prepping for Memorial Day weekend, we headed to a nearby beach to enjoy some sun, waves, and company of our good friends who have a daughter the same age as Scarlett. We hung out at the beach until the sun hit the spot in the sky that I absolutely love. About a 45 degree angle from the horizon, prior to sunset.
I got some sun that day. I didn’t get burnt because I’ve been pretty good about reapplying since we moved to Florida. My belly, since it was raised up like its own little mountain, tanned more than the rest of my body. My stomach is legit like 4 shades darker than the rest of me. Point of telling you all this is that we were in the sun all day basically. Enjoying the heat and the ocean.
The Next Day
Saturday. I decided to go lounge in our pool for a bit. It was a nice day out, again. Sorry my Pennsylvania friends/fam. I did my time in the ‘Burgh and moved to Florida because I know full well in the depths of my soul how bad the weather sucks in Pittsburgh.
Please all move here. I miss you…but I don’t miss anything else except for Beto’s pizza.
Anyways, in the pool. Floating in a raft where most of my body is submerged under water…except for the tops of my thighs (since they are massive in their own right) and Mount St. Belly, which popped out and soaked up the sun.
I floated there for about an hour, trying to meditate while absolutely enjoying the lack of gravity. Laying on your back is a luxury that you don’t really appreciate unless you are pregnant. I felt really good and really relaxed. And, what the hell. I’ll admit it. I peed in my pool. I know a lot of people do it and a lot of people hate to admit it. It’s my pool. I can do what I want.
I THOUGHT I was just peeing in my pool. Which I soon realized, was not only pee, but in fact something more.
I get out of the pool to take Scarlett down to the lagoon that is in our housing plan. (Again, move to Florida folks. You only live once). As I got out of the water, I felt a whoosh in my bathing suit bottoms. Ewwwwwww and OH F’IN SHIT.
What the hell was that?
I won’t get any more graphic on that front because I know some of you (aka Vince) are holding back your up-chuck reflex right now. The jelly blob was my mucus plug. A bit of panic starts in the back of my mind.
It was supposed to be Memorial Day, Not Labor Day (har har)
After the plug fell out, I called my doc. She didn’t seem concerned. Said it was normal and labor could be weeks off still. Doc instructed me to keep an eye on it (no shit) and if I was concerned, that I should go to the hospital.
I hung up and immediately starting googling because I needed my internet doctor to give me more info. I felt like a plug falling out of my body was a bigger deal than she was making it. Dr. Internet, however, gave me reassurance that labor, in fact, could be weeks off. I should only be concerned if contractions started to rear up and be consistent. If that happened then shit was hitting the fan.
Of course, shit hit the fan. Contractions started soon after I finished getting my doctorate in mucus plugs from Google. Nothing major at first….but dear lord it didn’t take long for them to increase in intensity. I tried walking them off. I tried breathing exercises and meditation. But in the span of 1 hour, they were so bad that I knew we had to head to the hospital.
As you can see from my text string with Vince, I had planned to get ice cream that day. Because it sounded really good and I wanted it bad. On the way to the hospital, Vince got in line at the Twistee Treat and it was seriously 6 cars deep. WTF. There’s a global pandemic folks. Go home so I can get my ice cream. I wanted ICCCCCEEEEE CREEEEAAAMMM. This may be my last meal, I really wanted to load up on calories and sugar one last time. Cookie Dough, chocolate….I wanted it in my belly before this baby came out of it.
The pain was too intense to wait. I reluctantly told Vince to leave the line and gave up my 500 calorie creamy dreams. Life isn’t fair sometimes. A few minutes, later we pull up to the hospital. Neither of us know where to go because we haven’t been there before. We couldn’t tour (due to the pandemic) and thankfully hadn’t had a reason to visit before this day. Surprisingly, Scarlett hasn’t seriously injured herself since we moved down here. Knock on wood.
We pull up to the front and there are two people sitting outside the main entrance at a table. For COVID checks prior to hospital entry. I get out of the car in sheer agony. My face had to look awful. As I waddle up to the table, another employee comes running out of the hospital with a hopeful look on his face…
“Are you from Jimmy John’s?”
You gotta be fucking kidding me, right? Do I look like I am here to deliver hoagies?! I was tempted to tell this moron off, but before I could manage to breathe out any words, the one lady at the desk said “no, she’s not from Jimmy John’s. She’s in labor.”
So grateful for people with intelligence in this day and age. They may be unicorns. The one woman goes in and gets me a wheelchair and proceeds to whisk me off to the ER. First, we had to have our temp scanned and answer all the intake questions. We were given masks to wear, which you can imagine is really awful to have suctioned on your face while breathing through the pains of contractions.
I was trying hard not to pass out.
It’s My Fault
Once in the room, they take my vitals and inform me that all this is happening because I am severely dehydrated. Turns out, you can’t bask in the rays of the Florida sun or soak your body in salt water like I did those past 2 days without gulping down a shit ton of water. The nurse informed me that my blood was like tar because of the lack of water.
Of course, after hearing this, the guilt started to eek in. Nancy started making me feel like a royal piece of shit. Because I didn’t hydrate myself properly, the contractions happened. I caused early labor. I cried because I was so ashamed of myself. The contractions were so close together that I was already 7cm dilated and the nurses were rushing around like murder hornets trying to get everything done in time so I could still get an epidural.
Oh sweet God I was scared of not having the epidural. The pain was already so intense. I couldn’t imagine it getting worse. I was scared of being in even more pain.
Not only was there the threat of no epidural, but also the chance that I wouldn’t get to hold the baby once she was born. They require all pregnant women to get a test for the virus. That involves shoving a 10 inch long cotton swab up your nose to basically swipe your brain tissue. It’s great. Apparently the test results take anywhere from 1-3 hours to come back. If we didn’t get the results back in time, or if I tested positive for COVID-19, they couldn’t let me hold the baby.
Yes. Let’s just add another layer onto my anxiety level please. I wasn’t already stressed out enough.
I was scared that I would be in agonizing pain, delivering with a mask on. I was scared that the COVID test wouldn’t come back in time, and I wouldn’t get to hold my baby. I was scared something would be wrong with her because she was coming early. I was feeling guilty that I caused this all to happen. And I didn’t have fucking ice cream. I had to cry. All this emotion had to come out.
I was scared and guilty and in pain. Oh yeah, and I had labor shakes. My entire body was shaking for at least 2 hours due to the hormone changes and adrenaline spikes. I couldn’t stop….which did make it interesting when they were finally trying to put my epidural in. You really shouldn’t move for that…because shit can go wrong if they hit something. It was fun trying not to move. So, let’s add the fear of being paralyzed to my list of things that gave me anxiety during labor.
It’s Time
At last, the epidural was in. I stopped shaking and the pain went away. I felt glorious. The nurse came in and told me that my test results were back and I did not have the ‘rona. They pumped me full of fluids to combat the dehydration. Things were looking up.
After a couple hours, and a shot of pitocin later, it was time to start pushing. With the mask on, of course. Thankfully, all it took was three pushes. 7 minutes total of delivery time and out shot Miss Evangeline. Vince wasn’t surprised that I basically sneezed and she came out. Apparently, my lady parts aren’t what they used to be 20 years ago. Whatever, I’ll take a hallway-sized birth canal if it means delivery is that friggin’ easy.
They placed her on my chest and told me I could take off my mask. I looked into her eyes, which were wide open, and fell in love. She came into this world earlier than she was supposed to, but Miss Evangeline looked at me with quiet, wise eyes and I knew she was here right at the right time. Vince called her his little doe, because she was so alert but quiet. Just observing us.
Despite being early, Evie didn’t have any issues. Aside from some amniotic fluid still left in her belly since my loose birth canal didn’t squeeze it out of her. This caused her to cough it up, choke on it, and turn blue in the process. This is very common…BUT I DIDN’T KNOW THAT. Needless to say I freaked out the first time it happened. Called the nurse in a full-blown panic afraid she was dying. But we suctioned the fluid out with a syringe, patted her on the back, and she was good as new.
I am so grateful she is healthy. Grateful that labor turned out the way it did. Grateful that we have neighbors and friends to watch my Gianna and Scarlett, or to bring us meals. The support and love we’ve had the past two weeks has been wonderful.
So that’s it. That’s the story of Evangeline’s birth. Thanks for reading all the way through. Seriously, I know that was a lot and it was written off of about 4 hours of non-sequential sleep. Stay tuned for more posts about this little lady and be sure to follow my FB page for an obnoxious amount of photos of Baby Eve.
Epilogue – Her Name
Oh, and her name. If you’ve been following my blog, you know how much thought I put into this lady’s name.
We were down to two contenders before she was born. Vince didn’t really like either name I was noodling over, and Evangeline was the one he disliked the least. So that’s how it ultimately won. But here’s how I got to the name Evangeline Maeve.
I fell in love with the name Evangeline after hearing it years ago in “The Princess and the Frog.” Evangeline was the name of the star in the sky that a firefly falls in love with. He sings a song to her and everything.
The name itself means “messenger of good news.” This little nugget is definitely going to be our good child, lol. I am sending that vibe into her now and willing it to happen.
I also love writing the capital letter E, which was a requirement for the name I gave her. Since I would be writing her name a lot, I wanted to like the letter it started with. Read my name post for more info.
Finally, we found out her gender on Christmas Eve surrounded by all our family up in PA. The fact that we can knick-name her Evie or Eve was a nice reflection of that memory.
The middle name had to be short in syllables because Evangeline is so long. And, Vince loves his Irish heritage so I wanted to find a middle name that honored that. Maeve, which means “song” in Celtic, honors his heritage, goes back to the fact that we named her after a song, and kinda reflects the fact that she was born in May.
I’ve been calling her Evie Eve (like Easy E the rapper), Miss Evie, and Evangeline – only when I sing the song to her.
Welcome to this crazy, insane world little one. Get ready for one hell of a ride. It’s going to be fun. Love you always and forever – your Mommy (aka the Boob).
love love love this article! Evangeline is a beautiful name!
I love this!!! Can’t wait to meet her too ❤️❤️❤️????
Lovely name and look forward to more info
You look beautiful as always & crack me up! Awesome writing!! So happy for you all & can’t wait to see you all!
Give proud Papa & the girls a big hung & kiss! PS…..that is what chlorine is for! You’re good!?????. Eileen
[…] when Miss Evangeline was a bun in my oven, I happen to stumble upon the idea of cloth diapering thanks to a pregnancy […]