My pregnancy with Archer was one for the books. We found out we were pregnant in November 2019. I'd been feeling for some time that a child was missing from our family. We knew that another little baby was waiting to join our family. We slowly let our family know about our exciting news and told Josh's family over Thanksgiving break while vacationing in Fripp Island, SC. Those days seem like an eternity ago. During that trip, my morning sickness began. My morning sickness this pregnancy was so much worse than my pregnancies with the girls. I told Josh that it's a good thing we had three girls first because I probably would not have had 4 kids if I'd been that sick with all my pregnancies. The next couple months were pretty much spent flat on my back or sleeping in my bed. I honestly don't remember much of those couple months. I remember friends stepping in, I remember meals being brought, I remember my kids wandering outside to play and just praying that they'd be safe because getting up to check on them made me throw up. I had never experienced such debilitating sickness. Josh came home early as often as he could. He cleaned, he cooked, he did bedtime every night. He was such a blessing. I could not have done it without him.
After a few weeks of suffering, I finally called my midwife practically begging for help. After some prayer and time spent trying to ease my uncertainties, I decided to start on Zofran. I had heard of several risks, but at this point, I didn't feel like I could adequately take care of my kids and deal with the sickness. The Zofran took enough of the edge off to be able to function at a small level. I was grateful for it.
I started feeling a bit more human as we headed into late January/early February. On January 21 we went in for a gender ultrasound. Josh was hopeful for a boy but I think we both assumed that baby number four would be another sweet baby girl. We were both completely shocked that we were going to have a boy! Elliott kept saying, "I knew it! I knew it!". Piper started crying. She had her heart set on a girl.
The morning sickness was completely gone by around 18-20 weeks. What a difference! But just 2 short weeks later, Covid hit our country and our lives were turned upside down. Suddenly Elliott was out of school, we were home from church, and we were advised from my midwife to be especially careful and do everything we could to keep our little family safe from the virus. We took that advice seriously. We turned down friends, we didn't see cousins, we missed out on family get togethers. We spent all our time together in our home for months. The emotional toll of this new life was especially difficult on me. I missed my family. I missed my friends. I missed being able to take the kids to the store, or to Chick-fil-A on a whim. I tried hard to stay positive for the kids but I had constant breakdowns. Mix pregnancy emotions with the stress of a global pandemic and you get a big old mess. We had a few socially distanced girls nights and date nights with close friends. But I missed normalcy. And as selfish as it sounds, I missed out on one of the best parts of pregnancy. I love showing off the bump, and answering questions about due dates and birth plans. I felt like Covid was stripping me of the normal parts of pregnancy that I love. His kicks and rolls kept me sane.
But somehow, someway, we made it through the pregnancy. My due date was July 16. My sister came into town the week before to help with the kids in case he made an early arrival. Of course he was just too comfortable and waited until the day before she needed to leave to make his arrival. On Sunday the 19th I started having some mild, sporadic contractions during the night. They continued throughout the day but they weren't strong enough to really affect my day. I decided that there was a good chance he'd be making his arrival soon, so I made sure to get in a good nap on Sunday afternoon. I was able to sleep for over three hours (thank goodness). Sunday night, we went to bed around 1am. Probably should have tried to get more sleep...At 2:30am the contractions woke me up. In my sleepy state I realized that they seemed to be pretty close together and decided to start timing them. They were consistently 5 minutes apart. They still weren't too painful, but I was having to breathe through them and change positions to get comfortable. I got up and put the last couple things in my hospital bag and woke Josh up when they were 3 minutes apart. We called the midwife and let her know we were heading to the hospital.
We got to the hospital around 4am. The midwife took us to triage to check and see how far along I was. I was so discouraged to find out I was only dilated to a 3. I was sure that they were going to send me home. They put on some monitors and said they'd come check me in an hour. But the midwife came back 15 minutes later and said that if I wanted to, she'd go ahead and admit me. Since it was my fourth baby and he was 40 weeks 4 days she was confident that the contractions weren't going to stop or even slow down. I was also positive for Group B Strep so I needed to get on antibiotics and this would give us lots of time to do that. So we went ahead and got admitted and got into our delivery room. They got my IV in (after blowing the first vein), started the antibiotics and got the monitors strapped on to check on baby. When we were in triage, he was pretty sleepy, so they wanted to make sure he wasn't in any kind of distress. He was much more awake once we got into the labor and delivery room. There were two other moms delivering with the midwife that night, so we didn't see as much of the midwife as we did with Scout's delivery. She left us alone to labor and try to progress. I spent some time on the ball, some time resting in bed and some time walking around the room. The contractions were about 4-6 minutes apart for most the morning. Around 8am I asked if we could start filling up the tub. She wanted to make sure I was at 6cm before filling the tub so we checked my progress. I was only 4cm. Another hugely discouraging moment. But I tried hard to not let it affect me. I knew I still had a lot of work to do. The midwife asked if I was interested in some pitocin, but I declined. I really didn't like my experience with pitocin with Elliott. The other option she suggested was nipple stimulation. I'd heard of people using it in labor, but hadn't ever done it. She called for a breast pump. She said to put the breast pump on alternating sides in 10 minute increments. 10 minutes on, 10 minutes off. Switch sides. We did this for about 90 minutes. I could not believe how well this worked. It was unreal. She said that with first babies, she doesn't feel like it usually does much, but with subsequent babies, it usually gets things going. And boy did it. During those first 10 minutes, I had 4 contractions, that were not only way more intense, they were between 60-90 seconds apart! They slowed down a bit, but they stayed quite intense. The midwife came in around 10am to top off the tub and check the temperature. She quietly listened to me labor and then said, I don't need to check you, you're good. Go ahead and get in the tub. I was so thrilled. Because at this point, the contractions were getting super intense and I knew the tub would bring a little relief.
At this point, my water hadn't broken. This was one thing that I really wanted to happen. With Scout, I was able to labor in the tub for a long time, but I didn't get to deliver in the tub because my water just would not break! So they moved me to the bed to break it and I stayed there to deliver.
After getting into the tub, it was just a couple contractions before I felt my water break. I was so excited! I remember looking at Josh and saying, I think he's going to born in this tub! My fluids were clear but there was a bunch of vernix in the water and I remember the midwife making a comment that he was going to be cheesy! My contractions after my water broke were interesting. The first couple contractions were insanely powerful but I still didn't feel the urge to push. I was on my knees with my bottom near the bottom of the tub. The midwife said she was going to put her hand down near my bottom because she didn't want the baby to hit his head on the bottom of the tub. I remember thinking she was going to be there for a long time, because I didn't feel close to pushing. After a couple contractions, I decided to start trying to push. I didn't feel that absolute need to though. It was so strange. But it wasn't long before the urge did come (though still not as strong as with my others). And then the ring of fire. But it was SO much more bearable in the water. Probably 20x less painful! I couldn't believe it. On the second push with that burning ring, I could feel his head coming out. The midwife guided his head out behind me and then we worked his shoulders out. It took a bit to maneuver his shoulders out! But before I knew it, he was out! The midwife told Josh that she was going to guide him back through my legs and up my front and told Josh to reach down in the water and grab him. But apparently, in my excitement, I just reached down and grabbed him myself. Poor Josh! I pulled him up and immediately started sobbing. I couldn't believe how quickly he'd arrived. And I couldn't believe that he was actually here. After such a long pregnancy and such an emotional few months, he was really, really here!
Archer was nice and purple when he came out and didn't want to cry. He was also covered in vernix. By far my cheesiest child. They suctioned some gunk out and gave him a good rub and finally got him to make a few big cries. Then we moved to the bed to get the placenta out. This was almost as bad as the labor! My placenta had no interest in coming out. They kneaded my stomach, reached in and tried guiding it, pulled and wiggled the cord but that stubborn thing didn't want to come out. It took probably 20 minutes and several big pushes before it finally made its way out. What a relief! Since Archer came so quickly, I did have a small tear that required stitches, but it seems to be healing nicely.
The midwife and nurses left us to bond with Archer for about an hour before coming back to move us to our new room. I got up to use the bathroom and felt pretty good! It was pretty much my dream delivery.
We got to our new room and got settled in. Josh grabbed us some lunch because I was starving! Since I was Group B strep positive, I had to have antibiotics during labor. In order to avoid an extended stay after delivery, you have to have the antibiotics in your system for four hours before you deliver. Then you're considered "treated for GBS". Since the progression was slow to start, I had the antibiotics in for 5 hours before I delivered! So we didn't have to stay for 48+ hours like we did with Scout. They weighed, measured and bathed him right in our room. Archer weighed in at 8lbs 8oz and was 21 inches long. Our biggest baby!
The first night in the hospital was long. But he did pretty well. I never sleep well in the hospital. Those beds are just awful. But I finally gave up on the basinet and just let him sleep on my chest and then we both slept a lot better. He took to nursing really well but didn't have any interest in nursing during that first night. I tried several times but he just wanted to sleep. The next morning, they did all his screening and tests so that we could get out of the hospital that afternoon. He passed everything with flying colors. We got the go ahead to pack up and were discharged around 4:30 that afternoon.
Archer's name wasn't decided on until the day after his birth. We have had a list of names since we found out he was a boy but couldn't ever decide on one. We figured that when he came out, we'd know. Well, we didn't. Haha. We prayed about it, we called him all the names, we read about origins and meanings but we could not figure it out! Finally, we decided that any of our top names would be perfect and we both felt slight inclination toward Archer, so we decided that's what it was. We had never had such a difficult time deciding on a name. It was stressful! But he now has a name!
Archer has been home for a couple days now. My mom is here helping, which is such a blessing. He is such a sweet boy. I love having a newborn in the house. Even though the sleep deprivation is so real. But he is healthy and eating and we are just so happy to finally have him here. Welcome to the world sweet Archer. We love you so much. We have been waiting for you for so long.
(Josh took video after Archer was born, so I took some screenshots off the video)
