The arrival of James...

The contractions started for Sarah Beth on the night of Friday Feb. 13th. They were short but regular, so we knew that we had to be on our way. Much later that night we called the doctor to get an idea of where we were at, but decided against going to the hospital at that point. Saturday came with more contractions and increasing intensity as the evening set in. After another sleepless night, we decided that we needed to go to the hospital to see where we were at. When we arrived at the hospital, the contractions were spacing further apart and found out that we were dilated to 1 cm. After leaving he hospital we headed home to make it in time for church. Sunday night was much like Saturday night with the contractions increasing in intensity but they were much more painful than any to that point. By 1 am, Sarah Beth told me that we had to go to the hospital. I called the doctor and once more, we drove back downtown to the hospital. When we got there, we were sad to find out that we were only dilated to 2 cm. This was both frustrating and disappointing. The nurse, feeling bad since she could see how much pain Sarah Beth was in and realized that she hadn't slept since Thursday night, got approval to give Sarah Beth some medicine that would help her to sleep. The nurse assured us that Sarah Beth was days away from actually giving birth and there was no way that she would have the baby that night. So, I went to get the car, the nurse gave Sarah Beth the medicine and then wheeled her downstairs. When we were almost 5 minutes from the house, the medicine started to kick in and Sarah Beth was asleep. As we walked into the house, Sarah Beth had one of the worst contractions that I could remember. It brought her to the floor in pain. When I helped her to stand up we realized that her water had broken. I once again called the doctor and drove us back downtown around 4 am. By this point in time, Sarah Beth was so sleepy that she couldn't remember everything. I brought her up to the room at the hospital and the nurses hooked her up to an IV. We were finally there to stay. Around 9 am Sarah Beth was fully awake again. Shortly after she received an epidural. After that, she was examined again and was at 10 cm. Sarah Beth began to push for 3 hours. After three hours, the doctor advised us that we would have to have a c-section to deliver the baby. The concerns were that the baby was being stressed during the pushing and showed decelerations in the heart rate. We would later find out that the baby was "sunny side up". They prepped Sarah Beth for surgery and I scrubbed in. James Timothy Smoter was born at 4:50 pm on Monday February 16th 2009. He was 6 lbs 11 ounces and 19 and 1/4 inches long.