DeLange News: April 2016

Caleb John DeLange

4/4/16 @3:50pm

8lb 2oz 21in

Caleb was born exactly 1 week before my due date (thank goodness!!) Although I do think my due date that was determined by the 12wk ultrasound was wrong, I calculated I was due April 18 but was measuring big at 12wks so they moved me up a week. So really I think he was almost 2 weeks early. Which makes sense why he was only 8lb 2 oz! I say only, but the nurses at the hospital kept saying that he was a good size baby.....that is TINY for us though! With Brie being 9lb 2oz and Leah 9lb 6oz, a small 8lb-er seemed miniature!

Early Monday morning (4am) I realized I was having lots of contractions that were pretty uncomfortable and I wasn't sleeping through them. I kept trying to get comfortable in bed and get some more sleep, but finally around 6am I got out of bed. I was very doubtful this was the real thing, I thought I was just crampy and having random contractions (denial). I tried to make the contractions go away; ate some cereal, drank a bunch of water, and got comfy on the couch to watch some TV. I was kind of timing the contractions at this point, just looking at the clock. They weren't very regular, anywhere from 3-15min apart. Alec got up for work around 7am, checked in with me, I told him just to carry on like normal for right now and get ready for work. The girls got up around 7:45am; at this point I was starting to realize they were all painful contractions and seemed to be getting closer together.

Still in denial......I just told Alec he should maybe work from home for the time being and make sure this isn't the real thing. He got the girls breakfast, and then headed downstairs to his desk to work. I starting bustling about cleaning up, JUST in case this was the real thing. Around 9am I got in the shower; during my shower they seemed like they were on top of each other contractions. I told Alec to call his mom and just see if she was available for childcare today, she wasn't so I started thinking of other plans for the girls. I called my brother and had him on standby. My sister, who lives in Indiana, was planning to come Wednesday and stay for a few days. She said she would just come now and if nothing happened oh well; so I felt way better knowing she was on her way and would be there in like 2.5hrs. I decided at this point I was probably going to end up going to triage, but who knows if I would be sent home or not.

Before calling the doctor I realized I really had not been timing contractions at all and had no idea how frequent they were. So I sat on the exercise ball and timed contractions for 1hr (10-11am) They were consistently 2.5-3.5min apart, and lasting anywhere from 25-45sec. I called my doctor's office, of course had to leave a message. They thankfully called me right back; I kind of passively told the nurse what was going on and she said "Well, you are 39wks with your 3rd baby and those contractions are really close together.....we are definitely going to send you to the hospital now!" This kind of made me a little panicky! Meanwhile Alec was already loading the car up and getting ready to go. I told him to slow down because I needed to check my bag! Called my brother and he said they would be here in less than an hour. After hanging up with him I realized an hour is a long time.....called my brother in law who lives 10min away (and just had a baby 4 days ago), asked if he could pop over and hold down the fort for a little while. He said he would leave right away. Sure enough he (AND Alec's sister and new baby!) arrived 15min later and we left shortly after that. I was starting to come to grips this was the real thing, I even said to Alec "I guess I would be surprised if I got sent home"

We arrived to triage at 11:55am. They checked me and monitored me for a short period of time, and within a half hour we were heading up to labor and delivery. I requested an epidural already in triage, these contractions were PAINFUL, I couldn't even stay on the stretcher long I was so painful. Anesthesia arrived to place the epidural around 1pm; unfortunately my epidural wasn't all that great. I started with having some mild pain only on the left. But it continued to increase throughout my labor. My doctor was actually on call until 5pm, so he instructed to have my water broken so he could hopefully deliver me. They broke my water at 2pm; after that the pain increased greatly. My nurse checked me at 3pm and I was 8-9cm, at this point the pain was so bad I was writhing in the bed. An anesthesia nurse came in and gave me a bolus through my epidural which made a huge difference and I was far more comfortable; while she gave me the bolus my nurse checked me again and I was complete at 10cm (3:20pm). She went to page my doc who had to come from the office down the street. He arrived within about 15min, quick stopped in with his coat and everything on to see how I was doing and then ran out to change his clothes. He was back in the room and said it was time to push (3:45pm) and Caleb was here 5min later! There wasn't much pushing involved, at one point my doctor said "stop pushing" and I remember thinking "I'm NOT pushing!" Right away they put him on my chest and I knew he wasn't as big as his sisters, he didn't have the big chubby cheeks. They took him to the warmer to make sure he was breathing ok for a little bit and quick weighed him, I was pretty surprised with the 8lb 2oz! They brought him back and we did skin to skin for about an hour, it was so amazing.

So thankful everything went well and he came out healthy; praise the Lord! It was so fun calling family and telling them the news. We are just so blessed to welcome Caleb into our family!

A few people have asked where we got the name Caleb; Alec and I had been throwing around names here and there with nothing really landing. One day I asked him, "What do you think of Caleb" and he said "yeah, its ok" Ok perfect, we agree on a name, that is it! John is the middle name of Alec's dad, Alec's grandpa, my grandpa, and my brother. We really like using family names for middle names, makes it so special :)

In triage being monitored: