Jonathan's Birth Story: Part 5 {The Final Installment}

Just joining in? Catch up by reading Part 1: What was I Thinking?, Part 2: Sorting Through Baby Clothes & Contractions, Part 3: Put the Petal to the Metal, and Part 4: I Can't Get Out.

We Interrupt This Tour to Bring You a Special Delivery

The nurse who had met us outside of the elevator continued to fill out paperwork as she directed Tim to push me into the triage room. At one point she asked how to spell my name, Tim said, "A-l-l-i-s-o-n," to which I retorted, "It's a "y", we've been married how long and you don't know how to spell my name?" I wasn't mad at all, I knew Tim was pretty stressed out by this point, but I think the nurse thought I was upset as she rewrote my name with the correct spelling :)

By this point they had moved me from the wheelchair onto the examination table and another nurse had entered to check my progress. As she put her gloves on I began feeling the urge to push and told her the baby was ready to come.

I'm not sure that she quite took me seriously, but one look told her I was right! She shouted to another nurse to grab a doctor. Within a few seconds a doctor who was giving a tour of the birth center entered the triage room, snapped on his gloves and moved to the foot of the table. Thankfully his tour participants didn't follow him in! The nurses also got a pair of gloves for Tim and I told the doctor that once the baby's head was out I wanted Tim to deliver the baby.

The doctor was a little surprised that I was still worried about who was catching the baby when I was obviously so far along, but Tim had caught Emahry and that was what I wanted for Jonathan as well.

While all this was going on the nurses were trying to figure out if they could move me to a delivery bed which could be broken down for delivery, but I told them there was no time and the examination table would be fine.

A few seconds later another contraction hit and I felt the urge to push. One push and Jonathan's head emerged. The doctor saw that the cord was around his neck and that the cord was too short to unwrap. He quickly clamped it and handed Tim scissors to cut the cord. Tim then moved into position to catch the baby.

My next contraction hit within a few seconds and with one final push Jonathan was born into his Daddy's arms at 3:54 PM, only 9 minutes after we had arrived in front of the hospital.


My first thought when I saw him and Tim gently handed him to me was that he was so tiny. We later found out that he was weighing in at only 4 pound 14 ounces. He was 18 1/5 inches long.

A few minutes later, we were wheeled into our room and our midwife arrived. Jonathan's breathing was a little fast, so the nurses began to monitor him. He also had some trouble keeping his body temperature up, no surprise since he has so little fat. He ended up needing an IV for fluids to help get his sugar levels up. He also had to be under a heating lamp for a few hours. Other than that, he was completely healthy, just very, very small.

After a few hours in the nursery, where either Tim or I was with him the entire time, he was brought back to our room to nurse and spend the night with us. His IV was removed around 3 AM and he was able to stay with us for the rest of our time in the hospital.

One thing that was amazing about having such a quick labor and delivering such a small baby was that I felt great. In fact, I was carrying and playing with Emahry a few hours after Jonathan's birth. I was even able to squat next to the toilet to hold Emahry on the potty when she came to visit the hospital later that evening!

Thankfully, like always, God knew exactly what I needed and how much I could handle. I'm so glad that Jonathan's birth was so "easy" (if easy can be used to describe labor) and that I recovered so quickly in order to be able to keep up with Emahry and our new beautiful baby boy!

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