Eva Lane| Birth Story & Nursery Design Reveal

To start off…if you’re really squeamish or get embarrassed easily, scroll on down and just look at the nursery design reveal.  However, if you want to hear the full story of how our beautiful baby girl arrived…continue ;)

A week ago, on the last day of hunting season, I called my husband while he was out in a tree stand and told him that I felt like something wasn’t right with the baby and I wanted to go to the hospital.  After leaking clear fluid all day I just wanted to make sure everything was ok and that the baby had enough amniotic fluid to survive.  The husband came home–pretty quickly considering he was in the middle of the woods an hour away– and we casually walked into the hospital and got checked.  4 hours later, a paper strip test and ultrasound confirmed that they didn’t think it was amniotic fluid and when they checked, I was only 1 cm dilated…so we went home.

That night I started having cramps (bad enough to keep me awake all night) that continued/worsened into the next day, but the cramps were mainly in my back and extremely irregular.  Sunday night they got a lot worse, but were still very irregular (we’re talking 20 minutes apart, then 4 minutes apart…20 seconds long then 1.5 minutes long) so I laid on the couch with a heating pad and suffered through them while my husband slept.  Around 4 am, I called my doctor in tears–mostly concerned that if I were actually in labor I wouldn’t have the strength to have a baby because I hadn’t slept since Friday.  She told me to come in to the hospital and get checked again just to be safe.  I went in our room and woke my husband up…he got up slowly until he heard the sense of urgency in my voice.  We literally threw a few things into a suitcase (just in case–though I KNEW I wasn’t in labor 3.5 weeks early) and left the house.  I was extremely uncomfortable riding to the hospital and walking up to the women’s center, but still didn’t think I was in labor.

Then the nurse checked me.

Apparently I was already 5cm dilated and fully effaced…still with extremely weird contractions that wouldn’t even show up on the monitors. They moved us to a labor & delivery room and I got on the birthing ball and just chilled for an hour or two with my husband pushing on my back through every contraction.  I figured sitting in the bed all I would think about was my back pain, so I wanted to get up and move around until I couldn’t do it any longer.  Again, if you’re offended by this picture, I’m actually not sorry…having a baby is painful and messy and sometimes inappropriate to share, but mostly beautiful–especially that look on my husband’s face ;)

They kept asking me if I wanted drugs and I kept giving them wishy-washy answers…I knew that I didn’t want drugs because of all of the side effects also after the article I read by Legacy Healing, I just didn’t know if I could actually go through with labor without them.  The next time they checked me I was already 8 cm, so I decided to just roll with it drug-free (with the exception of antibiotics because I never even made it to the appointment to check for step B and I was not immune to Rubella).  The worst part about the labor was how HOT I was. They had me covered in ice rags and literally had to change them every 5 minutes because they would get hot so quickly.  I also constantly had to have ice chips shoveled into my mouth and was fanned with pillows in between each contraction–thank god for nurses, student nurses, and moms.

When the pushing time came, all these people came into the room and I was pumped and ready to go.  Contractions still didn’t show up on the monitors, so I just had to yell “OK” whenever I felt one coming (that was weird…).  After the first few pushes and hearing the doctor say she was face up and “just a little stuck on my pelvis” I started to deflate and the exhaustion of no sleep for 48 hours and 34 hours of labor hit me.  I remember that I was so tired I literally felt like I could fall asleep between contractions–not at all what comes to mind when you think of a natural delivery.  I even asked the doctor for a c-section halfway through pushing (though that was my worst fear/nightmare).  When she said no, I responded with “well, can you suck her our?”  I was literally so. effing. tired. After an hour and 10 minutes of pushing (so hard that every blood vessel in my face, neck, and chest burst…leaving me looking like I had freckles everywhere), she finally turned and came out screaming!

The whole experience was surreal–especially because I honestly never even registered that I was pregnant in the first place.  They put this bloody screaming thing on your chest and you just fall in love so hard.  Love at first sight.  Because she was “pre-term” they monitored her closely for a full 48 hours and then we literally got kicked out of the hospital due to overcrowding.  We actually listened to a girl give birth in the hallway right outside our door that night because they had SO MANY people in labor.  Needless to say, I was happy to have been there a day prior.  As you’re leaving the hospital they spew information about your health, the baby’s health, breast feeding, etc. and you just sit back and wonder…are they seriously letting me take a tiny human home?  They think I can do this?  I am now responsible for this child for the rest of my life?!  It’s a crazy insane overwhelmingly scary feeling…but you would do anything for them!

Now that it’s been a week–a LONG sleep deprived week–since that first hospital visit/wake-up call, I am finally getting a chance to sit down and post her nursery design pictures.  8 long months went into the ideas and details in her surfer-girl inspired room and thankfully it was finished early (on time)!  So enough stalling, here is her nursery!  Side note- you will get to see lots of pictures of her once we get our newborn pictures taken in a few weeks!!

Craft projects included the “mermaid scale” cornice boards over the windows, the grey-washed “dock” crib backdrop, the artwork, sea urchin ombre table lamp, and the sea urchin and driftwood jellyfish mobile.