The Twins’ Birth Story

In the days leading up to the boys’ birth, I spent a lot of time crying and a lot of time lying in the bathtub. I hurt, I was tried, I couldn’t find anything to drain my pasta in – I was a maniac. Actually, the night before they were born Kevin said “Isn’t there something you can eat that will speed this pregnancy up?”
Poor guy – he was living with an oversized, sweaty and crabby version of what once was his wife. Little did we know, the babies were already on their way.

I woke up the next morning with a very strange feeling. Not physically – physically I still felt just as terrible but nothing new, but I felt like I wasn’t going to see Max that night. I kissed him on the cheek about 100 times before Kevin took him to daycare. I went around the house, emptied all of the trash…just in case…and headed off to work.

Around 11am, I was sitting at my desk listening to Beyoncé’s new album, when I started having cramps and some lower back pain. After a half hour I texted my friend Katie and said “What does labor feel like?”

I didn’t go in to labor with Max so I had no idea what to look for. I described everything I was feeling and she said “You need to call your doctor.”

I decided to go home for lunch and see if string cheese, tomatoes and some couch time would help before I called. The pain got a little more intense and I thought, “Okay maybe I should give them a ring, I mean Katie had her baby in like 5 minutes so I need to listen to her.”

I called and they told me to come up to get checked out. Annoyed, I grabbed our hospital bag and drove to the hospital knowing they were going to tell me to leave and that we’d have another $200 bill for nothing. I called Kevin to tell him and asked if this was going to come out of my eyebrow tattoo account.

I was hooked up to monitors and my cervix was checked – turns out I was 3cm dilated and was having contractions that were two minutes apart. I told Kevin to come up just in case something was going to happen, but we still didn’t know if they were going to try to stop the labor since I was only 34 weeks and 4 days pregnant. Once Kevin got there, I was admitted to labor and delivery for observation while they waited for orders from my doctor. A short time later, a nurse came in to tell me that I needed to eat dinner asap because I was getting an epidural soon, they were going to break my water, and that NICU was going to come talk to us about what to expect because they babies were coming out.

I laughed and smiled through my cold sweats and deep down, I was completely terrified. The next several hours were overwhelming and a blur. My contractions ended up stopping around 10pm and we had to start Pitocin to get things going again – about an hour after that was started, I woke up from a nap because I needed to push…but I didn’t want to tell anyone. It was almost to midnight and in my mind, I needed to make it to 12:01 so they would have made it one more day gestating. I mean it makes absolutely no sense but I thought that extra day on paper would make a world of difference. Finally at 11:45 I couldn’t take it anymore and asked Kevin to go tell the nurse I needed to push; sure enough I was at 10cm and it was time to go to the OR to deliver these boys.

We arrived in the operating room at 12:01…I made it! The room was bright and cold and there were close to 150 people in there. A team for everyone and every scenario – NICU, anesthesia just in case, C-section just in case, a doctor for each baby and 500 nurses. Shortly after the entire state of Missouri walked by, said hi and saw me half naked I started to push. 3 contractions later Mr. Hudson Thomas arrived weighing in at 5 pounds 10 ounces on May 4th at 12:34am. Then it was Lucas’s turn – but they doctor realized Lucas was still in his tiny sack so that water needed to be broken first…then he realized that peanut was sunny side up. Time to buckle down and get to work on getting this fella out. 5 contractions later (4 minutes after Hudson) Lucas Scott was born…pretty blue and a mouth full of fluid. He didn’t cry at first and his NICU team quickly swept him away. As I lie on the bed I looked to my left to see Kevin bouncing from kid to kid and each NICU team working to make sure the boys were okay. I noticed they were working more on Lucas and I looked at the doctor – he just smiled and said “He’s fine honey don’t worry.”

They wrapped Hudson up and let me see him for a few seconds before both boys headed to NICU. Kevin went with them and I stayed to get stitched up (pushing two kids out will do a number on you.)

Three hours later I was finally able to see our boys. It was nearly 4am, I still had my eyeliner on and my hair teased from work and I was in a complete daze. They were so amazing though – even with all the cords and tubes and craziness that comes with being a NICU baby. Kevin and I were completely exhausted and decided it was time to get some shut eye for a few hours before our “new normal” began. At 5am we finally went to sleep – and this is how our newest journey began…

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