Nurse Julie

I think that my best blog posts come out of my head around midnight when I'm funny-tired.  You would think that with the lack of sleep I'm getting these days, my funny-tired would come out at 12:00 in the afternoon also, but my 'hazy-confused-blurry eye- what is going on?'  mode comes out instead.

I think I better share the story of what an idiot I was the day Teigan was born though, and the nurse that I was very grateful  to have.

Long story short: my water broke around 2:45 a.m and by the time we got everything together and arrived at the hospital around 5:45,  the excitement that my baby was coming that day was a little overshadowed by how unprepared I felt.  Three things were on my mind when we walked into the hospital: 1, was that the cats were out of dry food.  I had planned on grocery shopping that morning and I was very unhappy about leaving the cats at home without enough food for an unknown amount of time, but Jeremy, being the rational one of us, refused to stop at the store for cat food before going to the hospital.    2,  Rebekah had a school project due two days later, that we had planned to finish while she had the day off of school.  And the third thing that I couldn't stop worrying about was a court date.  Jeremy had been given a "fix-it" ticket for having a cracked windscreen and the court date was set during two separate time slots on that day.  All he had to do was go to the Scottsdale Courthouse and show them the receipt proving we had had the windscreen replaced and the whole thing would be taken care.  Pretty simple I thought.

At 7:30 a.m. I was only dilated to a 3, so they gave me the spiffy epidural and told me to try and get some rest.  I thought... we've got time, let's take care of some things!  After failed attempt followed by failed attempt of asking Jeremy to leave and get cat food... I gave up on the starving cats.  But after quite a bit of begging, I convinced Jeremy to leave at 9 a.m to go take care of the court date.  I knew I would feel so much better after it was taken care of!  Jeremy finally left with the cell phone and planned to be back in just over an hour.  I turned off the lights and started trying to sleep, everything was great for 40 minutes.  Suddenly I became painfully aware (in more ways than one) of what a dumb idea it had been to send my husband out while I was in the hospital. 

Enter:  Nurse Julie.  I think Julie was the best nurse I've ever had.  She came into the room to check me at 9:40, and I was dilated to a 9.  When I tried to call Jeremy from the hospital phone, it wouldn't call to our long distance cell phone number.  Julie offered to make the call for me from her cell phone and assured me that we had enough time and Jeremy would be able to make it back.  Things quickly progressed and 20 minutes later... Julie wasn't looking so confident anymore that Daddy was going to be there for the birth of his third daughter.  Julie's positive attitude and reassuring smile kept me sane for the next 15 minutes as I literally stared at the clock and thought about how I would never forgive myself if he didn't make it back in time.

After a little while, Julie's smile wasn't looking so re-assuring.  As a knock came at the door Julie looked to see who was coming in the room, it was my Dr..... AND Jeremy.   They had met in the hallway on the way to the room and they both arrived just in time!  Teigan was born about 3 minutes later.   Soon after, Julie turned to me with a big smile and admitted she didn't think Jeremy would be able to make it.  I was so happy to have a nurse that kept a positive attitude and found the humor in the whole situation, rather than point out to me what a bad choice I had made. =) 

I went to the hospital last week to give Julie an extra special thank you, and to get her picture for the baby book.  I will remember Julie for many years, and be thankful that she was my nurse that morning!