The best laid plans of mice and men …

So Frog is here.  Though he is more aptly named Dolphin.  Why you may ask?  Oh because he’s FLIPPER, FLIPPER, FASTER THAN LIGHTENING!  The last month was filled with ultrasound after ultrasound after ultrasound.  Yeah, yeah, I’d like to see the insurance EOB on those too. NOT!  But seriously folks … he’d be head down one day and feet down three days later.  So Doc T decides to go ahead and schedule a c-section.  Four kids … four not c-sections.  Here’s kid number five, the surprise, and SURPRISE he’s got to come a different way.  Figures.  He was marked special 10 months ago, right?  So we pick a day.  At least we can do that.  June 12th.  Special day around here.  That’s Clark Kent’s dad’s birthday.  His dad passed away in ‘95 of colon cancer (at 39 … get your screenings people, they ain’t playin’ when they tell you to get your insides cleansed and camera ready for one day.  It’s important!)  So the day is a special day already, and then we get to welcome our last (and FINAL) child that day too.  Awesome.  I feel privileged to have that as Dolphin’s birthday. 

Fast forward to the last appointment before B-Day.  He’s head down.  And has been for a week.  BOOYAH!  Looks like we will have 5 not c-sections.  I mean, Doc K even says “cancel the c-section” and “95% of babies stay head down once they get like this” and “the chances of him flipping again are very slim”.  Well, lesson learned.  We went in to the hospital for a lovely induction (I’ve done this 4 times, I can say lovely all I want.  They are great).  Nurse goes to check and we learned quickly that you don’t give Dolphin a challenge.  He likes them.  Takes them on daily.  He was feet down.  AND to top it off, a once in a lifetime thing for me – water breaks.  Oh yeah.  So we go from the slow, methodical process of preparing for an all-day event of an induction to the 150mph get ready for a c-section that no one was planning on.  Oh my goodness how fast people move when that happens.  They decided at about 10:30am that we were going for c-section.  In what seemed like slo-mo to me, we prepped, went over everything, signed the “oh yeah, we’re doing this and you may die, is that okay?” paperwork, and got ready to go to the operating room.  We get there and a poor terrified, shaking, trembling, what-the-heck-just-happened-back-there me sits as still as possible as they get my body ready to be sliced and diced.  Seems like hours.  Really, it’s just minutes.  From the time they said “oh dear, Dolphin has flipped again.” until he was out and screaming was 45 minutes.  Total.  Craziness.  Clark Kent spared me most of the details.  Like the '”uh-oh, he’s choking on fluid” worried looks of the doctors and the “that took longer than expected for him to cry” moments.  He cried, he was great, and he passed his Apgar's.  That’s what I know.  Then the nice CRNA gave me drugs.  Really, really good drugs.

I can’t tell you how we got from the OR to the recovery area.  I don’t know when I held Dolphin for the first time, though I remember holding him.  I don’t remember getting all the dressings and bindings put on, but I remember them being there the first time I needed to move.  Then we were in a regular room where I am fairly certain that these 4 nurses were trying to rip me open.  Then 3 days of recovery.  We got to stay one whole extra day because Dolphin need some photo therapy to hone his super hero powers. 

And now we are home.  Getting used to the five kids thing.  Nana was here last week.  That was a saving grace.  And Clark Kent is off work this week too.  So I am not stranded in “don’t pick anything up land” by myself.  We are doing this family thing together.  And so far it’s doable.  Which is crazy.  Didn’t think it was possible and have been telling myself we were just silly to think we could do this.  But we can.  The kids are being awesome.  Peanut is helpful, and Bean loves to hold Dolphin.  Monkey Man thinks it’s cool he’s the “biggest brother” and Bug just wakes up every morning and points and Dolphin and laughs.  It’s fun.  Of course, we’ve had to teach Bug he doesn’t need to share his toys with Dolphin just yet.    But it’s great.  Ask me again in a month and the story may have changed.  All I know is I’m thankful for science, and doctors.  They got my Dolphin here safe and sound despite a last minute turn of events.  Thanks Doc T for being amazing.  Now, where’d I put that coffee??