Our Little Shane

HE IS FINALLY HERE!!

Hannah woke up at around 3 am and told me she was having steady contractions and may need to go to the hospital. Instinctively  I jumped out of bed; ready to go right away. She assured me that he was not coming right away so I was able to take a quick shower and ran to the store to pick up a few things.

At this point, Hannah was just very uncomfortable when she had a contraction. They had been happening every 3-4 minutes and hurt enough that she was having trouble talking. When we got to the hospital (5 am) and had her checked she was dilated to a 3 and and was about 80% effaced. They were still unsure if she was in full labor so they monitored her for a few hours.

Around 8 am she was officially admitted. I tried my best to help her by walking with her through the halls and pressing on her lower back to help ease the pain. By this point her pain was pretty strong and it was very difficult for me to watch her in pain. Her contractions were a steady 2-3 mins apart by this point. However Shane's heart beat was pretty steady and not being affected by the contractions. Later we learned that is not really normal. It meant he wasn't low enough for the contractions to push him down to help him come out.

At 10 am the midwife came in and explained that we could either wait it out or go ahead and break Hannah's water and see if that would help him descend. We went ahead and broke her water and all hell broke lose. Side note: They found meconuim in the bag of water. Warning sign #1.

After only about 5-10 minutes she began to have very intense labor pains and began to scream in pain. I have never felt so much love and anguish at the same time. For most of the contractions I kept myself together pretty well watching my wife go through such pain. It wasn't until Hannah said through gritted teeth and tears "Ron, I love you" that I lost it. My eyes began to flow with tears of love for my wonderful wife and the struggles she was going through for our family. I couldn't believe that in the middle of such pain and anguish she would exclaim her love for me and not hate me.

As time went on Hannah became more and more, let's say, "Intense" with her word usage. Which is completely understandable. The nurses told us that on average women usually have about 1-2 minutes between contractions. That is what gives them the energy to make it through the next spike. Hannah, however, was having 1-2 minutes long contractions happening about every 20-30 seconds, giving her no time to recuperate. She was basically going 1 step forward then 3 steps back. She screamed for the pain to stop and they gave her fentanyl to numb the pain. It honestly did not seem to work very much, as she was still yelling obscenities. She tried moving around, getting in the bath, sat on a blow-up ball, and lots of yelling all in the effort to dull the pain. They did little good.

Much to my, and definitely her, satisfaction we finally gave in and got her an epidural at around 11 am. This was a difficult endeavor because she was forced to stay completely still and was still having very intense contractions. She was just a tad drugged up as this time and was pretty loopy; my favorite being while she was in the peak of a contraction she started mumbling/yelling the word "Water park". I asked "You want to go to a water park?" She looked straight at me with her eyes about to bulge out of her head and just said "Mmmhmm, Lets go".  One of my favorites, as was our nurses', was she tried yelling, "Oh, FuuuuuuuuDDDDGGEEE! This hurts!" I tried really hard not to laugh, and she said, "Don't laugh at me! I have to get this epidural in." I could see the nurses laughing too. (Hannah can now laugh about it, but it was pretty intense). It then became procedure to plan out next vacation every time she had a contraction after that. When the epidural finally kicked in she exclaimed how much she loved it..... about 20 times.... Within the first 5 minutes.

With the contractions manageable and having been up since 3 am I was finally able to relax. I no longer had to see her scream in pain and she was comfortable. I decided to take a short tap while I could before the baby came. I was awoken by a few nurses, the nurse-midwife, and Hannah all talking. They explained to me that while I was asleep the nurse-midwife had checked Hannah again and found that she was only at a 4-5 and that Shane's head was coming down at an angle. Warning sign #2. It had been ruffly 12 hours of consistent contractions and he was not progressing. She had actually started contractions at midnight, but didn't tell me until she woke up to super strong ones at 3. We also found out that Hannah had developed a 102 fever and they were concerned it would transfer to the baby. Warning sign #3. It was because of this that he eventually had to have an IV in his arm. We were both very scared and was unsure of what the future would hold. Hannah, being the beautiful spirit she is, asked to have a blessing, however, I was in no condition to give one. We called out home teacher and within about 5 mins they were there. Brother Reynolds gave Hannah a beautiful blessing that proved to calm her more then it did me. They also gave me a blessing of comfort. This is when we decided she needed to have a c-section in order to be safe for both her and Shane.

They prepared her and I to transferred her to the OR. While they were preparing her I was forced to wait in a room for them to come get me. After the hustle and bustle of getting ready I was all alone in a room with only my thoughts to keep me company. As any father or husband can attest, when something happens to your loved ones the only thoughts that run through your head are the most terrible outcomes you can think of.  I prayed to my Father at this time to please not take her or my baby's life. I was so scared that the only comfort I had was to pray to the one person who could make a difference. Looking back, I don't know if he answered my prayers or if he never intended to take them and just looked down at me saying "Oh Child, worry not" Either way all I could do was ask. So I did.

When they took me into the operating room Hannah was laying down with that blue curtain blocking what the doctors where doing to her stomach. I could have looked if I wanted to and see what exactly they were doing, but I knew I was already about to explode with emotion and did not need to that to give me more. I just sat down beside her and held her head and hands. Then it happened.

While we were looking into each others eyes we hear that distinct beautiful cry. Every parent knows exactly of what I am talking about. That cry that immediately tells you are are no longer just your own. You are a parent. He is presented to us and I look over to see my gorgeous child. Nothing can prepare you for that moment. The wait was over. Shane Dean Beck was here.

This is the journey of our first child. Or at least the end of the wait and the beginning of the life. After this point it was all downhill. We were blessed with no more complications and Hannah is recovering fast. We are now home and enjoying our new life. To finish up, here are a few more pictures and a video. Love you all.

The champion and her prize.

Our new family

In the attempt to take the last picture, the nurse taking the photo didn't  know how to use our camera and ended up taking this picture of us laughing.

We had originaly named Shane "Shane Richins Dean Beck" However we changed it to just Shane Dean beck.