On June 1st the girls and I went to visit my friend Sarah and her daughter for the afternoon. I was 39 weeks and 3 days pregnant and completely miserable so I needed a trip out of the house to distract me. When the girls and I got home Tim and Sophia went out to play while Alyssa and I curled up in the recliner to sleep. While I was laying there I started getting some pretty regular braxton hicks contractions. This was no big deal because I had been having these for weeks and weeks. This time however they didn't stop. This was about four in the afternoon. While I layed with my little Alyssa in my arms I started to feel like this could be "it". My contractions started getting a little more intense.
Once Alyssa woke up I started making dinner. Once I got up it started getting more obvious that these contractions weren't going away. I told Tim I thought it was time and so we discussed what to do. We decided to call Tim's parents, who were going to keep Sophia and Alyssa, and let them know it was time. We fed the kids and called the birth center to tell them we were on our way. During the craziness of packing the kids stuff and gettting them on thier way, preparing the house for a few day absence, and getting our own stuff ready Tim asked his sister, Liz, if she wanted to come with us to Taos. Of course, she said, yes so at 9pm we all packed in the car and headed to Taos.
The car ride up was fun. Everyone was excited that it was finally time to meet our little girl. We still hadn't picked out a name so while we drove we threw names out. My contractions were pretty consistently six or seven minutes apart and they hurt bad enough that the bumps in the road were very uncomfortable. When we arrived at the birth center I my cervix was checked and I was at a four. This was a little disheartening because I on the way up we took bets on what we thought I would be at and everyone thought higher. So we went on a walk to try and progress things. It was a beautiful night in Taos.
When we got back we did some things to entertain ourselves while things progressed. We played some cards, talked, had snacks, and just went with the moment. Gradually my contractions became more and more intense. I couldn't sit down during them because it hurt too bad. All of my pain was in my lower back. The midwife suggested different positions to try but they were all agony. The only thing that was tolerable was standing straight up. I didn't want to be touched or massaged or even talked to during a contraction. I was getting tired because at this point it was like 2 in the morning and I hadn't slept since Alyssa and I dozed on the recliner. After a while I started to feel like I had to have a bowel movement. This was a welcome feeling because it meant the baby was moving down and was almost ready to come out. After about and hour of my complaining over and over that I had to poop the midwives ran hot water in the tub. This was very welcome relief. I would suggest to anyone to try sitting in warm water during labor. I had maybe two contractions in the tub and suddenly felt the urge to push.
My inital plan was to give birth in the water. The midwife told me that if I got out of the water she tought the baby would come right away. So, I got out and made my way to the bed. I layed in the bed and got comfortable and with the next contraction they could see her head. One more contraction and she was crowning. At that point I was in so mych pain I just wanted her out so I pushed just a few more times and before I knew it there she was, at 3:19 am on June 2nd. My first thought was that she looked excatly like her sisters. It was so relieving to be done and to be able to hold the little baby that had been growing inside of me for 39 weeks and 4 days. It took us several more days to finally decide on a name. Emillia Christine (because she looked so much like my dad, Chris) Elizabeth (because her auntie was there to see her frist moments here on earth and is a special person in all of the girls lives, including mine) Pacheco
Here she is at birth:
My mom went on that same road to Toas when one or more of us kids were born!! But back then the road to Espanola had dips.
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