Ain't Nobody Got Time For That

Well folks. We had a baby, and let me tell you...it was crazy up in here.

Yannos said it could be summed up in four words:

There. Was. No. Time.

Apparently our son is a big fan of Sweet Brown.

Alekos Ioannis arrived on September 4th at 6:35am.

The time is our best guess since we were both a little busy. Weighing 6 pounds 8 ounces and measuring in at 18 inches long, he came 25 days before his due date.

Here's a play by play. Thanks to the power of cell phone time stamps, we were able to make some sort of timeline of this chaos.

12:30 am - 4:30 am: I was having hardly noticeable but kind of regular contractions. Sometimes they woke me, sometimes they didn't. Sometimes they were about 15 minutes apart, sometimes longer. Basically, I didn't care about them at all because they felt like absolutely nothing.

4:30 am: I couldn't sleep anymore because I was starving. I was also leaking some amniotic fluid. Yannos saw the bathroom light on and said he was staying home from work. I tried to convince him that was silly, that I wasn't in active labor and this could be nothing. Sound familiar from my first birth? Apparently I'm a labor denier and cannot be trusted under any circumstance. I'm so grateful he didn't listen to me.

4:50 am: I sent the midwives an email, just so they had a heads up that stuff was happening.

5:11 am: I made my first call to the midwife letting them know I was in labor. Contractions were still no big deal, but regular. I was told to call back when they were about 5 minutes apart.

5:15: I sat down and ate a huge breakfast. I started getting more uncomfortable and when I stood up to move around, my water broke.

5:27: My second call to the midwife saying that things had picked up and they should come. Contractions were still not painful and I took a shower.

5:49: Third call to midwife because things got a lot more intense in those 22 minutes. Each contraction was a minute closer and quite a bit stronger. It seemed like every contraction was the next stage of labor.

Around 6:15am: Zoe wandered into our bedroom saying...

Although not crying, I was yelling.

Between contractions I said, "yes mommy hurts because baby brother is coming out soon."

She happily replied...

I had another contraction and she ran into the hallway. My mom took her out to breakfast and they passed fire trucks. I wonder where those were headed?

6:24: I hit transition and started to panic so we called the midwife who was well on her way. She said we needed to transfer to the hospital and she would meet us there.

6:25: Yannos called the midwife right back to say I needed to push. We were told to call 911 since I was only at 36 weeks and 3 days and she didn't want Yannos to have to deal with a medical issue.

Yannos called 911 and the dispatcher talked him through what to do. He was incredibly calm and delivered Alekos, while holding a phone and comforting me. He really was my hero, telling me I was doing a great job, only one more push. It actually only took 2 pushes total to get him out. Alekos was crying when EMS arrived about 2 minutes after he was born.

EMS was great, never mind the total awkwardness of having 8 burly guys standing around you while you wait to deliver your placenta. The first to arrive took over holding the baby and nicely obliged waiting to cut the cord. When it stopped pulsing, they asked if Yannos wanted to cut it and he quickly declined, looking grossed out. It was pretty funny considering he just delivered a baby.

EMS loved that we had all these birth supplies just laid out and waiting for them. We kept saying, "We were having a home birth, the midwife just didn't make it in time!"

I felt 100% fine right after the delivery. It was like it didn't even happen. Going from active labor to baby in a little over an hour was surprisingly easy.

A stork had just delivered a baby to us.

Since the baby had already arrived and we both looked completely fine, EMS decided it was fine for us to stay at home and wait for the midwife instead of transferring to the hospital.

One of my favorite moments was when everyone was debating about whether we could stay home or if we had to transfer, there was one guy standing in the corner with the baby wrapped in a bloody towel.

An hour after birth. Welcome, Alekos!

Check out these two videos of Zoe meeting baby brother and singing him Happy Birthday.