Permanent Transition: And though she may be little, she is but fierce.

Before I go any further with this story, I want to encourage any woman during any pregnancy to listen to her own intuition. You know when something doesn't feel right. You know in your heart that something is going on. So if doctors don't want to listen, MAKE THEM! No one knows your body better than you do. They may have all the fancy medical degrees, but you're the one that knows how that body is supposed to feel.

Okay so here we go..

As I said, when we got to NHRMS, they took me straight to L&D. They transferred me over and the staff set to work. They gave me lots of meds to try and delay labor. When the doctor came in and did my exam, they found I was 5-6 cm dilated by this point. They decided to keep me on the meds and do everything possible to delay labor as long as possible. I had already had one steroid shot at Naval, so I learned our goal was to make it 24 hrs past the second shot, which is given 24 hours after the first. The first was given to me at 11 a.m on Sunday. Labor and delivery was horrible that first day, I'm not gonna lie. I didn't eat before I left home, and the meds they put me on would make me sick, and could cause me to get food or water in my lungs, so I laid there starving and thirsty until well after midnight.

After midnight they decided that we were in a sort of safety zone. I was taken off the meds, allowed to drink and eat, and go to the bathroom on my own (I was catheterized.) They took me to a different ward of the hospital, called high-risk Antepartum. At this point I had pretty much been told that was my new room until I delivered, whether it be sooner or later. So we hung out.

So all day Monday (wow it was only one day? It felt like forever.) I had short contractions on and off. The staff didn't think there was anything to worry about, because they were so far apart, so it was just a waiting game. I took a shower Monday, and when I got out, Ma was sitting in my room and I told her "Scarlett is going to be here tomorrow." I don't know if she actually believed me at that point, but somehow I just knew. Maybe it was God whispering it to my heart so I could be prepared. By the way Ma is my grandma, my mom's mom. My Mom, Ma, and my brother Joel drove up on Sunday from Georgia to be with us in case it happened.

Tuesday morning around 3:30, the nurse came in to give me my meds and check my vitals. After she left I got up and went to the rest room and noticed there was more blood. I called the nurse back to the room and she had me start writing down the times of my contractions. After I had six in one hour, she called the labor and delivery staff, and had the doctor come in. They checked me and I was up to 6-7 cm dilated. It was time to go down to L&D.

When I got down to labor and delivery, they started the meds back up to delay birth. I had been on Motrin all day Monday, because they could only give me so much of the magnesium sulfate at a time. The second steroid shot would have been mature at 11:00 am, so even though they were saying they were going to hold it off longer, I knew we were just trying to make it to that point. They set up everything to get ready for labor, and the NICU staff came in to set up everything in the event the birth did happen.

The contractions didn't stop. So at this point the doctor come in and told me we had no choice, she was coming today, so in an hour to two hours we were going to push. It was starting to be really painful. I wanted to do it all natural, but as the anesthesiologist said, there aren't any awards and it wouldn't hurt the baby so why not? One of the doctors told me a regular epidural wouldn't do me or Scarlett any harm if I wanted to get one of those. Then when she left the nurse came in and said as a mother and a nurse she wouldn't advise it, and told me about a different kind of pain meds called an Intrathecal. It is a Needle inserted into central spinal fluid where medicine is injected and needle is removed.

The intrathecal was supposed to last three hours. It didn't. I got maybe a good 30 mins of numbness. It did make it hurt less though. We did a round of pushes, then they decided I wasn't dilated enough. So they gave me meds to push it along faster. They came back in and we did another round of pushes and Miss Scarlett was born at 25 weeks 1 day, weighing in at 1lb 12 oz. She was 12 1/2 inches long and came out screaming! I don't know how I knew, but I knew she was going to be okay. They let me hold her for a brief moment, and I fell in love at first sight, she was most perfect beautiful thing I had ever seen. They whisked her away to NICU and Daddy and GiGi went with her.

They wouldn't allow me to go down until I went to the bathroom on my own and ate something, to make sure I was okay after the intrathecal. I rushed through the motions. When I got down to the NICU, I can't even explain what I felt. It was so hard seeing my beautiful daughter laying in an incubator and not being able to hold her, only touch her a little bit. She was so tiny. My heart was hurting for her, I would have gladly taken her pain and struggle. But Scarlett proved from Day 1 she is a fighter and she's a tough little thing.