I Love My Girls

I should be doing homework right now but I can’t help it, I want to write a few of my thoughts down before I lose them forever. I have been going for the past four days on about eight hours of sleep. This post could be completely incoherent and if so, please enjoy.

Wednesday
On Wednesday morning I woke up around 4 a.m. to work on some homework in anticipation of the possibility that Sophie would be induced that night. Well it turns out that she wouldn’t be until the next day Thursday. I felt a little relieved that I would have more time for homework. Christine was sad because she really wanted to be induced. So I took her to Dairy Queen, which somehow solves all of her problems.

Well that afternoon she came into my study room/closet. Yes I do most of my homework in our walk-in-closet, that’s for another post. She told me she was having a contraction more intense than she had felt before. I realized I would have to work harder on my homework. By the time we went to bed around 11:30 p.m. the contractions were closer and closer. Needless to say I didn’t sleep.

Thursday
When the contractions became 5 minutes apart we called Clint and Shaylen. It was around 1:30 a.m. We rushed to the hospital, Christine was admitted and we waited. Sometime around 4:30 we dozed off for a few hours.

Shaylen sent a text, Belle was more than happy to see them in the living room. I don’t think she cared that Mom and Dad weren’t there. Besides, I bought her all the Lucky Charms and Fruity Pebbles cereal she could ever want. So between wickedly high sugar cereal, (have fun Hawthorns), and the Hawthorns being there, life was good for Belle.

Okay, I was tired and hungry, so when I found a Butterfinger in one of the bags we had brought to the hospital I started to devour it. Unfortunately I think devour was the correct word for what I did. Well, when Butterfingers get shuffled around the outs side crumbles, that’s not my fault. This Butterfinger had been shuffled and I was leaving a huge mess on the floor. Fortunately for me the doctor came in just as I started to kick the chocolaty crumbs underneath Christine’s hospital bed. I’m sure that looked great. I just stood there probably with chocolate on my face. I thought: nice one Steve. I blame it on the Butterfinger, stupid Butterfinger.

I worked on some homework while Christine rested. I found out later that in my lack-of-sleep daze I didn’t save anything so I lost about 3hrs of homework , at least it killed some time.

Just after 10:30 a.m. the doctor came in again and told the nurses that Christine should start to push. I knew this was going to be hard on her but I had no idea how hard. I had to psych myself out so I wouldn’t get emotional. Yes I cry. I hate seeing her in pain and I knew this was going to be tough. I spent the past month or two telling myself that I wouldn’t cry or let her see me upset during delivery. I conditioned myself by listing to sad songs on the radio that usually make me cry and forced myself not to cry, my training was only somewhat successful so naturally I was a bit worried. I’m glad I trained, if I hadn’t I would have been a wreck.

Near Crying Experiences
Relatively near the beginning of the delivery Sophie’s heart beat started to drop from 160 down to 40 something. I saw the look on the nurse’s face as they watched the monitors. They never said anything but I could tell that wasn’t good. I could hardly breathe, it felt like every time I saw it drop more of my breath was taken from me. It felt like someone had punched me in the gut.

Then near the end Christine was exhausted, she was shaking and could hardly move, she had been pushing for almost two and a half hours and the nurses lost the heart beat. It took the nurses well over five minutes to find it again. That was the longest five minutes for me. Christine kept asking if Sophie was okay, she was almost in a panic. I kept reassuring her that Sophie was fine, but to tell you the truth I had no idea at all. All I knew was that I had to pray. I had to hold my emotions back when they found the heart beat again. I’m happy to say I never lost my composure during delivery. That’s what the car ride home to go take care of Belle was for.

Sophie Juliette Marshall, 8lbs 9oz, 20.5 inches, born at 1:30 pm on 2/19/09



Christine just called me with her phone, she’s in the living room and I’m studying in the other room. She called to tell me that Belle was falling asleep on her floor in her bedroom and it’s too late for her to take a nap. She does that sometimes when she is either too tired or she is upset. I think it was a little bit of both. I went in her room and lay down by her so she was facing me.
Me, “Are you okay buddy?”
Belle, “Hold Me.”
She turned so her back was up against my chest, pulled my arm around her, and fell asleep in a matter of a few seconds.
Me, “I love you Belle, you will always be my Belle girl.”
We slept for about an hour.

I love my girls!