newborn

In case you hadn’t already heard, baby number 7 is finally here! Primrose Elowen Roberts was born one week ago on February 20th at 8:57pm! She weighed 8lbs 6oz  (our biggest baby) and was 20 3/4″. The whole day was so crazy and unbelievable to me so I wanted to type it all out before I start forgetting details. All the pictures were taken by my friend, Mayci. She has taken pictures for my past few births and I could never thank her enough for providing me with these precious memories!

(**As you may already know, my due date was on February 12th. My best friend, Maggi, was due on February 14th. For our entire pregnancies, we talked about how fun it would be to have our babies on the same day.)

In the last weeks of pregnancy, my body was hurting quite a bit. But even with all of the discomforts, I still didn’t want her to come any earlier than my due date. I was terrified and anxious about the labor to come. However, as soon as my due date passed, I was just so ready to have her. I felt like I just shut down and spent the next days so emotional, irritable, and impatient. I was being quite dramatic. The entire pregnancy seemed to fly by but as soon as we made it past that “due date,” each day felt like 100 years.

What made the wait more difficult is that I experienced “false labor” quite a few times and felt like I was in early labor. I would time the contractions for hours, just waiting for them to become stronger and closer together. But each time they started to fizzle out after about 6 hours. I was beginning to wonder if there was something wrong with my body. The most overdue I had ever been was 6 days with my 2nd child so I didn’t expect to go that far overdue…and especially not any longer than that! I just didn’t expect my 7th child to take so long or be so confusing. I lost all sense of logic and really thought that my body just wasn’t going to be able to go into labor on its own. And I was fully convinced that I would be pregnant forever haha.

On the morning of the 19th, my friend Maggi texted and said she was contracting! I was so excited for her and kept hoping that I would also go into labor. I started having contractions in the early afternoon and thought “this is it! We’re going to have our babies on the same day!” But just as before, my contractions died down. However, Maggi’s got stronger. She was heading to the hospital as I was heading to bed. I got the exciting news in the middle of the night that she had her baby at 1:01 am! So the rest of the night I laid there just waiting and hoping to feel contractions.

But they didn’t come. I got up and once again felt very discouraged. I had my 41 week appointment that morning and figured my doctor may want to send me for testing to check to make sure everything was healthy with the baby. So I just felt like it would be best to send the kids to their grandparents’ house..just in case. I don’t do cervical checks with any of my pregnancies until I’m in labor. But that morning I was just dying to know if any of those contractions I was having had progressed me at all. And then I heard very discouraging news that I hadn’t dilated a single bit.

How could this be? Those dumb contractions hadn’t done a single thing! My doctor asked what I thought about induction. I have always been against it in the past…not ever wanting to do it unless there was a medical reason. He told me I could set one up as soon as that day or any day leading up to 42 weeks. But in that moment of weakness and desperation, I just asked to be induced that night. I didn’t think I could mentally handle another day of waiting. He called and got it set up and told me that I would be getting a call some time after 6pm to come in for an induction.

As we left the office, I felt such a weight lifted off of me. Instantly the stress melted away and I felt excited to know that we were going to be meeting our baby girl soon. But I was terrified of the induction to come. All my other labors started naturally so the thought of this new experience just made me so nervous. I was just fearing the unknown.

Anyway, since we were up near the hospital already and had a couple of things we wanted to do up in that area, we decided to waste time until we got the call for the induction. We started by going to meet Maggi’s new baby girl, Sylvia. I snuggled with her sweet baby and we hung out there until we decided it would be a good time to head out for lunch.

St. Louis recently got a Shake Shack and it has become my new obsession! I had already been there twice since their opening in December, but Don had never been. So since we didn’t have the kids, we took advantage of this day out together. We hit up Shake Shack for lunch and then headed over to Ikea to walk around. We realized we were already out of ideas for time wasting things to do because it was a rainy day. However, we still had hours to kill so I suggested going to Old Navy. On the way there, I stupidly started googling stuff about inductions and started to scare myself. I remember praying that if I wasn’t supposed to be doing this induction, then please, oh please, let me go into labor naturally.

It was about 3:45 when we got to Old Navy (probably only 10-15 minutes after praying that I could go into labor naturally.) As we were walking inside, I got hit with a contraction that had me doubled over in pain. I thought there was no way that could be a real contraction because it had come on so suddenly. But I was definitely hopeful. We quickly walked around Old Navy and decided to head to the mall to walk laps. The whole way there I was feeling quite a bit of cramping and pain in my lower back and hips. But it was hard to tell if I was contracting or not.

As soon as we started walking into the mall, I got hit with another hard contraction. And as we walked a couple of laps around the mall, I continued to get them every few minutes. For the most part, I could continue to walk through the pain. I would squeeze Don’s hand through each contraction and slow down my pace. But I still wasn’t convinced it was the real thing. These contractions were more painful than the braxton hicks contractions I had been having for weeks. But I felt like it was just too perfect for me to be in labor. So I was starting to wonder if I was imagining the pain. However, as we were leaving, I had a few more hard ones that did make me stop because they hurt pretty bad.

At this point we decided to head back to the hospital because it was after 5 and we were hopeful that we’d get a call about the induction sometime soon (we were overly optimistic 😉 ) We went back up to Maggi’s hospital room, along with her whole family, and we hung out as the contractions grew stronger. I was trying to keep the contractions coming so I was pacing her room while I had a big audience watching me haha. This was the point that I finally felt like there was a small chance that our babies could share a birthday!

With each contraction, Don became more nervous. He kept urging me to go down to the triage to get checked but I was afraid to go down there too early. I was trying to compare my contractions to how I felt with Clementine. With her, I was 5 cm when I arrived at the hospital and these didn’t feel as strong. So I kept pacing while Don kept nervously watching. I kept joking “what’s the worst that can happen? We’re already at the hospital! I can just have the baby right here!” I didn’t realize I would regret my nonchalant attitude pretty soon!

After about 45 minutes of my husband’s pleading, I finally decided I would head down around 7:30. We got down to the Maternity Welcome Center–which was booming–and went through all the questions. (A little sidenote–I later learned that so many women were having babies that night that they hadn’t even started calling people to come in for inductions…even at 11pm when I was headed to my hospital room to get settled for the night. I was 3rd on their list so I likely wouldn’t have even gotten a call until way past midnight.)  This is when my contractions started to become quite a bit stronger…to the point where it brought tears to my eyes. They brought me back to a triage room and I kept telling them I wanted an epidural as soon as possible.

As the midwife checked me, she said “okay, well I’m not going to tell you how dilated you are. Let’s just get you upstairs to get you that epidural.” I flipped out and asked her how much I was dilated and after quite a bit of hesitation, she finally said “You’re almost complete.” I thought she was going to tell me 4-5cm at most. When I found out that I was 9cm, I completely lost control. I immediately started crying. I know there are so many women who can give birth without the epidural. And I truly think that’s awesome. But I have always had an epidural and I was terrified at the thought of going without it. I kept repeating the same thing to Don, over and over–“I should have listened to you and gotten checked sooner!” “Why didn’t I listen to you??”

They rushed me upstairs into the same room where Clementine was born. Within minutes, the IV was in my arm and the anesthesiologist was waiting outside the room. The midwife said she wanted to check me one more time to see if there would even be time to get the epidural but I begged her not to. I was afraid she would break my water and the baby would come flying out. So the anesthesiologist came in and inserted the epidural. I felt like everything was so rushed that I didn’t have time to really get too scared about it. So from the time I left Maggi’s room at 7:30 to the time that I was in the delivery room with the epidural in was about 45 minutes.

I asked them to call my doctor because even though I have had the same doctor for all 7 of my kids, he had missed the past 3 births because he happened to be out of town all 3 of those times. This time I knew he was in town and was planning on being at my birth. But they told me he was at a meeting. They tried contacting him but when he heard that I was already 9cm, he knew there was no way he’d make it in time. I was so bummed! So was he. It was seriously a 2 hour meeting and I happened to have the baby withing that two hour time span.

Anyway, as the epidural was taking effect, I was feeling tons of pressure. I remember the nurse saying something at 8:45 about having the baby at 9. I laughed and said there was no way. But a few minutes later, when she checked me, she said “okay…well, we’re about to have a baby.” The bag of water was bulging out. And let me just tell you that is one of the most bizarre, disgusting feelings. **probably TMI–but just imagine a slug crawling out of your body haha. I can’t believe I just wrote that on the internet. Let’s just say it felt so weird and I couldn’t stop laughing.

The doctor came in the room and got everything set up. They were waiting for me to feel the urge to push. And just like every birth before, I was completely terrified to push. Knowing that I was so close to meeting this child that would change my life forever just made me so scared. Yes, I was excited to meet her..but it’s like my body just froze up. I stopped feeling all contractions and pressure for a few minutes.

Then finally it was time. As I started pushing, the doctor told me to slow down and do a “half push.” Within seconds, she mentioned the baby’s chubby cheeks and they told me to reach down and grab her. I had only pushed for like 20 seconds so I was seriously shocked that she was already out. I yelled “Wait! She’s born?!?” which makes me laugh every time I think about it. But I honestly could not believe it was that fast. The past 5 births I only had about 1-3 minutes of pushing. But 20 seconds was just unbelievable to me.

I pulled her to my chest as she let out a few cries and just as with the 6 previous children, I instantly fell in love with this sweet child. Nothing in the world compares to the moment you meet your child for the first time. It doesn’t matter if it’s your 1st or your 7th…it is equally amazing each time. As soon as I saw her face I noticed that she looked exactly as Clementine as a newborn. It felt so crazy. I seriously felt like I gave birth to the same child twice. Even a week later, I keep staring at her and feeling like I have a newborn Clementine all over again.

So about an hour and a half after leaving Maggi‘s room, I was in the delivery room holding Sylvia’s new birthday buddy and new best friend. We both delivered our babies on the same day, in the same hospital. The dream we had had for the past 9 months came true and I was so excited. I couldn’t believe how quickly everything went. It felt so rushed and chaotic and perfect. I don’t know if it was the fact that I had set up the induction and didn’t feel so stressed anymore or maybe the oxytocin release from snuggling Maggi’s newborn, but I’m convinced those two things played a role in the timing.

I’ll admit that I had such a hard time trusting God’s timing in those days leading up to delivery. I prayed for patience and tried to trust His timing. But I was so discouraged with each passing day. And now that it’s all over, I can see how beautifully orchestrated it all was. I’m so thankful that He not only kept her safe and healthy, but that He did it in His own perfect timing.

Now we’re home and adjusting to life as a family of 9. It’s chaotic and loud and our house is a mess. But everyone is absolutely in love with their new baby sister. Even Clementine, who I was convinced would be jealous of having a new baby in the house, is head over heels in love. So we may struggle at first but I think we’ll get used to our new normal in no time.

Primrose has been such a happy, content baby. Although we’re still trying to work on her schedule–she prefers to sleep all day and party all night. But I’m not going to complain because the newborn snuggles are 100% worth it. I’d just like to go ahead and press pause on life for just a bit to enjoy this stage just a little longer. I’ve caught myself tearing up so many times because I love this little girl so much.

Anyway, I’ll share more about that in another post soon. But before I go, I’m also going to share our newest vlog, welcoming Primrose into the world! I debated sharing the birth clips. I had it recorded for my own personal memories. But I just think those moments are so beautiful and felt (since it doesn’t show anything graphic) that I wanted to share how amazing the miracle of birth is. The vlog also shows the kids meeting their sister for the first time and also our first moments at home. It’s a precious video that I know I’ll love to look back on over the years. But just a fair warning–Don does give a brief recap of the labor and delivery that actually was quite a bit different than it actually happened haha. It’s funny how husbands can forget so easily while I can clearly remember how and when everything happened.

Thank you all so much for all the love and congratulations over the past week! We definitely feel the love!!

You can read Desmond’s birth story HERE and Clementine’s birth story HERE.