And then there were four

Athena Paz (yes, we are aware of the irony) Espigares Fortin was born on November 2, 2010 at 1:15 pm. I don´t know what it is with my kids, but they both decided to come into the world at reasonable hours. I thank them for that. I went into labour at about 6:00 am. Of course again I wanted to be sure that it was labour and just sort of wandered around the living room for an hour or so before I woke up the hubby. It was kind of funny because when I woke him up and said “It´s time to go” he thought I meant to get JR ready for nursery. After 10 minutes I realized that this is what he thought and informed him that the other one was coming so he needed to be a little quicker getting out of bed.
So off to the hospital we were. All three of us. My wonderful friend Natalia was about 3 minutes behind us on the highway to come and grab JR when we arrived. Thank you for that. I couldn´t imagine Miguel trying to deal with a two year old while trying to check me in and help me with translation.
One thing I have to say is that the health care is phenomenal in Spain considering it is public. Growing up in Canada and hearing how great the health care system is and experiencing it first-hand you start to think that every well else sucks. Well, for having kids Spain is awesome. I was a bit worried about going to the Costa Del Sol Hospital. I went to El Materno in Malaga the first time around and we debated driving all the way there to have Athena, but in the end we realized that we were going to be just way to far from JR should we need to pick him up from nursery or something. I´m glad we didn´t because Costa del Sol was even better. I didn´t realize how “antiguo” Malaga was before. It was still excellent, but CDS was amazing.
It could be also that this birth went so smoothly. Last time they had to help JR out a bit so I was a bit worried that they were going to have to again this time. I spent about an hour on the monitor for my contractions which were a bit erratic, but they were definitely the real thing. Once they started to get a bit more regular they checked to see how far along I was. It was all so familiar from when I had JR. I was just as far along. Scary.
At that point they put me into a delivery room and asked me if I wanted the epidural to which I replied “oh yeah”. Well the guy handing them out just happened to be wandering around our ward so they quickly had me sign the paperwork and within 2 and half hours of getting to the hospital, right when the contractions were starting to get a teensy bit annoying, along came Mr Epidural and all was good. The epidural was a much better experience this time around. The first time was a bit weird. At one point it was wearing off and then it was so numbing that I didn´t like the feeling I had of absolute no feeling. This time it was helpful in dulling the pain, but I could still move and feel certain things which is better because then you still know what is going on and know when to push and all that.
At one point the contractions stopped which happens sometimes with epidurals so they had to give me something to kick start them again. By 12:30 it was time to push, which was a bit of a shock as it seemed so quick, but not as much of a shock as how quickly and easy she arrived after that. I had it in my head that I was going to be pushing for at least 2 or 3 hours as I was pushing for about 5 hours with JR, but I swear to god, she was there within 10 pushes. I didn’t even realize just how quickly she was coming.
Carmine, my little 24 year old midwife who handled my labour all by herself from start to finish, asked me if I wanted to pull her out. I think she thought that I hesitated because I didn´t understand the question, but I fully heard Miguel translate it. I just had to think about it. I know there are these people out there that think that childbirth is a beautiful thing and I suppose that there is some aspect to it that is. More the thought than anything though because in my opinion, child birth is not all that pretty and quite frankly some of it is just gross. At one point Carmen held up the afterbirth for me to see afterwards and it just looked like something the butcher would do when buying meat at the store. I mean, I don´t need to see that, do I? Anyway, in the end I opted to pull her out which reminded me a bit too much about helping our dog birth her first litter a few years ago, but I´m glad I did it. It was kind of cool and something that I´ll always remember. Still not pretty though. I nearly dropped her because she was so slippery. Miguel cut the umbilical cord which again he thought was a bit weird and worrisome. He worries about breaking newborns when picking them up though so I could see him freaking out about cutting the cord.
After that they gave her to me right away. This was very new for me because when JR was born they pulled him out, washed him up and took him away for a check up and then 15 minutes later brought him back to me and then took him away again. With Athena, I pulled her out, they put her on my chest right away and about 30 minutes later they cleaned her up and did the check up right there and then gave her back to me. We went up to the room together and everything. I think I like it better that way. I grew up again thinking that babies spend most time in the nursery after they are born, but not the case at all in Spain.
The second time around is definitely easier. Your body knows what to do and you have a better idea of what is going to happen and what to do. The aftercare was excellent too. This time they told me to call them the first time I get out of bed to get help as I might be light headed. The first time I learned that the hard way by almost passing out and hitting the floor. Labour really takes it out of you. I think I´m good with two for now. I´m expecting if we have a third it will be the “accident”.