Luke Henry Pudel came into this world in a little bit of a Whirlwind, a week ago yesterday, September 28, 2020 at 2:51 in the morning.
The day before, Sunday, Jeff and I went to church and met our lovely friend Bernice there. After the service Bernice and I stayed behind to talk for a few minutes. I got a heavy nosebleed. I used to get nosebleeds quite often. So often in fact, that my nose needed to be cauterized at least 5-6 times.
Anyway, we made our way to the bathroom where Bernice helped me clean up and get the bleeding under control. At one point while we were standing there I had this weird feeling, something was different pregnancy wise, but I couldn’t
put my finger on what it was.
Once we got into the car, I mentioned to Jeff that something feels very different. I was wondering if my water maybe broke. 
Stop to Fuel our Bodies
We were supposed to have lunch with my family. So we made our way to my parents house where I made a beeline to the bathroom. Nothing crazy to note, just a weird ‘leaking’ feeling. A a quick call to the labour and delivery assessment room, confirmed we should go in rather sooner than later.
Since we were already at my parents and lunch on the table, we decided to quickly have a few bites and then head over to the hospital. It became very clear through lunch, that my water definitely broke and we would be meeting this baby sooner than later. Every time I got up, I had a little ‘gush’. Nothing major, just enough to convince me that it was baby time.
Jeff quickly zipped home to grab the last few items (you know chargers, headphone, those kinds of things) to be added to the bags we already had in the car for a couple weeks). I thought baby would come early but wasn’t necessarily prepared for it that particular day. We have had some major stress in our lives that I will talk about some other time but we were saying it’s not surprising with all of that, that I went into labour early.
Few days before
Few days beforeI had seen my doctor in her office the Tuesday before to do the Group B strep test, at which time she also checked my cervix to see if I was already dilated. Lo and behold I was walking around with 3 cm dilated (for those who aren’t familiar with labour and delivery, 0 is a closed cervix meaning the body hasn’t started to prepare for birth in this manner yet. 10 cm is fully dilated and it’s time to push this baby out).
Being 3 cm when I really should have had just over 4 more weeks to go, confirmed all our suspicions that baby would show up on his own schedule, most likely sooner rather than later.
The Group B strep test had come back positive as well which meant that once my water broke, I should go to the hospital soon, so that I could get antibiotics before baby was born.
Arrival at the Hospital
When I got to the hospital, they had to check and make sure my water had actually broken, which it had. At this point I wasn’t really feeling any contractions yet, which the nurses were also a little surprised by since the machines all registered contractions. I could feel some light tightening or maybe very minimal menstrual cramps but according to monitors, they were some really good contraction. I have to say in that regard I am very grateful.
Once the antibiotic was done, a small dose of medication was hung, to help move labour along a little faster. An hour or two after that we were moved into the delivery room. I was still doing very well at this time. Walking around, talking to people on the phone, and even attempting to have a nap. The medication is increased every 30 minutes or so until regular contractions are achieved. Shortly after my nurse increased the medication again and Jeff had laid down for a nap, things changed very quickly.
Its Go Time
Within 15-20 minutes, I went from being comfortable to ‘oh yea I can feel them now’ to ‘please get me an epidural this isn’t stopping’. Turns out my body reacts really, really, really well to the medication. So well in fact, that at a quite low dose I was having contractions that were less than 2 minutes apart and lasted almost 2 minutes. Meaning the time between each contractions was maybe a few seconds. Basically one contraction stacked on top of the other, without any breaks.
Since this was a major change and because I was requesting an epidural anyway, my doctor checked me again and I had made very little progress (given the big change) dilation wise. So after what felt like an eternity (probably only was like 20-30 minutes), the anesthesiologists came into the room and out in an epidural, promising relief in the next 15 – 20 minutes.
Well 30-40 minutes later, the pain was getting worse not better and nothing on my body (besides maybe my feet) was actually numb. So, call the doctor back. He decides it’s probably best to re-site the epidural completely. A little higher to allow for better numbing. 20 minutes after that one went in, I was getting some relief and actually could apologize to my nurse, who had come on shortly after things went a little crazy. I felt like I was quite short with her and according to Jeff was screaming that they weren’t fast enough. 
Definitely Go Time
When she went for break, another nurse came in to take over and noticed a decrease in baby’s heart rate. Which is always a little worrisome when you don’t really know why it’s happening. So she decided we should check me again to make sure the cord wasn’t prolapsed or anything like that.
Well, turns out it was pushing time since I was fully dilated. It wasn’t even an hour between getting the epidural and starting to push. Apparently my body just needed to relax a little after those contractions to get itself fully ready.
Welcome to the World sweet Boy
At 1:40 I started pushing and we welcomed our beautiful baby boy, Luke, into our arms at 2:51. Weighing in at 6 lbs 12 oz (3050g) and 21 inches (54cm) long.
The feeling is simply surreal having your newborn baby placed on your chest and hear those first tentative little noises and cries.
Jeff and I hadn’t fully decided on a name yet, but had about 7 that we had narrowed down to 3. When we saw him for the first time though he kind of made the decision easy. The other names we had just didn’t fit him.
He is Luke. Our bright one in some of the darkest times. He is absolutely perfect, at least we think so. He has brought us so much joy in this last week. It’s hard to believe it’s already been a week 
We are so in love with him and I could just sit here and watch him next to me in his Moses basket, sleeping, for hours!! 
Thank you for everyone who has helped us pray for our little miracle boy. First for us to even conceive and now for his healthy delivery. God has answered oh so many prayers. Thank you for being a part of storming heavens gates on our behalf.
