The Day That Changed Our Lives FOREVER

It was a Monday afternoon on July 1, 2013, and I was in pain and felt like I had no more room to grow my baby boys. My feet were hugely swollen that I had "thankles" (thigh-ankles), and I could barely walk. As I got ready for my doctor appointment, I was praying for some improvement cause I had been dilated to a 3 for 3 weeks and I was miserable and didn't know how much more my body could take. Dusty and I went to the doctor at 3:40 PM, and when Dr. Ott came into check me, I was already in tears with the thought that he was going to tell me there was "no change" when I had been contracting and in pain for weeks. After Dr. Ott checked me his exact words were, "Well I think a 5 1/2 is far enough along to send you to Labor and Delivery"! Dusty and I were shocked, we were hoping for improvement, but wow..that was a lot of improvement and we were so excited thinking that soon we would be welcoming our baby boys into the world.

We left the doctors office to run home and grab our hospital bag and make sure our little dog was taken care of for the evening, then we headed for the hospital. We arrived at the hospital at 5:00 PM! I was in my gown, monitors on my belly, an IV in my arm, and I was contracting every 1-2 minutes. The nurse checked me again at 6:00 PM and I was at a 6. Dr. Ott came in shortly after to see how things were moving along. He then told us that he thought we would be having the babies around 3-4:00 in the morning. As I looked at the clock and it was just after 6:00 PM, I thought to myself "Wow, that seems like an awful long time away!" The nurse then told Dr. Ott that she thought I would be having them much sooner. She guessed before midnight. So her and Dr. Ott had a little bet going on when we would be having our babies. :-)

As I continued to contract, it was time for the epidural to be administered. The doctors highly recommended I get an epidural, whether I wanted one or not due to the fact that one or both babies may need to be delivered by emergency C-section. With "Baby A" head down, we were hoping that I could have both babies vaginally. The anesthesiologist administered my epidural around 7:00 PM. I started to get numb, but only on my left side. I could feel every contraction on my right side still. They offered to give me another epidural, but I said I would wait and see what happened. After about 2 hours, I decided to have the second epidural to help my right side. So by 9:00, I was dilated to a 9 and I had my second epidural and it finally started numbing my right side.

Not long after my epidural started working, I was dilated to a 10, and they got Dusty and I gowned up and were wheeling my bed into the Operating Room to deliver my babies. (Twins are delivered in the OR in case it ends up being a C-Section on one or both babies). We got into the OR, the nurses and doctor were getting everything ready to go, and within a few minutes I started pushing.

Ready to deliver our babies!

I don't want to get into the "gory" details of childbirth but after pushing for 10 minutes I had an adorable, perfect baby boy laying on my chest, crying, while the nurses were scrubbing him down and sending him to the NICU. "Baby A", Paxtin DeMille Mackelprang was born at 9:31 PM, weighing 5 lbs. 13 oz. and 19.3 inches long.

Shortly after, the doctor was checking "Baby B" with the ultrasound to see what position he was in, and he was already turned and coming out feet first. So, 4 minutes later, coming out breech, "Baby B", Channing Oliver Mackelprang was born at 9:35 PM, weighing 6 lbs. 2 oz. and 19 inches long. They laid him on my chest for a quick kiss and love before they sent him off to the NICU with his brother.

Tears were being shed by Dusty and myself as we thought of how amazingly perfect our little miracles are. I wanted so bad to see them and hold them. I was FINALLY a Mommy!! Dusty went with the babies to the NICU, while the dr finished up and wheeled me back to my room for recovery. I was so happy I was able to have them both without a c-section. 

My nerves were going crazy I was shaking so bad for a couple hours after delivery. I also was losing A LOT of blood, I had clots coming out the size of softballs, and if I kept losing blood like I was they were going to have to give me a blood transfusion; but fortunately the bleeding started to slow down and I didn't need one. That was when they wheeled me from the labor & delivery floor to the mom & baby unit. Later that night I started running a fever, I was getting so anxious to go to the NICU to see my babies again, but sadly the doctor wouldn't allow me to go where I was still losing a lot of blood and now I was running a fever. So I would have to wait until the morning to go and see my little miracles. (Pic is me after giving birth)

Dusty would go down to the NICU periodically to check on our babies and would take pictures of them and bring them back to show me. My heart just melted with each new picture and I couldn't wait till morning so I could go down there and see my baby boys. For the rest of that night, I ate some dinner, texted family members, and finally was able to fall asleep. It was hard to fall asleep cause my dreams were laying in the NICU and my dreams had finally come true.
 

Paxtin in the NICU

Channing in the NICU