**** Be warned I’m not sugar coating much of this so it will be graphic ****

This was the happiest day of my life. But let’s back up first.

Leading up to Thursday, July 20th, the boys and I were planning our annual Pocono Raceway trip. I bought all the food for tailgating and dinners for the weekend. We were pretty set, because I also was going to be taking Kyle and Anthony with me to Pocono after work, while Matt would be with his father. Minor problem on July 19th though:Dina texted me that she had some reddish mucus discharge, which is normal as it gets closer to your due date. I’m telling the boys about it, and they are telling me to relax; it’s only normal and it may take days to weeks for labor to start. Meanwhile on a sidebar conversation, they were saying that Dina was going into labor soon and they needed to get plan B ready.

I had gone to bed around 11:30 pm July 19th, and was playing a game on my phone for a bit before finally going to sleep after the midnight check in from my Spypoint Trail cameras. Clearly nothing exciting.

At 1:45 am on July 20th, I woke up to Dina going to the bathroom. It was nothing outside the norm with her going to the bathroom, but for whatever reason this time it woke me. 5 minutes goes by, and she comes out half naked.

“Ummm… you aren’t going to Pocono.”

I snap up, wide awake. “What? What’s going on?”

“I think my water broke.”

I turn on the lights, and look over to her side of the bed as she goes back to the toilet and sits down, with more fluid coming out. There’s a streak going across the bed going from where she had been sleeping to off the bed. I immediately start taking the sheets off and look back over at Dina.

“You call in to the on call?”

“Not yet.”

“Might be an idea to. Do you think they’ll want us to stay home?”

“I dunno.” She starts to call the number and tell them what’s going on. I text the boys.

Welp. Dina’s water broke. And left it at that. I knew that I was going to have to text another group around 6 because it was way too early in the morning for them and I didn’t know what lay ahead of us.

Dina finally got off the phone.

“We gotta go to the emergency room at Overlook.”

“Get your bag packed then.” Unfortunately Dina’s go bag for the hospital wasn’t packed, so she spent the next hour getting it ready before we were finally hitting the road. While she was doing that, I called my mother. Luckily, months ago I fixed her iPhone so that after 8 pm the only phone calls that could go through her do not disturb would be mine.

“Yeeess?”

“It’s show time.”

“Alrighty then. What do you need me to do?”

“Be on standby until we get to the hospital. We are getting ready to leave now.” I got pants on and drank a Jocko GO Energy drink I had in my refrigerator.

3:30 am. We are on 78 heading to Overlook Hospital talking about how and who had involvement in this.

“You know Dad is shaking his head at you because you didn’t have your go bag packed.”

Dina starts laughing, “I know.” Weeks later she vowed to me that with the next baby, when she finds out that she is pregnant, the bag will be the first thing packed. As for myself, I’ll have my MRE’s ready to go too, which I had planned on ordering but never got around to it.

4:10 am. We got to Overlook, and walked towards the ER, thinking that is where we needed to go. The security guard at the ER turned us around and said to go to the main hospital because the ER would just send us that way anyway. We followed the directions and were met by another guard who checked us in and sent us up to labor and delivery triage.

4:30 am. We are sitting in the triage room waiting for a nurse. I’ve now peed 3 times since we got there because boy did that Jocko drink make me pee.

5:00 am. A nurse came in and checked vitals as well as if Dina’s water actually broke with what looks like a q-tip with some sort of chemical to test for embriotic fluid. It barely went in, and it came up blue. The nurse said to us that her water definately broke, and she needed to see how far dilated she was: 3cm. The nurse left and said that another nurse would be by to take us to the actual labor and delivery room.

5:45 am. Labor and delivery nurses came in and checked vitals on Dina and the baby before getting a wheel chair to take her to the room and out of triage.

6:15 am. We were settling in the labor and delivery room and just relaxing. Dina was having small contractions, nothing too major yet. I sent a group text to my supervisors and Matt and Anthony so everyone knows I’m not doing a no call no show since I was at the hospital with Dina.

7:00 am. New nurse. Checked vitals. Mom came up to the hospital with my bag after I moved my car from an ER spot to somewhere down the garage deck. I put my bag that my mother brought in my car, since I didn’t know where or how long we would be in the one room. She also brought me a Dunkin Coffee and sausage, egg, and cheese muffin. Honestly probably could have done without the muffin, really wasn’t the best thing in the world to eat at 7 am.

8:15 am. A nurse and a doctor came in to check on how far Dina had progressed. This check was a painful one for Dina and the doctor told us that the sack had resealed itself and created a four bag. I was now informing everyone that we were in the hospital awaiting little Meredith.

9 am. Our primary doctor came in and talked progress and the steps needed to get things moving. The nurse showed me how to make the couch into a cot for me to sleep on and brought a pillow and fresh sheets for me to sleep on while we waited for things to get moving.

11 am. The nurse and doctor checked progress again on Dina to see how far along she was. They say she was 4 cm dialated. This check was extremely painful for Dina, and I had to hold onto her as they checked.

12:00 pm. Dina’s contractions were getting worse and she was having problems managing the pain. She went to the bathroom, and had three in a row while trying to poop. I went out and got a nurse to tell them that Dina was ready for the epidural.

12:30 pm. The anesthesiologist came in and gave Dina the epidural. Dina started to feel pretty good, with no pain as the contractions came and went. The nurse told me there was a cafeteria a couple floors down where I could get myself something to eat, since I really hadn’t eaten much all day. I got a chicken ceasar salad and sushi, because why not have sushi? Only problem was I forgot the fork for the salad, so I had to eat the sushi first then eat the salad with the chop sticks.

1:30 pm. The nurse and doctor checked Dina’s vitals and how dilated she was again. Dina didn’t feel a thing and they said she was 8 cm.

3:15 pm. The nurse and doctor checked on vitals and progress again.

“Oh. She’s right here.”

“Huh?” The nurse questions.

“She’s right here.” The doctor says again. “Okay, Dina we are going to have you do a few test pushes to see if you are ready.”

I watched as they got her in position and she did a few pushes with the contractions. The nurse started getting our room ready as the doctor went to get ready herself. A nurse that was still in school was shadowing our nurse, and watched everything get ready after they asked for our permission for her to be there. We had no problem with it because with Dina, being a medical assistant herself, knows how necessary stuff like this is to learn.

“Dad, are you okay with blood?”

I looked at them, and looked at my shirt that literally said HUNTER on it, and look back at them, “Uh, yeah. I’ve gutted and cleaned dear before. Why?”

“How do you feel about cutting the umbilical cord?”

Honestly, hadn’t even thought of it being a thing because I thought I was to be ushered out of the room, or delivery was to be somewhere else. Or I needed to be in a gown, or something other than what I realized was about to happen. “Yeah sure, I’ll do it.”

“Okay, good. We also need you to help with her leg on her right side so her legs are open enough to let the baby out. Do not wrench on her leg or you could hurt her hip and we won’t know about it until later.”

“Okay. Are we moving? Do I need anything?”

“Nope, you are good as you are, and no we aren’t moving. We are doing it right here.”

My brain registered that, and accepted it.

3:45 pm. The room was ready, and Dina started pushing during her contractions. I was trying to help by pulling her leg back, but Dina kept trying to exhale while pushing, not listening to the doctor who’s saying to close her mouth and just push and exhale after the push. At 4 pm, the doctor realized that Meredith was about to come. She ran out of the room and put a gown and cap on, and came back in time for her to catch Meredith at 4:05 pm. The nurse in training was taking pictures the whole time. I cut the umbilical cord, which was a little tougher than what I had thought it was going to be.

Within the hour, we had Meredith measured and weighed. She was 6 pounds 4 ounces, and 18 and half inches long. They gave her the initial shots and eye ointment. While they were doing the foot stamps, someone accidentally hit the code button and immediately the whole room was filled with nurses from the desk.

“Who’s coding?! Who’s coding?”

Our nurse realized what she did “I hit the button, sorry!” And just like that, the nurses left the room, most breathing a sigh of relief.

At 6 pm, Dina was ordering us chicken fingers and fries with Sprites for our dinner. I was told that I could have 2 visitors come up, but that at 8 pm everyone needed to leave. I called my mother and Dina’s mother and said just the grandmothers could come and visit tonight because visiting hours would be ending at 8 pm. My mother came up by 6:45 pm, as we were getting our dinners and being moved to Mother and Baby from Labor and Delivery. Dina’s mom came up around 7:15 pm. My mother left around 7:30 pm, which allowed Dina’s uncle Shawn to come up and see her.

At 8 pm, they all left and we were able to relax a little. A nurse came in and checked on us while we adjusted to being a family of 3. Dina was getting help to go to the bathroom, I was holding our little girl, and we had been told about something about the nursery.

“Who do we talk to about our daughter going to the nursery?” I asked.

“By about 11, the nursery will come by to check her vitals and they will take her if you wish.”

I looked at Dina, because I was exhausted, I knew she was too. “Well if you can let them know ahead of time that would be good too. We are both exhausted.”

“I will.”

Dina was having the nurse with her for a little while, so I asked if it was okay to go get our stuff from the car. I left the room, and was given another wrist band because with that I was able to go in and out of the mother baby ward. I made my way down to the ground floor and out to the parking garage.

There was a group of men, I needed to talk to.

Ring. Clicking on the end. Phone lit up. Conference call.

“Congratulations, Dad.”

“Congrats David!”

“How does it feel?”

“I will burn this whole world for her.” It was true. I had felt nothing like this ever before, and I would do anything for her. She is everything to Dina and myself, and deserves nothing less.

“He gets it now Anthony.”

“There is nothing in this world that will ever make you understand true love, like having a child.”

“I understand it now.”

“So David. About Pocono….”

“You already know the answer to that.”

“Yeah, we were already planning that you weren’t going to go. Matt and I were talking about it while you weren’t on the phone yesterday that Meredith was coming sooner than what we thought. We just were trying to keep you calm and not focused on that.”

“So plan is, Anthony and Kyle go to your place, get the food and everything else that we potentially need and head to Pocono from there.”

“Easy enough.” I grab our bags from the car.

“Don’t blink.”

“I won’t. I’ve heard you tell everyone else that on your route.”

“Enjoy it though.”

“I will.”

I walked back in, and stumbled my way back to our room carrying all our bags. Dina was trying to breast feed, but Meredith wasn’t having it as she was curled up in her swaddle.

As 11pm came around, the nurse from the nursery came through and checked on Meredith. We asked about having her stay the night at the nursery for us, because we were running on little sleep, and had been at the hospital since 3am that morning. They said sure, but they needed to finish their rounds first before taking her. Not too long after 11:40pm, they came and took Meredith to the nursery and told us she would be back at 6:30am. We thanked the nurse and settled in for the night. I gave Dina a kiss, and made my makeshift bed, before we both fell fast asleep.