When Jessica texted me that she was in labor and on her way to the hospital, I dropped everything and headed straight over. The Falde's had warned me that Jess has FAST labors and their last baby was born in the backseat of the car in their driveway.
**Jaws Drop**
Thankfully she got to the hospital in plenty of time with this one, but when transition hit, the baby LITERALLY came out in 5 minutes!
5 MINUTES!!
I know this since cameras record the time of each image, and I was able to look back and see how mind baffling fast Jessica popped this baby out! (Sans-epidural too!)
When I showed up, Jessica was still chatting, joking and handling contractions very smoothly.
Jessica kept saying "I hope I am really in labor, and they don't send me home."
We assured her that she was definitely in active labor.
Little did she know she'd have a baby girl in her arms in less than 2 hours.
Jessica's friend Danielle was there for the birth. She is also a NICU nurse. Her experience with newborns came in handy with this super speedy birth. (As you'll see...)
One last walk around the room, and one last shot of the belly. (1 hour and 15 minutes before birth)
Daddy and Grandma
Still handling contractions like a champ!
Left: doing fine. Right: Hello, Transition!
Conversations went to consolations as that first transition contraction never let up.
We were excited to see that Jess was getting closer.
But we would have never guessed that this was 5 minutes before the baby would be born!!
With perfect timing Jessica's Doula and friend, Kristen, showed up right on time.
(3 minutes to birth)
Note the multiple peaks on the contraction monitor!
No wonder she was squeezing those bed rails to death!
About 1 minute to birth, Jessica started yelling at us in the room, "She's coming, she's coming!"
A bit frantic, I remember picking up the sheet to peek under and see how serious she was. Her unbroken bag of water was bulging out as the baby's head was crowning.
Danielle quickly paged the nurses, who paged daddy, Chad. And everyone came running in.
No time for the Dr. to arrive, the nurses delivered baby Gabrielle!
Grandma & Daddy ran back in from the waiting room just in time to see the birth.
"AGAIN??!!" -Chad (referring to fact that he almost just missed ANOTHER one of his children's birth because they come so quickly and unexpectedly.)
Danielle threw on some gloves in case she needed to switch from "friend" to "nurse", in this short staffed situation.
Mama, winded from the frantic last 5 minutes. We were all in disbelief that this had just happened.
A congratulations smooch from a proud friend!
Mommy and baby having their first snuggles.
There she is! Awake and bubbly!
Perfect Toes.
Perfect fingers.
Perfect Vitals.
Oh, hey Dr. Sullivan! So nice of you to join us!
(All kidding aside, I LOVE Dr. Sullivan. He delivered my last baby as well.)
Daddy, calling Gabrielle's big sister and brother to tell them the news!
And here's that little bundle of joy! Isn't she CUTE!!?? (as are all the Falde kiddo's)
Congrats Chad and Jessica!
