Arrival of Alyssa & Katelyn - October 12, 2009

It all started with my water breaking around 6:45 p.m. on October 12, 2009! Jeremy was on his way home from teaching classes out at the King´s Castle Camp when I called him to let him know what had just happened. He was about 15 minutes away from our apartment, so he called our missionary friends that live just around the corner from us and asked the husband, Scott, if he would pick me up and meet him at the hospital. I called Dr. Ramírez to let him know that I was on my way to the hospital and he said he would meet us there as well. Scott picked me up soon after and in about 5 minutes we were at the hospital...Jeremy had already beat us there and was waiting on me outside of the emergency room!

Once at the hospital, I was rushed into the Labor & Delivery area. The OBGYN on call checked the fetal heart rates of the twins and rate of contractions while a nurse inserted my IV. I didn´t feel any of the contractions or have any pain (Praise the Lord!)...just more and more water! Dr. Ramírez arrived shortly to check on me and before I knew it, I was in for my C-section. The anesthesiologist gave me a spinal and soon after I couldn´t feel a thing. Jeremy was allowed to come in the room at this point and the C-section began. I couldn´t see anything that was going on over the cover, but Jeremy was able to watch the whole thing.

I heard the babies cry as they came out! Katelyn Joy was born at 8:40 p.m. and Alyssa Grace was born at 8:42 p.m. Katelyn was 4 lbs. 3 oz. and 17.3 inches long. Alyssa was 4 lbs. 6 oz. and 17.3 inches long. I saw them briefly as the doctors and nurses laid them on a table to check them out after they were born. Katelyn was doing fine, but Alyssa wasn´t able to expel the fluids from her lungs at birth and had to be resuscitated after several attempts to suction hadn´t worked. Those were the scariest 3 minutes of our lives, watching one of our babies lying there lifeless. Jeremy & I both began to pray for her and the Lord saved her! After the doctors saw she was alright, they headed off to the nursery with the girls and the doctors began to stitch up my incision. Afterwards, I was wheeled into the recovery room where I would stay until about midnight, when they would finally take me to my room to rest.

Side note about Dr. Ramírez: He was not the doctor I used my entire pregnancy, but was actually another OBGYN that shares the same office as my doctor, Dr. Zavaleta. Dr. Zavaleta was out of the country for a few weeks and I had seen Dr. Ramírez for my latest appointment since my doctor was gone. Dr. Zavaleta warned Dr. Ramírez that I might go into labor before he got back, so Dr. Ramírez might have to be the doctor to deliver them. He was right! I was only 35 weeks along and didn´t make the October 25th date that Dr. Zavaleta had hoped I would make. Dr. Ramírez did an AWESOME job and Jeremy and I were well pleased with how everything went.