"Baby, my water broke." I said in disbelief on the phone in a somewhat empty hallway in the Titan Student Union.  After weeks of reading baby books, magazines, and diligently doing online research of everything about parenting and delivery - almost an overload of information - here I was at school, about to pop.

It was early afternoon as I was uncomfortably sitting in a lecture hall feeling cramped between two firm arm rests in the new business building. I never appreciated my lean, perky pre-pregnancy body until I was stuck next to a girl who couldn’t stop hitting her elbow against my arm as I sat there trying to concentrate on Gutenberg’s printing press instead of how itchy my belly was or how ridiculous I looked behind that fold-up desk, trying not to bump my belly against its rigid surface.

I felt like an obese man. Even though from behind, all you could see were two little legs. My belly was nonexistent.

"I feel heavy," I texted my husband. But this time it was a weird heavy. I explained I was convinced it couldn't be contractions. It was just this odd pressure, not consistent or continuous, just uncomfortable. I was imagining raw pain like that cinematic hospital hallway scene where a sweating pregnant woman is yelling and bass heavy music led her trough the maternity ward. And that wasn’t happening, so I thought nothing of the heaviness.

"Okay I love you baby. Let me know if something's out of the ordinary okay?" he said.
Twenty minutes had passed and then it happened.

Walking down the Titan Walk in my black stretch leggings and charcoal gray v-neck tee just barely covering my 38-week belly, I suddenly felt a stream of water slowly falling from beneath me. Unlike the cute, dramatic all-of-a-sudden puddle seen in the movies, it was discreet, almost unnoticeable.  

Still skeptical, I walked as fast as I could to the nearest bathroom, which wasn't that near considering I was carrying around an extra 40 pounds on my 5 feet' 5 inch frame. I waddled in, shut the door, and made sure it was what I thought.

I started texting random people "are u at school?" -no?- "ok bye"  or "my water broke I need to get to the hospital." I kept saying.

Word spread fast. I felt my phone was going to collapse with texts.

Finally, my ading (my unofficial little brother) Michael came to the rescue but was stressing more than I was. "My car is shaky," he said and we waited for my friend Eileen. Eileen came; we were off to the hospital.

The short 10-minute drive to the hospital consisted of my husband calling me and then Eileen and then me again and well -- repeat.

Jex was waiting for me at the hospital entrance. We went in and the whirlwind began.
The admitting lady fiercely filed forms because my husband told her my water broke had broken and I began signing way too many forms as she looked at me blankly.

I waited a little and then they put me in a room. The nurse checked on me and asks me if I was having contractions while she hooked up a cluster of monitors all over my body with a rapid rhythm.

I had flashbacks of the old women I would encounter at work who would rub their hands all over my belly like it was their own. During my pregnancy I had a strange magnetism that made people want to give me advice. Strangers would feel the urge at random to tell me horror stories from their own deliveries that resembled Discovery Channel investigative documentaries. But still, I thought I was fearless until I heard the nurse.

“You’re 4 centimeters dilated, and your contractions are consistent,” she said. I looked at Jex with a look on my face that read too many profanities to name and then, “The baby is coming today, you’re not going home,” she said with a nonchalant, I-tell-this-to-everyone tone in her voice. My doctor ordered the nurse to put me up to Pitocin, which made the pain intensify to that Hollywood movie pain I had been dreading.

In the meantime, all I can remember is Jex frantically calling and texting all of California while I lay there holding his hand, tired and in pain with an oxygen mask on.

My mom and dad came to the hospital and my mom went into medical mode because she’s been an RN for 30 plus years. She read my monitors and looked at the dosage on my IV. I felt like my own mom was diagnosing me while slowly, my in-laws, sisters, and nephew trickle into my room.

I decided I wanted an epidural, which I then discovered was the greatest invention known to man. Everything was numb and I had time to relax. By this time, the nurse informed me that she’s not going to page my doctor because I won’t be able to feel anything from the epidural and she didn’t expect me to push for at least another three hours. A couple of minutes passed and then I told Jex I could feel it. I just knew she was wrong.

I buzzed for another nurse. She checked on me, “You’re ready,” she said.

No amount of research can prepare someone for the blur that came next.

The nurse paged my doctor, set the room up - and my mom and Jex stood on both sides of me.

I was hot, and all I could think was I really wanted ice cream. The nurse started yelling out numbers like a drill sergeant, counting from one to 10. My doctor arrived soon after and he said, “Wow, you’re fast.”’

 I suddenly turned into an acrobat as the ha he-ha-he-ha-he-ha-he breathing pattern I perfected over four weeks of Lamaze class turned into “AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH” in the few seconds before my daughter made her big debut.

I was exhausted, sweating, and out of breath, the most consuming nine hours I ever experienced.

I thought, I still wanted ice cream, but this was so much better.

And there she was my slimy, beautiful, tiny baby girl. The nurse cleaned her up and all I could hear was her announcing measurements while my mom held my hand and Jex looking over at her in awe.

The nurse put her on my chest.

She looked up at me with her big almond-shaped eyes with her tiny six pound fourteen-once body; she was perfect.