On Wednesday, August 24, 2011 at 9:21 a.m., we welcomed Asher Austin Olson into the world. Even though I had a c-section scheduled for 9:30 a.m. on that same date, Asher picked his own birthday. Most of the day on the 23rd, I was having cramping that I now realize was real contractions. They were fairly minor and bearable. My mom had arrived the evening of the 23rd so that she could take care of Jude and Levi for us the following morning since we had to arrive at the hospital by 7:30 a.m. By 1 a.m. on the 24th, I was having cramping so bad that I hadn’t been able to fall asleep. I had Andy call the doctor since I figured I was in labor and know I’m not supposed to go through labor given that my uterus has plenty of scar tissue from a prior surgery to remove a uterine fibroid tumor and 2 prior c-sections. The doctor on call thought the contractions sounded far enough apart that it wasn’t real labor yet and that I could safely wait until my scheduled time. Since I couldn’t sleep anyway, I went to work on this annual profile of my practice that I needed to do for work. I would mark down how far apart the contractions were. Sometimes they were 8 minutes apart and sometimes 15 minutes apart. They were really painful. I had to take breaks from working to get Levi back to sleep a couple times and also get Jude back to sleep. Jude was so excited about the new baby’s arrival that he got up for good at 4 a.m. or so. By 4 a.m., I was in so much pain with the contractions that I told Andy to call the doctor again. I decided no matter what he said that we would head to the hospital. I felt the birth was imminent and didn’t want to deliver at home or on the way there. We headed to the hospital at 4-ish. We hooked Jude up with Star Wars or something to watch and then my mom woke up as we were heading out. Jude said something like, “Grandma Forbes, can you watch over me?” He wanted company as he partied in the wee hours of the morning. We made it to the hospital (I had 3 painful contractions on the way there). I surprised myself by gladly accepting a ride from Andy in the wheelchair. When we arrived, they got me hooked up to a machine that monitored the baby and contractions. I was indeed in labor. My real doctor prescribed some medicine that stopped the contractions. Then they attempted to move the c-section up to 8:30 a.m., but it got a bit of a late start. We headed to the OR at 8:45 or so. I was just so excited to get the little guy cut out of me since he had been crowding me for months and had been causing me bad pain for a day. The birth itself went just fine. Andy got it all documented. Little Asher came out with dark black hair. It didn’t seem like I got to get a very good look at him in the OR and then he was gone to the nursery with Andy while they sewed me up. It was in the recovery room that I got my first real looks at him. He’s absolutely adorable. I love him so much. We brought him home on the 25th, the day after he arrived. I was so eager to get out of that hospital. I was doing whatever I could do to get out. I would ask the nurses what the soonest was that I could walk/remove IVs/get off meds. We waited to leave until after Asher’s circumcision on the 25th. The adjustment to 3 kiddos is going much better than I could have hoped for. Jude and Levi are crazy about him and not jealous at all yet. I’m just finding it’s harder than ever to keep the house clean and get stuff done, but maybe some of that will get easier once I’ve fully recovered.