Made in Taiwan

Scarlett Mei Jensen

Born August 25

6:45pm-ish*

6lbs 6oz

18.5 inches

If she was trying to gain a little favor with me by coming 6 days before her due date, it worked. Scarlett Mei (pronounced May, it's Chinese for beautiful) is a week old today and it has taken me that long to wrap my head around her birth and try and decide what I wanted to write on here. Right now she is snoozing next to me, smiling in her sleep, so I have a few minutes to try and get down the gist of it. 

We were using the same Dr. Albert who we saw with Ander, so we would also be delivering at the same old dirty hospital. I was dreading it. DREADING IT. But as the time got nearer I just quit thinking about the things that made it uncomfortable or unpleasant and focused on... I don't know what, just not that. 

So last Thursday around lunch I started to feel like the Braxton Hix that had been my near constant companion in recent weeks were actually starting to hurt and become regular. After eating, drinking and resting that hadn't changed. I didn't want to get everyone all excited (a theme I clung to the entire day for some ridiculous reason) so I casually texted Nathan, told him I was having some contractions and maybe he could come run interference with the kids since they would be home soon. He was on his way in no time. 

I spent the next hour or so taking my time in the bath and getting ready, just stopping through contractions as we went. I endured mostly the 3 older kids coming in at regular intervals for me to help undo some scuffle they'd gotten into which was a little frustrating. Nathan soon took them all to our neighbors for a little bit and the house was gloriously quiet. Sometime around 4:30pm is when I would guess active labor started. I began walking laps downstairs and timing the contractions, they were 2 min apart and 30-45 seconds long and they were getting difficult to relax through. Again, at one point or another all of the older 3 showed up randomly at the house whining at me for something after having slipped through Nathan's radar. Laboring with kids around = not ideal. 

Nathan brought the kids back at 5pm and quickly slapped together some grilled cheese for them then started to pack up some stuff. Looking back, at this point I should have said, forget packing, we need to go. But for whatever reason I was still being polite. 

FINALLY we were headed out, our neighbor Brandie came up to watch the kids with Carrie's daughter Sydney and Carrie was coming with us as a support and someone to run interference with the Chinese nurses etc. As we were headed to the car I felt a pop and an immediate release of pressure. I'm not gonna lie, this is where things started to get a little panicky for me. There was meconium in the water so that was distressing to see. Plus I was starting to feel a bit shaky and like I might need to throw up which are all signs for me of transition. The girls got me some new clothes and we were on our way. 

Did I mention it was a peak traffic time? And never have I been so keenly aware of how terribly bumpy Taipei's roads are. It was impossible to relax through contractions at this point. We thankfully made lot's of lights and arrived at the hospital. Carrie went to go park the car and Nathan and I made our way up to the 8th floor.

Our Dr. was there all casual hanging out, he was planning on going to dinner with a friend. They took me into a Labor Room, circa 1970, I don't know why they didn't take me into their one Labor and Delivery room but I bet they were regretting that later (just a little foreshadowing for ya).

The Dr. checked me and said I was a 3, 80% effaced and a -1 station. But all I heard was a 3... 3??!! He then left and nurses came in to try and make Nathan go down to the first floor to get us registered but he refused to leave me. He went out in the hall to try and convince them to bring the paperwork upstairs and meanwhile I had a couple more hard contraction and I was telling Carrie, almost in tears that I didn't think I could do this much longer. 

Cut to about 30 seconds later when I had another contraction and the baby was born. No, you are reading that right. Born. I need not get into details but it was a pretty crazy couple of minutes, Carrie alerted Nathan and the nurses when I realized what was happening and there was no stopping it.  The Chinese nurses ran off in different directions shouting (we've never seen Chinese people move so fast!) and there stood Nathan, Carrie and a lone nurse. Looking back now it's kind of comical but at the time it wasn't. Poor little Scarlett, in the States had there been meconium in the water they would have had the NICU waiting at her birth. Well, there was no NICU, no place to set her with say, a warming lamp, no blanket, no delivery room and no Doctor. Thankfully I was at least on a bed. 

A few minutes later the Dr. ran in, in complete disbelief, he's never missed a birth before and couldn't believe what had happened. As things calmed down a little bit we realized no one knew what time she had been born, but we all agreed it was probably 6:45pm. Thanks to the time stamp on our parking ticket we figure Scarlett was born no more than 15 min. after we arrived at the hospital. Had we hit a few more red lights things could have been very different. 

This is me with my 'I can't believe that just happened' look

Nathan was just glad he wasn't down on the first floor when Scarlett was born...

And Carrie who now has a pretty good track record as a Doula- we joked that she'll have you in and out in 20 minutes! I was so grateful to have her there.

Eventually the NICU realized they needed to check out the baby and they kept her overnight to monitor her breathing. We were grateful that there were no lasting effects or problems.

The next morning Kennedy got to go in late to school and come meet her new baby sister all by herself. She had helped Nathan get everyone up and going out the door to school and we were happy to let her have a special moment with her sister that for once she didn't have to share.

 Because later that afternoon when everyone but Ander was there... she had to share :) Please excuse how sweaty and wild looking the kids all are, it had been a hot and muggy day.

 Oh, and did I mention that Aly broke her arm earlier that week? Yeah, she fell off of the play ground at school and broke her elbow. Thankfully nothing major.

When we pulled into our neighborhood when we were bringing Scarlett home we saw this first thing on our neighbors gates:

 (Welcome to the neighborhood Scarlett, you're gonna love it here!)

And this sign on our gates that had a note and hand prints from each of our kids, the sweetest was from Kohen who toiled so long to write how excited he was to be her big brother. The signs made me teary, I felt so loved.

We are so grateful that Scarlett made it here safely and so grateful for good friends to take care of us when our families are so far away.