Penny Mae, 8/26/14

About 2.5 years later, here is my birth story for our PMA, Penny Mae. Better late than never, right?!

2 days before my 28^th birthday and about 3 weeks before Penny’s due date. I was uncomfortable all day and was having Braxton hicks contractions. Vic was getting ready to head out to a show to see Murder City Devils and I was pacing back and forth. Nervous. All I could think was, what if I go into labor tonight and he’s at a concert!? Remember, this was a valid fear since Lori was born on the sidewalk…

He kept getting ready while asking if I wanted him to stay. I felt like the contractions were getting stronger and my nerves kicked in. I told him that I needed to go to the hospital. At this point the pain was getting stronger and I was worried everything would move just as quick or quicker than it did the last time. We grabbed our bags, asked a friend (Penny's Godmother) to meet us at the hospital to stay with the girls and away we went.

We checked into triage and then waited. Belly hooked up to the machines and nothing. As my nerves calmed so did the contractions. Full of different emotions I didn’t know what to think. I remember looking at Vic, sitting in the chair, eyes closed wishing he was at the concert and feeling AWFUL (probably why it's taken me this long to write her story). I wanted to be excited about the baby on her way but felt SO bad that he was missing a concert he had waited for, for so long. We sat and waited some more. They said it was only Braxton hicks but to stay due to my labor history. So we paced the hospital halls to see if any progress would be made. The pain left but I still had contractions pretty evenly spaced. The girls were in the lobby with now most of our family. We sent everyone home and they put Vic and I in a room. This was it. I either went into natural labor or they induced since I was already there with small contractions.

Excited and disappointed at the same time we sat. I remember doing squats in the room while he slept through the night so things would happen naturally. I got to 3cm dilated…that was about it. The next morning, 8/26/2014 labor began to progress much quicker! By this time I was hooked up to the Pitocin to induce labor and it was doing its job. Contractions were MUCH stronger. Family now in and out of the room time began to fly. I remember sitting on the medicine ball trying to keep a conversation through contractions. One time Vayda and Lori were even in the room and I tried to hide the pain during a strong contraction lol. Moments later I got the epidural, things calmed down and the Dr. said it was time to break the water. I wish I had time stamps for each step because my body kicked into gear the moment she broke my water. There was a huge gush. She left the room, came back and said it's time. I looked at Vic, the Dr. said to push and we didn’t even have time to ask people to leave the room. In hind sight, I’m so glad we had who we did in the room. This being our last baby we got to share the amazing experience with my mom, Samantha (my niece) and Tia Mini. 

Penny Mae was born on August 26^th, 2014 at 11:03AM. 6 lbs 5oz and 19” long. Our family of five is complete. 

Next day, my 28th bday. Best gift ever!!

Introducing Lori Darling aka "Lucky Lori"

On Wednesday May 18th, 2011, a day and a morning after Lori’s due date, I woke up having small contractions. The first was at 4:48am, each were 8 to 10 minutes apart. The apartment was quiet, I put water on the stove for coffee and sat down to watch the news and track the contractions. An hour passed so I thought it would be safe to say I was going into labor. At this time they still weren’t too bad, just obvious contractions. So I opened our room door to let Vic know. He had just gotten out of the shower and was getting ready for work. I still didn’t think they were hard enough so I casually told him that I’d been having contractions for about an hour and maybe he should stay home. He said he was going to get some gas in his truck then call me from the gas station to see how it was going. He left and a few minutes later, I called him. All this time I was still writing down my contractions which were becoming stronger each time. Before talking to me on the phone he was already on his way back home. He got home and I called my Doctors office. They just said, yep go ahead and come into triage and they will notify our Dr. I came out and told Vic and my Mom (by that time she was awake too) that we needed to get ready and go to triage, lucky for them I made them coffee already haha. Vic just said, ok go ahead and take a nice long shower and that he would call Nana Tula to pick up Vayda. Knowing how long labor typically can take, we wanted to take it easy and take our time.

Notice towards the end I was scribbling...I'm not sure why I was still writing the times lol.


Keep in mind, with Vayda my water broke first then I was in labor for about 10 hours. I felt my contractions up until I was about 4/5 cm and got the epidural, so my sense of how hard or close my contractions are at this point and how close I am to hard labor was not clear to us.

By this time I had taken a shower and had 7/8 contractions, just in the shower! I got out, Vayda was eating cereal all ready to go and her Nana Tula was here ready to take her as well (BTW when I came back out the smell of the coffee made me nauseous, if that’s not a sign I don’t know what is haha). I knew we had to speed it up by now. My contractions were hard enough that I had to stop what I was doing and take deep breaths. I knew they were hard but I defiantly didn’t think this was it. Vic left to put the car seat in Tula’s car and the second he left my water broke! Thankfully it was in the toilet but the second that happened my contractions were awful, screaming awful lol. My mom came in and held me then Vic did as well. It was time to get on the road!

Vic, my mom and I finally got out of the door and headed down to the truck. By this time the contractions were every other minute or so. Poor Vic had to lift me into the back seat of the truck, just the way I landed on my side was how I stayed, I could not sit on my butt. We were on our way and I kept telling Vic that I either needed to go to the bathroom or the baby was coming. It was raining and it was traffic hour, I knew the freeway was going to be awful. I had another bad contraction and screamed that I needed to go back home or he needed to find a bathroom. If he hadn’t made a move quick we were seconds from being on the freeway. He pulled over and saw an ambulance; he tried waving them down but missed them by a second. He jumped back in the truck and turned around back towards the house. I remember saying over and over that I wanted to go to the bathroom, from my point of view I saw the Starbucks sign, I was going to verbalize and say just go there but I couldn’t even talk by that time (I wanted a Starbucks baby I guess haha). By this time my mom was calling 911. In the back of my head I was worried it was just bad labor pains and I was going to be SO embarrassed if the ambulance came just for bad contractions, but I couldn’t even say that because I was in so much pain. We got to the apartment and I had tunnel vision, I just wanted to get back home, don’t ask me what my plan was but I just knew I was in pain. As I walked through the front gate I had another bad contraction, I screamed, Vic held me…and all of a sudden I screamed, “That’s her head! Oh my god her head is coming out!”. Vic threw off his jacket and laid it down, at the same time he and my mom laid me down and I heard the fire truck sirens. The moment I heard the sirens I knew for some reason it was going to be ok. My mom ran back to the gate to wave them in and Vic was ready to catch the baby. Her head was out and the firemen ran in with their blankets and pads and had me deliver the baby. With 2 pushes she was out! The fireman called the time of birth, 7:37am. All this took place by our apartment recycle bins and mail boxes, lol yup, not the most glamorous place to give birth. Thank goodness only one neighbor came out and she went down and out of the entrance behind where the action was. I was so relieved to have Lori come out but I didn’t hear her cry, subconsciously I think I knew not to look up. I just looked at Vic and kept saying I can’t hear her cry. He just said it’s ok, she’s ok. I saw his eyes water, then I heard that perfect little cry. Not till later did he tell me that the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck four times. Poor Vic had to see them cut the cord and slowly unwrap the cord around her neck. He stayed so strong and told my mom to stay by the door to wave down the ambulance so she didn’t have to see that and kept me calm as well. Not too much later the paramedics ran in, swooped Lori and I up onto the stretcher and pushed us into the ambulance (she was laying on my chest in a big wool blanket). By that time I paused and asked if someone could take a picture haha. I had her on my chest and I guess I was feeling good. One of the firemen took out his phone, snapped a few shots and text them to Vic. From then on I was able to breathe again. They said her vitals were good as were mine and we were headed to the hospital. She even breastfed in the ambulance! Since all that passed we ended up just going to Sharp Chula Vista which is much closer than our Hospital (Sharp Mary Birch). I have to say we were a little disappointed that we weren’t at Mary Birch, but it ended up only being 24hours there so all was well.

This space is now dubbed "Lori Lane" or the "OR" ;)

Once we got to the hospital they cleaned both Lori and I up. Lori weighed in at 6lbs 3oz and 19 inches long and healthy as can be :). Vic’s Aunt (Vayda’s Nana Tula) and his Mom didn’t even get back home before they got the call from Vic that Lori was born. Apparently they both got emotional and were shocked in the car by what happened. Vayda in the backseat of the car told them both to “Calm down” haha silly girl. So they turned around, not even making it home first and came to the hospital. Most, if not all of the family got to come meet Lori in the Labor room, including my Dad who drove down from LA. By the time our room was ready I had already gone to the restroom by myself so I guess they figured I was ok to walk. So we all walked to the room, haha yup, I walked there! Even though I wanted the epidural SO bad since the first contraction after my water broke at home, I was shocked about how nice it was that I did not have to come off of the meds at the hospital. I felt great and was ready for visitors =P. Whenever a new visitor would come by in the hospital Vayda was too cute and would point to her little sister with both hands, introducing Lori as “my new baby, my baby is here”.


After the adventure and surprises there are a million "what ifs" we can say (i.e. what if we went on the freeway or if I had made it to the bathroom), God was def looking out for us and more importantly Lori. She is truly a blessing and Lucky Lori.

Vayda's new BFF

Since Lori was born she has been a perfect little baby. She is so calm and doesn’t mind the occasional poke from her big sister lol. How is Vayda doing? Well she is defiantly loving to her little sister, kisses and hugs are always there. She has acted out for attention and is defiantly testing Vic and I with what she can get away with. Hopefully that goes away sooner than later (pray for patience for us ;).

Thank you Vic & Mom for being there for me during that crazy, scary, exciting time and in the end, an adventure we will talk about forever. Mom, I enjoyed the time we shared waiting for Lori to arrive and the help you gave us, both before and after her arrival. Vic, you will never know how much I appreciate your love and support. You really are the best doula I could ask for lol. And now you can even say you’ve delivered one of our babies :). Thank you to everyone else as well, whether family or friends, you have all been there for our little family one way or another, thank you! We’re hanging on tight; I think this adventure is just getting started.

Welcome Vayda Marie!

11.01.08 - Saturday we went to la Bellas for dinner with my parents and Vic's m0m and brother; my parents' plan was to leave that evening, but something on their car broke so we told them to spend the night and we would take care of it the next day. So we all stayed up playing the Wii till about midnight. Little did we know, their car broke down for a reason. At about 2:30am my water broke. I woke up so fast and told Vic. We both stayed really calm and began to get ready to go to the hospital. After the two of us took showers and I got my bags ready to go to the hospital (yeah, after being home for a few wks already from work I still did not have any bags packed lol) I went over to my mom and told her to get up because my water broke. I still didn't have any contractions at the time and was calm so my mom thought I was kidding and didn't believe me. When she realized I wasn't laughing she got up super fast, which also woke up my dad. Both of them were a lot more flustered than Vic and I and my dad kept saying that we were too calm haha.


On our way out of the house I still wasn't feeling any contractions and I think I was just excited to get going. I'm not sure what made me look up but when i did on our way out, I saw the brightest shooting star of my life! It may sound corny or that I'm making it up but it was beautiful and I knew everything was going to be ok...I couldn't wait to meet my little shooting star.


We arrived at the hospital, walked through the parking garage with my dad still commenting about how calm Vic and I were; as we walked in the front doors I was flooded with so many different emotions. We looked at the security and told her we needed to go to triage. She checked us in and that's when my nerves kicked in. No contractions yet, but I was nervous!!


The triage nurses checked us in, hooked me up to all the machines for my heart rate, the babies heart rate and who knows what else! Vic and I sat in that room for maybe an hour, staring at each other, wondering what was next. Slowly but surely I began to feel contractions. They were very small ones that would shock me more than hurt me (so far haha). Since our little curtain cubicle was right next to the front desk, we were listening in to the progress of our delivery room being prepared and also to them paging our doctor letting her know I was in labor. This took a little longer than it needed to because it was day light savings time, because of that all the computers were offline and they didn't have any of my medical records. It didn't look like it was going to come up anytime soon so they improvised, asked us a million questions to kind of make their own records for the time being. Finally they told us it was time to head up to the delivery room. They stuck me in a wheel chair (I hate wheelchairs, they make me nervous) and rolled me to the elevator. Vic yelled over the balcony to my mom, dad, Emilia, Michael, Sergio and Megan to let them know which room they could finally come up to and see us.


We got to the room and got comfortable. By that time I was beginning to get stronger contractions. I had decided that I did not want an epidural and I would muscle through the contractions. As time went by contractions got much much stronger and we got lots more visitors. The waiting room began to fill up with family and friends and so did my room. Vic and I used a lot of the techniques we learned in out childbirth class, we used a table to lean on while having contractions, an exercise ball, he and I rocked back and fourth like a slow dance haha, all to encourage natural dilation, we even used the bed and moved it into different positions (one being a chair, I didn't know beds could even do that!). I couldn't ask for a better coach, We worked so well together, our parents were a blessing to have in the room as well :)! The contractions got worse and I was ignoring people who were popping in to say hi because I was in a lot of pain. I think it was 4 or 5 hours into it and I thought I was close enough to push, the contractions were awful and I asked our nurse to see if it was time. I was only 3cm dilated!!!! Are you kidding me?! I was in so much pain and I was sure it was time. They were telling me that they needed to induce and use pitocine because my water had already broken, but I was pushing it off and told them I didn't want it. Well by then they said it was time and they really needed to induce because she had already been out of water for a while. Since the pitocine would make my contractions even stronger I gave in to the epidural, despite how much I wanted to deliver her natural.

Thank goodness I did get the epidural!! I was really nervous when the anesthesiologist came in, but Vic made sure I didn't see the needles, (he knows I would freak out!) held my hand and it was done pretty fast. After that I was so much better!! I had no more pain and I could actually acknowledge people coming to visit haha. By then I was still only about 4 or 5 cm dilated. The nurse told me to rest and maybe take a nap. But honestly, how did anyone expect me to sleep with so much excitement going on? I was about to have my little girl, I couldn't be anymore excited!


Finally about 4 or 5 hours later (my sense of time was all off) our nurse said I was almost 10cm dilated and I could began to slowly push while having contractions with just her and Vic in the room before paging the Dr. This was so nice because she was really looking out for me, she was great! She was all about things happening naturally, rather than forcing my body. So for a good hour She, Vic and I were talking and laughing. When I would feel a contraction coming on we would stop and push. When it was over we would take a break and finish whatever sentence I interrupted haha. Since I made it a point to not push the button for more medication from the epidural, just have the initial amount they inserted when giving me the epidural, by the time I was pushing I could feel and move my legs and feel a little pressure when a contraction came. Thanks to our childbirth class instructor for that advice, because I then had enough feeling to still push and know when to push without straining any muscles.


Now the doctor came in, they had all these tools and a few other nurses in the room for the big show. I think I pushed as hard as I could for about 20 mins (Vic would know the actual time, I was out of it) and there came Vayda Marie!!! Since she had a bowel movement in me when my water broke, the nicu nurses were in the room to check her right away and make sure she didn't swallow it or anything. She was perfect :)! Luckily I only had to have a few stitches, but the funny part is that when I was getting them, that's when i pushed the button for more medication through the epi! I still hate needles haha! A few moments later we got to introduce Vayda Marie to all of our family and friends.


11.02.08 - 1:07pm Vayda Marie Arreguin was born at 6 pounds 6 ounces and 18 inches long. So here she is, our precious angel.

Thank you to everyone for all your love and support!!! And a special big THANKS to Megan and Sergio, they made sure we got together for lunch every week to document this AMAZING adventure!!

Vayda being active at 3 days old, and the diaper bag Rita made me in the background :).