The Story of Aaric

I wanted to go back and tell the past birth stories so that you've got the background for the current me. I had a couple other entries in mind, but every time I thought through them, I kept wanting to fill in some puzzle pieces from the past, so I decided to just start there instead.
When I got pregnant with Aaric, Michael and I had been married for 5 months and were both full time college students. He worked part time, and I worked full time. We both worked both at an Italian restaurant across the street from the school. We had no insurance, other than a little hospitalization plan that the school required us to have. I was concerned about working and going to school full time while pregnant, and decided that having an income was more important than school at this point, so I finished that semester and then withdrew.
I went to the health department and got a test from them which confirmed the test I'd taken at home - I was definitely pregnant. The nice nurse did all the paperwork and I walked out of there with Medicaid and WIC - free medical coverage and vouchers for some free food. I had to pick an OB office. I knew nothing about such things, so I just picked the one across the street from the health department, because that was also near the school and work.
There were 3 doctors: Man Doc A, who was nice, and I saw most of the time; Woman Doc, who was nice and I saw a couple of times; and Man Doc B, who I detested and saw as little as possible. Evil Man Doc B would come in, measure, listen, and then walk toward the door, put his hand on the door knob and say "Do you have any questions?" The me of today would be prepared for this and spout off a bunch of questions to annoy him. Wonder what he'd say if I told him I planned to labor and possibly birth this baby in a kiddie pool in a screened in back porch? Poor old guy, it would probably give him a heart attack. But no, the me of 2000 just shook my head. Even if I'd had questions, who wants to sit and chat with a guy who obviously is too rushed to take the time to act like he cares?
At 37 weeks, I got a bad headache at work and my feet were horribly swollen. The next day, I called the doc, and got Nice Doc A, who nicely suggested that I quit working. I really just couldn't though - I had it perfectly planned that I'd be taking off 4 weeks and we just really couldn't afford for me to take 3 more. He said that if it did it again that night, to please come in and get checked out at the hospital. Sure enough, my headache started, so off we went. All the monitors said I was fine, but this time, the doctor more strongly recommended no more working, and I agreed. And became determined that the baby had better come early. Two days later, I was up all night having contractions around 5 minutes apart. We wnet to the hospital that morning to see what was up. Evil Man Doc B was on call, and after being monitored for a couple hours, he told me he doubted I was in labor and sent me home. Those contractions kept going, every 5-10 minutes, for the next 3 long weeks.
At 39 weeks, 6 days, we had our 4th childbirth class session. Yes, we'd procrastinated on that whole childbirth class thing. This session was the hospital tour. As we walked the halls of labor and delivery, I mentioned a few times that I really really needed to be back there by the next day, and contemplated just sneaking a bit of pitocin - they'd never notice, would they? Really though, here in late July, I'd become convinced that Aaric would be a Christmas baby. That night we went grocery shopping, with me gloomy and planning to spend the next few months bedridden and hungry. I was craving corn dogs. Yes, corn dogs. In my younger days, I knew nothing of nitrates, much less trans fats - as far as I knew they were just greasy and made from who knows what, but no worse than that. I think I ate two that night. My head started to hurt again, so I tool Tylenol PM (approved by my doc) and went to bed before midnight for the first time in weeks. Michael couldn't sleep, and was up all night tie dying t-shirts and onesies.
At 4 am, my eyes flew open. The feeling of your water breaking is really indescribable. Its a gentle little pop - and the amount of leaking or gushing varies. For me, it was just a trickle. I almost wondered if I'd just peed in bed, but wondered what on earth that pop could have been. I went to the bathroom, and afterward it seemed to stop. then it trickled some more. We called L&D and were advised to come on in, so we made all the phone calls to family and got our stuff loaded into the car. I KNEW it was my water, without a doubt, when I leaned over to put on a shoe and felt another gush, stood up and it stopped, leaned over and felt it again.
So we were off to the hospital.
To be continued...
(mainly because I need to leave now)