Dr. Long texted me yesterday morning and said to meet her at the hospital to be induced. So Chris and I got ready to go, said a little tearful goodbye to the kids, and were on our way. The only trouble was that right after we left I got another text from Dr. Long that said the hospital had just gotten 3 patients in labor, so she told us to go to her office instead. So that's what we did. She did an exam, said I was at a 3, and stripped me. She told us to go to the hospital around 8:00. We debated about whether to go back home in the meantime, but after talking to Mom and having her say that it was better for the kids if we stayed gone, we decided to just go have a fun day together. First we had lunch, then we went to see The Amazing Spiderman at the dollar theater, then we went to the shops at Planet Hollywood and walked around for a long time, then we went to Wahoo's for dinner and to watch the first half of the Monday night football game. At halftime we headed over to the hospital, and we caught the rest of the game while getting set up in our room.

I had been having regular contractions since we left Dr. Long's office, but was still only at a 3 when we got to the hospital. So they started me on pitocin right away. Up to this point, I had been debating about whether to have an epidural this time because of my history of adverse reactions to them. But between 10:00 and 12:00 my contractions got to be 3 minutes apart and very, very painful. I was crying and shaking uncontrollably through each one. So I decided I'd rather lose consciousness and have them revive me, like we did with the other kids, than have to be in that much pain anymore. The worst part was having those hard contractions while getting the epidural. My nurse, Liz, held me up and hugged me and I sobbed on her shoulder while it was all happening. I must say, the anesthesiologist did a fantastic job. I did feel pretty queasy after she was done, and there were a couple times when I thought I'd either vomit or pass out, but I didn't have near the reaction I'd had with my first 3 kids. Once the medicine took effect, I knew it was just the perfect amount of relief - not nearly the amount of pain I had just been having, but enough to know when to push. There were a handful of rounds of contractions where they told me not to push even though I wanted to so bad. I was finally allowed to start pushing around 1:30 am. At that point I really felt like an old pro, like I knew exactly what to do, and I got it done. Penelope was born at 1:38. She was beautiful, and I loved her instantly.