A Grand and Shocking Debut (Zadok Winston) 2012

The wonderfully hot month of June found our little family renting a few rooms from a very lovely family in the Alamo Farmstead area of San Antonio, and during the specific days of June twelth through the fifteenth we happended to be home alone as the Brown's were vacationing in Hawaii. My stomach had grown exceedingly large and it, as well as my back, were both begging for a break.  The little fella inside must have felt compassionate and so began preparing to exit the premises.  I awoke with a contraction-like pain on the night of the 12th but they never increased and I drifted back to sleep. On the night of the 13th, I again woke with contraction-like pressure, this time a little more noticable, but sleep was the stronger of the two yet again. Come morningtime, I got up early and realized that I was likely in the pre-labor stages so I decided to go on a walk with my friend Daniela. We had to stop every now and then as a contraction came and went but overall, it was a lovely brisk walk. Upon returning, the contractions had almost completely subsided so Caleb, who had stayed home from work and was cramming for an important final (the "coaching your wife through the second most epic experience of her life" exam), the text Natural Childbirth the Bradley Way, anyways Caleb went on in to work as we decided that the intense labor would likely happen much later in the day. We were not far off, in the evening the contractions started getting closer together and were a bit more uncomfortable, by dinnertime Mom had arrived to help us with Justus and to hopefully be present at the birth. After getting Justus to bed, all of us felt like we should get some sleep as the upcoming iron-woman challenge would be upon us before we knew it. Everyone slept fine, except for me. I decided to let Caleb snooze while I hunkered down on a yoga ball in the living room and endured some moderate discomfort. By midnightish, I decided to head back to bed with Caleb as I began feeling a need for his support. The contractions grew more difficult and closer together, but were very random, 8 minutes apart, then 4, then 6 minutes. Gratefully, I was getting sleep inbetween contractions. By 4:00am the contractions had reached a higher level of pain, but since they hadn't leveled out to the 4-1-1 (four minutes apart, a minute long, and all that for an hours time) we werent making any fast moves to get to the hospital. The twelve uncomfortable hours  in the hospital laboring with Justus were seared on both our minds and neither one of us wanted to be there any longer than necessary. I asked Caleb to call the midwife to get her opinion as my contractions were feeling pretty serious. He did call but first had to answer the operator's 20 questions, as a contraction came on I told him "tell her to cut the crap and get the midwife on the phone." We got the midwife's voicemail. Oh great. Caleb gently tried to reason with me by using the contraction record (7 minutes, 4 minutes, 4 minutes, 8 minutes, etc.) that it just wasn't time to go in, but I fell asleep as he was talking. The next contraction woke me with a new intensity, after it was over Caleb helped to me to bathroom. As I was taking a tinkle another incredible contraction racked my body, Caleb says my voice changed to a whimper, I vomitted, and both of us realized at the same time..."uh oh I've hit transition." (transition is the short phase right before pushing).

 There were no more discussion about when to go, we were both scrambling to get out of the house and to the hospital, ok my scramble looked more like a tortoise shuffle but I was trying. Caleb paused long enough to text my Mom with the message "we're leaving." And I kid you not, we were in the car within 3 minutes. As I was walking towards the door, the highly anticipated yet dreadful moment came (dreadful because we were still at home), my first urge to push came on.  I still made it to the car. Poor Caleb, he was trying to get me to the hospital as fast as possible (who wants to deliver a baby in a tiny VW Jetta?) but I kept commanding him to "slow down, uh ouch, ooowww sloooowwwly." The urges kept coming and I kept imploring the little guy to "just wait Baby, just wait." While on the drive, Caleb called the Cronenbergers to let Emily know she better hurry over. We also called Mom who was still at the Browns and in shock that we had left with so little notice, we asked her to grab both of our wallets as we had forgotten them in the shuffle. The midwife called and got the scoop and let us know we could come in the regular way, 3rd floor of the parking garage and then to L&D, or through the ER. I opted for the regular way as we knew exactly where everything was, or at least we thought we did. As we exited the car and between pushing contractions, I tried to lighten the gravity of the situation with "well at least my water hasn't broke, that means we still have time."

Less than two minutes later my water broke as we were slowly making our way across the breezeway from the garage to the hospital. At this point I was beginning to think we might not make it into the hospital before this little baby made his entrance. But we kept going, slowly and laboriously of course, I was feeling some intense pressure and what seemed like some extra non-me stuff in the crotch area so I felt down there and low-and-behold, I could feel a little head bulging out. At this moment we reached the end of the breezeway and went through the first set of doors we came to, oops it was a "restricted" area. After a security guy asked us what we were doing (I thought to myself "what does it look like we're doing? Having a tea party?") At this moment our midwife, Lauren found us. She calmly began escorting us towards L&D. After a few steps, I let her know that the baby was crowning. Without her eyes so much as even showing a bit of surprise, she felt for herself. Yep, it was for sure. And from that moment on, she walked beside me holding my arm with one hand and hovering the other underneath the baby exit. We sailed through the admittance area of L&D without so much as signing a single paper, Lauren just hollered my name to the lady at the desk. At this point, I could walk no more as the pushing urge could not be stopped. I was full out pushing and performing the accompanying guttural moan. I heard Lauren say "we may have to do this in the hall." "No!!" I whined, "I don't want to do this in the hall." Room 7 was our destination but Lauren realized that it might as well have been on the moon as it was a good ways down the hall, she pointed at the first room, "Is anyone in there?" The nurses said no and whisked over a wheelchair to get me into said room. I complained again and refused to get in the wheelchair (I thought it would be really painful to sit down). Lauren assured me that it would be OK so I sat in the wheelchair and much to my surprise found it quite comfortable. A nurse pushed me the remaining 10 steps or so into room 1. A whole posse of medical people gathered around with gloveless Lauren first and foremost (she didn't even have time to don them as this baby could pop out at any moment). I was pushing from my wheelchair position, she told me to slide forward a bit and with the next push out came our precious little son. He was beautiful and healthy as can be, seconds after he came into this world he was in my arms. I couldn't believe the pushing was over and he was actually here! What joy! I didn't notice at the time, but Caleb, who had been beside me the whole time, was crying tears of happiness as he gazed on his second son, Zadok Winston Pendleton. His official debut was at 5:16am on June 15th, 2012. He weighed 7 pounds and 7 ounces, and was 21 inches long. His skin and hair were dark, as were his eyes. His head was perfectly shaped. He had no trouble nursing right away.

My poor mother and friend Emily arrived moments after Zadok was born and were shocked that they had missed it. The nurses gave me a few  minutes to recover and enjoy our new little boy before they began the blur of paperwork, the funniest two I had to sign were 1) the "I want to deliver my child at St. Luke's Baptist Hospital "agreement and 2) "I want to deliver vaginally." We joked with the nurses, "umm if we don't sign do we not have to pay?" And "can we get a discount as we were here so short a time?"

Everything after his birth was a blur, delivering the placenta, getting a million vitals checks, entertaining visitors, learning how to nurse a newborn again (it's harder than one would think), and enjoying our precious addition. In retrospect, we would not have changed the time at which we left for the hospital, however we would have gone through the ER and gotten one of those fancy wheelchairs to whisk me to L&D (they were much much faster than my labor shuffle). But next time we may just stay home and not worry about when to leave, wheelchairs, and such. Caleb thinks he can handle being my coach and midhusband. No offense Love, I'll take you and a midwife ;)

Pendleton Crew Adventures in Costa Rica (6 weeks, 5th trip)

 By 3:20AM on Sept 2nd, our entire family of seven (the 2 and 3 year olds included) was not only awake but also loaded in our minivan. Accompanying us were: 12 suitcases (many weighing 49.9 lbs), 2 car seats, 1 booster, 1 stroller, and 9 carryon packs. Only a most amazing place and an alluring adventure could have have inspired us to take such extreme measures :). Costa Rica was calling.

Leading up to departure day, the excitement of all the children was unbounded, from 2 year old Adria right on up to almost 14 year old Justus. Although we have visited CR on 4 other occasions—this one took the cake when it came to excitement and anticipation. 4 years of special memories in CR, combined with the upcoming 45 days of opportunity for new experiences and new birding records, bubbled up in all the kiddos. 

 12 hours after departing our house, we arrived at our tried and true San Jose hotel having lost only 1 bag during the transit, and within 10 minutes, the boys had unloaded all our many bags and were out roaming the hotel grounds looking for birds. I enjoyed letting the little children run around in a safe and cool place while Caleb took off to go collect our bus (a mini-tour bus is what it takes to transport us these days :).

45 days later,  we have  traversed all across this little West Virginia sized country, with the cooler locale’s of Monteverde and San Gerardo being our highlights. For the last 4 weeks of journey we settled into one spot on the Caribbean (Puerto Viejo). Since arriving in CR, we  have collectively spotted______ species of birds, have spoken good amounts of Spanish, have visited world-renowned Caribbean beaches daily, have drank many many ounces of fresh coconut water (collected by the boys who have scaled many a coco tree), have been stung by countless ants (but gratefully not by any huge scorpions), have served the YWAM community by building 30 feet of sidewalk, have reunited with Teen Challenge missionaries, and met some new ones (that’s a neat story) and have eaten a ton of rice, to name a few of our  activities here.

 Although much has been the same (same location, same house, same Spanish teacher, etc.) there are a few new things that have spiced up the trip. For example, we have attempted more Costa Rican cuisine, with our favorite being Arroz con pollo (this is the star recipe), however the green banana ceviche that Zadok spearheaded is going down in the books as the most unusual and interesting. 

High points of this trip have the two nights we  stayed in the magical and cool San Gerardo de Dota, where a  Resplendent Quetzal visited a tree in our yard (ask the boys for pictures—they all got some stunning shots)! For Caleb and myself, our morning quiet times on our private balcony that features all levels of the forrest canopy are in themselves almost worth the work/money it takes to come here! Our family devotional times have been  a source of joy (although not without challenges) as we have focused on  learning about the boys and the special ways they have been wired (e.g. learning about 8 great smarts/intelligences, special giftings/abilities), discovering hints about their futures, and most importantly, hearing God’s voice on that journey. 

The boys dreaded going home. Thaddeus poetically explained that “we leave our hearts in Costa Rica” They love being able to climb a coconut tree and get “free” cocount water, they like going out into the big yard and hacking away with their machetes the coconuts till they reach the desired liquid, they love waking up early, 5:15am, and going birding around our house, and they enjoy being barefooted most of the day. Our daily beach outings are a source of great fun for them—they jump waves, snorkel, play in the sand  and build dams and channels for streams that are emptying into the ocean.  And the occasional waterfall visits are major highlights for th 3 big boys.