Smithler: A Work in Progress

It's hard to believe that 3 years ago tonight was our last evening as a couple without kids. We were in Istanbul, in our apartment in Gayrettepe, celebrating our friend, Rebecca's birthday along with the Johnsons, Lindsey and Heather. We were cooking chinese food and the gas in our oven ran out and we weren't able to get more because it had been snowing for days and the neighborhood roads were not in the best condition. So, somehow, we finished cooking dinner and played games for the rest of the evening. I made plans to have lunch with Lindsey and Heather the next day and Billy helped Jeff move some of our furniture around in the bedrooms. The roads were horrible and I was so worried about everyone driving home down and up the huge hills in our neighborhood. I sent a happy birthday email to my dad (his birthday is on the 25th) and we finally got to bed about 2am.

The very last thing I said to Jeff before we went to sleep that night was "I don't see how this baby could get any lower!". Little did I know, she was about to make it known that she was ready to join us on the outside.

Three hours later, I woke up with contractions which I thought were Braxton Hicks, but when the third one came along and all 3 were in a 10 minute period, I knew this was the real thing. I woke Jeff and told him I thought it was time and we immediately went to the window to see if the snow had stopped. It was still coming down and the roads were covered. Thoughts of having the baby in our apartment flooded my mind and I was pretty much freaking out. I remember standing at the window, and praying with Jeff, asking the Lord to take care of us and somehow make it so that we would be able to get to the hospital to have this baby.

I waited until 7:30am to call my doctor hoping I would not wake her up. She answered the phone in a groggy voice (oops!) and asked me to meet her at her office. Well, our car was under about a foot of snow so we called our wonderful friends, the Byrds (who, remember, were at our house just 7 hours earlier) because they had snow chains for their car. Scott was so wonderful to pick us up and take us to the doctor's office and then again, he came and picked us up and drove us all the way to the hospital (which was about 30 minutes away).


If you have ever experienced a taxi ride in Istanbul, you will probably understand why we chose not to "taxi it" to the hospital. Contractions every 3 minutes, snow everywhere... not a time to hop in a taxi!


From then on out, everything that happened that day was smooth sailing. Arrived at the hospital, got checked in to a great room overlooking the Marmara Sea, endured contractions for a few more hours, received an epidural that worked wonders in about 5 minutes, was rolled into the delivery room at 5pm, and our beautiful daughter, Adeline Marie joined us at 5:25pm.


She was so tiny.

She was so beautiful.

I just wanted to hear her cry.

When I heard that sweet sound I was so relieved and happy and proud and in love!

Everything after that moment is a bit of a blur. Everything after that moment has changed my life in ways that I didn't even know were possible.

I was so terrified to have a child... to endure pregnancy, to go through childbirth, to change a newborn's diaper, to never sleep again! If only I knew then what I learned at 5:25pm that Thursday evening.

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 25, 2009 at 11:10 PM. You can skip to the end and leave a response.