Liberty Triathlon Race Report

This was going to be my 3rd straight Liberty Olympic Distance Triathlon. Here's some of the major play-by-play:

FRIDAY, JUNE 10TH: PRE-RACE.

5:00 pm: Loaded my bike into my car.

9:00 pm: All my clothes packed. Well, "packed" is a loose interpretation. Maybe I should say "thrown in a loose pile on the chair." I had a few tri suits and lots of different tops to choose from - it was going to be a chilly morning on Saturday, and I wanted to have options.

10:00 pm: Pharmie and I went to talk to the new college neighbors. We could hear "CHUG, CHUG, CHUG.... WWOOOOOOO!!!" though our windows. It might be a year of college kids who like to party next door. But they're all 19-20 years old, so the cops will take good care of them if we need them to. ;)

11:30 pm: Pharmie shoots up in bed and says "I think my water just broke!" I followed her into the bathroom, and she embarrassedly says "Crap - I think that was a false alarm."

SATURDAY, JUNE 11TH: RACE DAY!

3:30 am: Pharmie wakes me up after being up most of the night and says "Yep, my water DID break a while back. You're not racing today, and we're heading to the hospital in a few hours." So after the noisy neighbor kids and the couple of wake-ups from Pharmie, I got a solid 2.5 - 3 hours of sleep on Friday night.

5:30 am: Pharmie and I headed to the hospital at the exact time that I would have left for the race. She got hooked up in the triage room for some observation for a while:

10:00 am - 2:00 pm: Baby had a few freak-outs inside of Pharmie, and we were all just hoping for the best. Our doctor was amazing.

3:00 pm: Started helping Pharmie with contractions on top of a balance ball. Pharmie's Mom was there (who's a Labor and Delivery nurse herself), and she was AWESOME!

6:00 pm: We walked the halls through contractions (2:00 to 2:30 apart, and about 1:00 long) because the doctor needed to see progress by 7:00 pm or Pharmie would most likely need an unscheduled C-section.

Some brief smiles between contractions

7:00 pm: Pharmie showed a little progress - just enough to be left to continue contractions.

9:00 pm - 11:00 pm: Contractions got more and more intense, but there was SO little progress being made. An epidural was discussed, and everyone thought it would be a good solution to help Pharmie get those muscles really relaxed down there to allow labor to progress. (Not to mention that Pharmie was in a lot of pain at this point, and could not have held out like this much longer.)

12:00 midnight: With the epidural in place, Pharmie was able to get a few hours of sleep along with her Mom in the room.

SUNDAY, JUNE 12TH: ADDITION TO OUR FAMILY.

1:00 am: I wandered the halls of the hospital as Pharmie and her Mom slept. One of the nurses grabbed an empty room for me and I was able to lay down. I got 15:00 of sleep and came back out to check on Pharmie. The nurses yelled at me and told me to go back to sleep, so I got another hour of rest.

5:00 am: After a total of about 2.5 hours of sleep, I went back to be with Pharmie. I had helped one of the nurses turn her in the middle of the night, and she was doing well. She probably got about 5 hours of sleep. The best news here was that when the doctor checked, she was at 7 centimeters!

7:45 am: Pharmie started pushing!! We'd been in the hospital for just over 24 hours at this point, and Pharmie got through the first hour of pushing REALLY well. Then it got harder. I was doing all I could throwing wet and cold wash clothes all over her to help keep her cool. Again, her mom was AWESOME to have there to help. Pharmie's a freakin' rock star!!

8:30 am: We saw hair! There was a hairy blonde baby ready to make his or her way through the birth canal to come meet us!!

11:15 am: After 3.5 hours of hard pushing (and just 1 day past the due date), out popped a healthy baby!!! I got to announce "IT'S A BOY!!!" to everyone in the room (while fighting back tears).

Dear blogger friends, allow me to introduce Henry Steven Stenzel:

Henry's first photo (just a few minutes old)


The 3 of us with our amazing Doctor: Dr. Doty




Pharmie's Mom who was a GREAT help through the whole process!


We all think little Hank looks most like his Grandpa (Pharmie's Dad).
They have the same big honkin' fingers!


My folks with their 3rd grandchild


Henry and his mohawk after his first bath


Clean, swaddled, and resting 6 hours after being born

So, like I said in the opening line of this post, "this WAS going to be my 3rd straight Liberty Olympic Distance Triathlon." But there was something better planned for me instead.