Pregnancy Journal - the conclusion (warning: long)
Cut, because it is super long, and has lots of gory details
Here goes my attempt to tell my labor story and the bits after as best I can. Bear with me, it will be long and possibly not as coherent as I would like (*I* was not entirely coherent a good bit of the time, and will likely have to reference Paul's facebook page for times on some of this)
At my NST on last Friday I was having a lot of BH contractions pretty close together. Dr. Dyson was actually there that night (I tell ya, that man must never go home), so he came by to check my dilation and strip my membranes and schedule me for an induction, as I was getting close to my due date (and even closer to one of the ultrasound estimations I had gotten of Nov 2nd instead of 6th). Because of the GD, neither he nor I wanted me to go past my due date. He checks me, and I am still at no dilation...he can't even get inside at all to try and strip the membranes. So the induction date setting doesn't happen, and I go home crying rather a lot.
Monday, Halloween, I go in for my planned acupuncture appointment. The doctor (have never seen her before...she is actually a family medicine doctor who just happens to also do acupuncture) is very nice and helpful, and I get kind of excited when she says that she has never had a patient who has had to come in more than twice for this before going into labor, and usually only once. The needles in my ankles don't hurt a bit going in, the ones in my hands hurt a tiny bit, but not much. Then she twists them around, and it was the *weirdest* sensation I have ever felt (please bear with me if I leave an "f" off of any words...there is something under the key and I don't have canned air at the hospital). Not painful, just...very strange and something I cannot at all describe. Then the needles stay in for 15 more minutes while I relax (and try not to pass out at the beginning...apparently I should have eaten more before going in but I didn't know that...whoops). Her assistant takes them out and I go home, very calm and relaxed, but not really expecting much.
Had lots of BHs all day long, pretty close together, but still not at all painful, so I still ignored them all day. Spent the day chilling at home as Paul had it off work as his normal day off. Went in at 6pm for my normal Monday NST. Baby was moving fine as usual, was having lots of BHs still. When they called Dr. Dyson to get his permission to let me go, he decided to schedule an induction for Friday, without even checking for dilation (he knew I would rather try not to have a c-section if at all possible). Went home super excited, as I finally had an ending point, even if it wasn't my complete ideal. (I really wanted the whole experience of being at home and getting those first signs of labor and all that). Let people know that I had an induction date, and that I didn't know if I was dilated at all yet because they hadn't checked, but that I would know Tues as it was my normal Dr. appt. day.
After the appointment we swung by the dollar store to grab a couple things, and decided randomly to pick up some snacks for Paul for the hospital bag as we hadn't done that yet and we now had an induction date. Went home and went ahead and got the hospital bags as ready as we could get them (minus toiletries basically) just so we were ready for Friday.
Paul went to bed at 9pm that night as normal (since he has to be up at 3:15 to get ready for work) but I didn't go to bed with him like I had been doing lately because I did not have to work anymore and I wanted to stay up until kelly got home from work (around 9:30 that night...crazy overtime that woman works) and watch an episode of TV with her, as I hadn't done that in a while. Ended up going to bed around 10:30 or so. Fell asleep pretty quickly.
Woke with a start at around 12:40 or so, as I felt a small gush of liquid rush out of me. Stood up to go to the bathroom and see what it was, and another gush came out. Went to the bathroom (my panties were soaked with a clear liquid) and decided it wasn't pee, as I didn't need to go that badly. Came back into the bedroom and woke up Paul and told him that I thought maybe my water had broken but I wasn't completely sure. He came to a fully awake state very quickly (it was adorable) and called the hospital to ask if we should come in (since I wasn't sure it was the water breaking I didn't want to feel silly for coming in for nothing....only about 8% of pregnancies have the labor starting with the water breaking, contrary to TV portrayals). They said to definitely come on in to be sure, so we got up and started getting ready (I changed panties and put on a pad, as I was still leaking some fluid every now and then).
It was then that I was super glad that we had gotten Paul those snacks and packed the bags earlier that day, as it only took us about 20 minutes to get things together instead of an hour or so. The entire time I was starting to panic as the fear had finally hit me (I hadn't even thought about the fact that I might be afraid at that point, hehe). Finally got everything we needed, told Kelly bye and to go back to sleep, and headed to the hospital.
Got there in good time (there was no one on the road at that point) and went in thru the ER entrance (the only one open that time of night). On the way there I had actually had about 3 actually painful contractions, so I knew that labor had indeed actually started, which only made me more terrified. They wheeled me up to the family birth place, which was expecting me since we had called ahead. Got taken to my room and put on a gown. They tried to do a test to see if what I had been leaking was in fact amniotic fluid, but it came back inconclusive, probably mostly because my leaking had slowed down a whole lot at that point. (the strip was blue, but they like to see it be a really dark blue to be sure). Wished I had brought the soaked underwear with me so they could have tested those, but oh well. They checked my dilation and I was *finally* at a 1cm. I was super excited about that, because it was my first progress. They decided to keep me whether or not it was amniotic fluid since I was starting to dilate and was having painful contractions.
Got me admitted, which I don't really remember much about actually. The fear had pretty much gone at this point in all the hectic excitement. Got a wrist band to identify me, along with one that has something to do with the blood draw they did. Got the IV line in my hand, although didn't actually get it hooked up to anything for quite a while after this. Got put on the usual baby heartbeat and me contraction monitors. Was having contractions about 5 minutes apart, which was exciting to me because that is when our birthing class said to come to the hospital other than water breaking (5-1-1, 5 minutes apart, a minute long, for an hour). The contractions hurt, but were definitely still tolerable at this point.
Order of what happened starts to get kind of fuzzy for me about here, and times really do, but I am going to do my best. So, officially admitted to the hospital at 1:32 am. Between then at 3:30, we mostly just kind of chilled. Played some cards, went for a walk around the birth place hallways, tried to relax and get used to the pain. Before I went for the walk, they had me put on the funny stretchy one size fits most hospital underwear and a big adult diaper thingy, in case my water decided to make a mess. The walk was an attempt to get things moving with dilation. At this point I only had to be on the monitor 20 minutes out of every hour, so that was nice. The pain was definitely getting worse with each passing hour, but I was breathing through the contractions mostly ok, along with squeezing Paul's hand. He was a really wonderful support.
At about 3:30 AM, oddly right as a nurse walked in to check up on me, I felt this *huge* gush flood out of me. Like, seriously huge, comparable to nothing I have ever felt before. It just kept coming and coming, for probably a good 5 to 10 minutes. Completely soaked the diaper thing, 2 blankets, 2 sheets, an absorbant cloth thingy, possibly a mattress pad or something not sure. Thankfully not the mattress itself or that would have been a real hassle. Nurse was going to do a swab to make sure it was amniotic fluid this time but after it finally started to calm down from leaking she was like, nah, nevermind, I am certain, hehe. Unfortunately the fluid was an ugly green color, which means that it had meconium (baby poop) in it, which means basically the baby needs to be watched carefully when it comes out to suction out any of that before she gets it into her lungs.
Got an entirely new set of linens and whatnot, laid back in bed with a towel between my legs as the water continued to come out a bit for hours after that. Had to change the towel every now and then. The contractions continued to get worse, but as of about 4:30 according to Paul's facebook updates I was still only 1cm dilated.
At some point in here, I got my first dose of a medicine I cannot remember the name of. It went in through my IV, which means at some point I must have gotten hooked up to the saline solution, but I cannot actually remember that happening. The point of the drug was just to, as they put it, "take the edge off" of the contractions. It was really nice, made me kind of a little bit loopy but not too bad, and made it so I couldn't really feel the contractions for a while. It began to wear off the first time in about 45 minutes or so, at which point I took a bath. The bath was *wonderful* and helped the pain as well, but after a bit it started to be unhelpful enough also.
Got the second dose of that drug not too long after the bath, and was ok again for a little bit. Think I might have napped then for the first time. Once that dose wore off as well, the contractions were to about an 8 or 9 on my pain scale and I was crying through each of them, trying hard to concentrate on my breathing but being pretty much unable to do so because of the pain. By this point it was about 10am, so I had been in labor for about 8 hours already, but I was still only dilated to a 3. My goal for the epidural had been 5cm, but at this point I knew that I just wanted it then. I knew that I was in more pain that I could reasonably stand for long and I had a *long* way left to go, so I decided to go ahead and get it, even though I felt like I was letting everyone down (the nurse had wanted me to go for another walk, and Paul was super supportive but I felt like I was letting him down anyway for not trying harder to go further). Apologized like a billion times.
Now, earlier they had told me that the only other person there delivering at the time already had her epidural so I would be first in line whenever I wanted it. Unfortunately though, there was a c-section that just happened to happen right when I asked for it, and the anaesthesiologist has to stay in the room the whole time for that. So they told me she would be able to get to me in about 40 minutes (which at that point literally seemed like an eternity to me). They gave me a 3rd dose of the other medicine in the meantime (it loses its effictiveness the more times you use it), but I knew that it would not last me 40 minutes. I was crying soooo badly at this point, I probably looked like a completely wreck.
Thankfully, another anaesthesiologist happened to be somewhere and heard we needed help so came a bit before the lady could and helped me get mine in around 11am. I had heard that the worst part was the shot beforehand that they use to numb you up, so I was anticipating that hurting pretty badly. In reality, I barely felt it. Probably because I was so used to the extreme amounts of pain that I was in from the contractions at that point, I doubt any needle would have barely registered for me, hehe. I made sure he told me what he was doing every step of the way, as I like to know what is happening to me. It didn't hurt at all going in, just felt a little strange sometimes. The hardest part was being really still through the contractions and also not yelling at the nurse when she kept trying to do other things to me during it which kept bumping me when I was trying to be still.
Finally it was in and the medicine started flowing. Then it was weird, because I could see the contractions going by on the screen, but not feel a *thing.* My legs and all felt mostly like they had fallen asleep really soundly and I kept thinking how much they were going to tingle and burn when they woke up, hehe. Finally I was able to get a really good few naps in with the epidural going though, and things were much easier for a while. Oh, I also got a catheter at this point, which I also didn't feel at all thanks to being numb down there.
At some point after the epidural went in, not really sure when, they started me on the Pitocin (drug to help contractions become more effective...it is what they generally use to induce as well). I had a feeling they were going to use it, because I was progressing so slowly and my contractions, while stronger, were still only about 5 minutes apart, or when they were closer were really irregular.
OK, I get really really fuzzy on event order at this point, so I will probably get it all down, but it may be in slightly the wrong order at points. Somewhere around in here, my temperature started to be a slight fever, about 99 or so, but the concerning part was that every time she checked it, it consistently went up a bit. Baby was still being reactive though, so they weren't *too* concerrned at this point. I remember dozing a lot during this time.
Once I was on the epidural, I was stuck in bed, obviously, so I couldn't do much besides roll over a lot. Somewhere around in here they decided to put me on an internal contractions monitor instead of the external one to measure the contractions more accurately, because the Pitocin wasn't really progressing them. They were getting stronger, but not really closer together. I was scared about this, because I was worried about anything hurting the baby, but they assured me that it would not hurt her at all. (I think I probably cried...I was crying about a lot at this point. I remember when the 7pm-7am nurse came in and checked my dilation, I cried about how things were progressing so slowly, and felt bad because the first thing she knew of me was me bawling). It was somewhat nice though, because it was one less annoying thing on my belly.
Apparently according to Paul's facebook, at 10pm I was 7cm dilated, which I remember being happy about because it had been a 5 the last time they had checked. Unfortunately though, my temperature kept going up and up, I think it was probably past 100 at that point already. They were getting slightly more concerned about the baby's movements because she seemed to be not doing as many heartrate changes. They decided to put in an internal monitor for that too, which I think attaches to the baby's head. I was scared about that too, but at that point I was so exhausted I just wanted it all over with.
Yeah, pretty sure this is all out of timeline, oh well. At some point in here, I started feeling my contractions again. I suspect they had just gotten a lot stronger. So they, I think, upped my dose on the epidural as well as giving me booster shots (not at all technical terms here) of some other drug in the epidural line to help. On top of just it wearing off, when I would lay on one side for a while, it would wear off only on my top side, which was strange let me tell ya, so I had to keep switching sides.
Oh, along with the internal heartrate monitor (which took the final thing off my belly which was nice), they had me on an oxygen mask for a while (along with turning down the pitocin for a bit) to try and get her to cooperate. That was super uncomfortable for sure, and I was glad when they finally agreed to let me just have it on and laying beside my head. Oh! And I forgot to say that because of the epidural I had to have a blood pressure cuff on my arm constantly which took my blood pressure every 15 minutes or so to make sure it didn't get too low, which is apparently a thing that can happen with the epidural. So itchy! And since the baby wasn't very reactive, the doc made me stay laying on my left side for hours, which got super uncomfy.
My fever continued to rise, so the put me on a bag of antibiotics in my IV line as well. Not that I noticed being hooked up to more things at that point. I asked the nurse (because I could see the "everything is not ok" look on her face) what would happen if the antibiotics didn't do anything or the fever kept getting worse or whatever, and she told me it would mean a c-section. Once again with the crying, but I told her my main reasons for not wanting one and she tried to reassure me as best she could. (they make sure that the mommies can hold the babies as *soon* as possible after the surgery, but I really wanted to hold her and feed her right away, you know?). I began to get my mindset OK with having a c-section since it seemed extremely likely at that point.
Somewhere around midnight, they left us alone for a good long time with all the lights basically out, and Paul and I took a really long, good nap, about an hour and a half I think. When I woke up, it was a different nurse (mine had gone on break), and she was checking up on me, and checked my dilation. I was pretty groggy from just waking up from my nap, so I wasn't sure I heard her correctly when she said "you are complete!" with a big grin on her face. I asked her to repeat it and she was like "you are 10 centimeters!" She amended it to maybe 9 3/4, but she said basically completely. I was ecstatic. I really was hoping that I would get to 10cm before they decided to do a c-section so I could at least *try* pushing her out, but I really didn't expect to be there already.
My nurse came back in soon after this and double checked the other nurse, and agreed, and said it was time to start trying to push. It was around (according to Paul's facebook) 2:15 am. I told Allyssa that she got 6 pushes and then she'd better be out, hehe. (she didn't listen of course). Had the nurse holding up one of my legs bent and Paul holding the other the same way, and I had to kind of hold them behind the knees when they told me to push, and curl up into a ball. When a contraction started, I would curl up, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, then push for 10 seconds, let it out, and do it twice more, per contraction. It was weird, because with the epidural I couldn't feel the pushing itself, like, I couldn't tell those muscles were doing anything, I only knew I was accompishing anything because the nurse would let me know.
Apparently I did pretty well with it, and she was definitely moving downward each set of 3. Paul got to see that she had dark hair at this point, because the nurse had her fingers inside me and he could look inside and see her head. Nothing was painful at this point, other than my lower back where the epidural had started to wear off a bit again. After a while though, I started to get really tired from it (hadn't had anythign to eat in like 30 hours at this point, so was hungry, plus my blood sugar was really pretty low). My biceps were hurting from holding myself curled up as well. So after an hour of this, the nurse went to wake up the doctor (he had just slept at the hospital so he would be available when she finally was ready to come into the world).
She came back in alone (I was expecting to see the doc) and told me that he wanted me to take some tylenol (for the fever mostly) and take a half an hour nap before we started pushing again, so that I would be rested and ready to go. I wasn't going to complain, as I was exhausted from it. I took the tylenol, and they also gave me another pain med booster to help with the back pain. I asked the nurse how much more pushing she thought I had to do, and she gave me the "well, it can take up to 3 hours" blah blah blah thing, and I was like, no, not in general, for me specifically, what would you estimate. She was like, well, yeah, it will probably take another 2 hours. Apparently Ally was having trouble getting under my pelvic bone.
I napped for half an hour quite well. Don't remember if Paul napped then too or not, he was sometimes pretty stubborn about actually napping. I got woken up abruptly by my nurse, doctor Dyson, and the charge nurse coming into my room. Without saying anything to me the began setting up the room for pushing and delivery...getting out all the supplies, taking off the foot of the bed and replacing it with stirrups, etc. It was very disorienting. Then Dr. Dyson was feeling inside me to see where the baby was and all, and still no one was talking to me, and I was all freaking out and asking "won't someone please tell me what is going on? What is happening?" etc. Paul and my nurse kept trying to calm me down but still no one was really answering me.
Finally I got a sort of "don't know yet, still checking on her and how she is doing, give us a few minutes, ok?" kind of answer, and realized I was overreacting because of just waking up, and apologized profusely (likely with more crying). Paul was sooooo amazing from this point on (not that he wasn't the rest of the time, but I particularly remember him being just super great from this point). I was told to put my legs up in the stirrup things (not like normal ones at the docs office...they were more like leg holders I guess, but I still had to hold my own legs and curl up to do the pushing). I told the doctor that my arms were killing me and I didn't know how long I could hold them up like that, and he said basically that I had to, because it was the only way to get me in the position he wanted for the pushing to go well. (which, despite sounding mean, was actually what I needed to hear to get myself to just freaking do it).
Paul didn't have to hold my legs anymore, so he just kinda stood beside me and helped me with words. He might have been touching me somewhere also but I really can't remember. The rest of this is both very very clear in my mind, and so surreal that I still am not sure it all actually happened. The pushing was exactly the same as before, only with more people in the room (which I wasn't a fan of, I really didn't want lots of people around but I didn't have a choice, they were all required). Everyone was saying encouraging things but the only person I really heard was Paul. He kept telling me how good I was doing and to keep going, which was good because I was *really* having trouble getting through each push.
Things were going ok I thought, but I guess the baby was still not wanting to come under the pelvic bone, so after a bit the doctor said he was going to have to use forceps. I really panicked at that point. I had heard too many bad stories about forceps, and I had also heard that you pretty much have to have an episiotomy, which I *really* didn't want. (If you don't know what it is, go look it up yourself, so not explaining it). I asked him about it, and he said no, not necessarily, so I relaxed a bit, but I was still *terrified* about hurting her with the forceps. Oh, and they had to bring in another nurse for this, apparently the policy for forcep deliveries, but I wasn't happy about that either as it meant even more people in the room.
The doc got the forceps inside and around her head, and this is the part that got *really really* painful. He started pulling her out while I was pushing, and between the forceps and the fact that her head was now actually coming out, it hurt sooooooooo bad, even with the epidural. I started babbling and screaming about the pain while pushing, and he had me stop pushing and basically said "you can't talk during the pushing or you won't actually push well enough." (Interpreted by my head...."shush you! yes it hurts, you are having a baby, now suck it up and do it and get that little girl out into the real world!")
So I went back to pushing and tried my darndest to focus on just pushing and ignoring the extreme pain I was in. I was doing more than 3 pushes per contraction now, basically just pushing as much as I could until I couldn't then resting a bit, then doing it again. Paul kept telling me how close I was, how he could see the head now, how the head was halfway out, etc. (yeah, that was fun. I ran out of steam when her head was halfway out of me...I think the forceps were even already gone at that point, but had to wait on another contraction to start pushing again, and it hurt soooooo much to have myself opened up all the way like that and have to just wait thru the pain for the contraction to start...aaaaah. Apparently according to Paul's recollections this is about when I tore).
Eventually (seemed like an eternity but it actually all wen't pretty fast) I was hearing massive amounts of "almost there! almost there!"s and then the head was completely out. They had me stop pushing immediately at that point to check for the cord being wrapped around (it was around her neck once apparently...from what I gather that is pretty normal and it wasn't hurting her or anything, but I have to stop pushing so they can fix it before going on). I thought all the pain was going to be done at that point, because all the things you see on tv and stuff once the head is out it is super easy to get the rest out. No so. The shoulders actually hurt *really* badly too. Not quite as bad as the head, but pretty darn close.
After the shoulders though, she did just slip right out the rest of the way...very strange sensation. Then all of a sudden she was on my chest, all funny colored and wiggly. I remember just repeating "oh my god" compulsively over and over and over again, like literally I don't think I could have stopped if I had wanted to. She didn't cry right away, but they took her off my chest and took her to do all the things they do right away, and she cried almost as soon as they got her over there, so I didn't freak out too badly. You can see all that part of it in the video on Paul's facebook page. Cleaned her up, weighed her, gave her a few shots, etc. During that, (I was bawling at the overwhelmingness of it all), I was getting sewn up by the doctor. It hurt a bit sometimes, but was mostly painless, especially compared to the birth itself. Apparently I had a second degree tear (out of 4 degrees), so not so bad really. I was glad I got to tear naturally, as they say it tends to heal faster and better that way.
I don't remember whether the sewing or the baby exam finished first, but soon she was right back on my chest and I was holding her. It was the oddest thing. I remember her being so warm and soft and it was soooo unreal that she came out of me. I still don't believe it most of the time. I have to keep replaying these things in my head to try and make it seem real, but it still doesn't. I honestly cannot remember when Paul first got to hold her, poor thing. I don't remember transitions at all. I was holding her, and then at some point I was eating jack in the box and Mom and Kelly were there holding her too. (dad was at work when she was born, but came as soon as he could, which turned out to be not that delayed).
She was born at 4:05 am, 7 pounds 12 ounces (*just* above average...average is 7 pounds 8 ounces...pretty amazing considering my GD and that she was basically to her due date). 19 1/2 inches long (which means nothing to me, hehe). Full head of long hair. It looked black and curly before her bath, but now it looks just very dark brown and *mostly* straight (I think it still might have some wave to it, but not sure yet). Her eyes are right now dark blue, but who knows where they will end up. She is perfect.
I was going to talk about breastfeeding in this entry too, but I think it is too much to add at this point, this is already a tome. I really really hope I didn't leave out anything big, but it is all still kind of a blur for me. More when I can.
For goodness sake people, if you read this leave me comments, I would like to know that I didn't write it all out only to have no one interested in reading it :-P
Here goes my attempt to tell my labor story and the bits after as best I can. Bear with me, it will be long and possibly not as coherent as I would like (*I* was not entirely coherent a good bit of the time, and will likely have to reference Paul's facebook page for times on some of this)
At my NST on last Friday I was having a lot of BH contractions pretty close together. Dr. Dyson was actually there that night (I tell ya, that man must never go home), so he came by to check my dilation and strip my membranes and schedule me for an induction, as I was getting close to my due date (and even closer to one of the ultrasound estimations I had gotten of Nov 2nd instead of 6th). Because of the GD, neither he nor I wanted me to go past my due date. He checks me, and I am still at no dilation...he can't even get inside at all to try and strip the membranes. So the induction date setting doesn't happen, and I go home crying rather a lot.
Monday, Halloween, I go in for my planned acupuncture appointment. The doctor (have never seen her before...she is actually a family medicine doctor who just happens to also do acupuncture) is very nice and helpful, and I get kind of excited when she says that she has never had a patient who has had to come in more than twice for this before going into labor, and usually only once. The needles in my ankles don't hurt a bit going in, the ones in my hands hurt a tiny bit, but not much. Then she twists them around, and it was the *weirdest* sensation I have ever felt (please bear with me if I leave an "f" off of any words...there is something under the key and I don't have canned air at the hospital). Not painful, just...very strange and something I cannot at all describe. Then the needles stay in for 15 more minutes while I relax (and try not to pass out at the beginning...apparently I should have eaten more before going in but I didn't know that...whoops). Her assistant takes them out and I go home, very calm and relaxed, but not really expecting much.
Had lots of BHs all day long, pretty close together, but still not at all painful, so I still ignored them all day. Spent the day chilling at home as Paul had it off work as his normal day off. Went in at 6pm for my normal Monday NST. Baby was moving fine as usual, was having lots of BHs still. When they called Dr. Dyson to get his permission to let me go, he decided to schedule an induction for Friday, without even checking for dilation (he knew I would rather try not to have a c-section if at all possible). Went home super excited, as I finally had an ending point, even if it wasn't my complete ideal. (I really wanted the whole experience of being at home and getting those first signs of labor and all that). Let people know that I had an induction date, and that I didn't know if I was dilated at all yet because they hadn't checked, but that I would know Tues as it was my normal Dr. appt. day.
After the appointment we swung by the dollar store to grab a couple things, and decided randomly to pick up some snacks for Paul for the hospital bag as we hadn't done that yet and we now had an induction date. Went home and went ahead and got the hospital bags as ready as we could get them (minus toiletries basically) just so we were ready for Friday.
Paul went to bed at 9pm that night as normal (since he has to be up at 3:15 to get ready for work) but I didn't go to bed with him like I had been doing lately because I did not have to work anymore and I wanted to stay up until kelly got home from work (around 9:30 that night...crazy overtime that woman works) and watch an episode of TV with her, as I hadn't done that in a while. Ended up going to bed around 10:30 or so. Fell asleep pretty quickly.
Woke with a start at around 12:40 or so, as I felt a small gush of liquid rush out of me. Stood up to go to the bathroom and see what it was, and another gush came out. Went to the bathroom (my panties were soaked with a clear liquid) and decided it wasn't pee, as I didn't need to go that badly. Came back into the bedroom and woke up Paul and told him that I thought maybe my water had broken but I wasn't completely sure. He came to a fully awake state very quickly (it was adorable) and called the hospital to ask if we should come in (since I wasn't sure it was the water breaking I didn't want to feel silly for coming in for nothing....only about 8% of pregnancies have the labor starting with the water breaking, contrary to TV portrayals). They said to definitely come on in to be sure, so we got up and started getting ready (I changed panties and put on a pad, as I was still leaking some fluid every now and then).
It was then that I was super glad that we had gotten Paul those snacks and packed the bags earlier that day, as it only took us about 20 minutes to get things together instead of an hour or so. The entire time I was starting to panic as the fear had finally hit me (I hadn't even thought about the fact that I might be afraid at that point, hehe). Finally got everything we needed, told Kelly bye and to go back to sleep, and headed to the hospital.
Got there in good time (there was no one on the road at that point) and went in thru the ER entrance (the only one open that time of night). On the way there I had actually had about 3 actually painful contractions, so I knew that labor had indeed actually started, which only made me more terrified. They wheeled me up to the family birth place, which was expecting me since we had called ahead. Got taken to my room and put on a gown. They tried to do a test to see if what I had been leaking was in fact amniotic fluid, but it came back inconclusive, probably mostly because my leaking had slowed down a whole lot at that point. (the strip was blue, but they like to see it be a really dark blue to be sure). Wished I had brought the soaked underwear with me so they could have tested those, but oh well. They checked my dilation and I was *finally* at a 1cm. I was super excited about that, because it was my first progress. They decided to keep me whether or not it was amniotic fluid since I was starting to dilate and was having painful contractions.
Got me admitted, which I don't really remember much about actually. The fear had pretty much gone at this point in all the hectic excitement. Got a wrist band to identify me, along with one that has something to do with the blood draw they did. Got the IV line in my hand, although didn't actually get it hooked up to anything for quite a while after this. Got put on the usual baby heartbeat and me contraction monitors. Was having contractions about 5 minutes apart, which was exciting to me because that is when our birthing class said to come to the hospital other than water breaking (5-1-1, 5 minutes apart, a minute long, for an hour). The contractions hurt, but were definitely still tolerable at this point.
Order of what happened starts to get kind of fuzzy for me about here, and times really do, but I am going to do my best. So, officially admitted to the hospital at 1:32 am. Between then at 3:30, we mostly just kind of chilled. Played some cards, went for a walk around the birth place hallways, tried to relax and get used to the pain. Before I went for the walk, they had me put on the funny stretchy one size fits most hospital underwear and a big adult diaper thingy, in case my water decided to make a mess. The walk was an attempt to get things moving with dilation. At this point I only had to be on the monitor 20 minutes out of every hour, so that was nice. The pain was definitely getting worse with each passing hour, but I was breathing through the contractions mostly ok, along with squeezing Paul's hand. He was a really wonderful support.
At about 3:30 AM, oddly right as a nurse walked in to check up on me, I felt this *huge* gush flood out of me. Like, seriously huge, comparable to nothing I have ever felt before. It just kept coming and coming, for probably a good 5 to 10 minutes. Completely soaked the diaper thing, 2 blankets, 2 sheets, an absorbant cloth thingy, possibly a mattress pad or something not sure. Thankfully not the mattress itself or that would have been a real hassle. Nurse was going to do a swab to make sure it was amniotic fluid this time but after it finally started to calm down from leaking she was like, nah, nevermind, I am certain, hehe. Unfortunately the fluid was an ugly green color, which means that it had meconium (baby poop) in it, which means basically the baby needs to be watched carefully when it comes out to suction out any of that before she gets it into her lungs.
Got an entirely new set of linens and whatnot, laid back in bed with a towel between my legs as the water continued to come out a bit for hours after that. Had to change the towel every now and then. The contractions continued to get worse, but as of about 4:30 according to Paul's facebook updates I was still only 1cm dilated.
At some point in here, I got my first dose of a medicine I cannot remember the name of. It went in through my IV, which means at some point I must have gotten hooked up to the saline solution, but I cannot actually remember that happening. The point of the drug was just to, as they put it, "take the edge off" of the contractions. It was really nice, made me kind of a little bit loopy but not too bad, and made it so I couldn't really feel the contractions for a while. It began to wear off the first time in about 45 minutes or so, at which point I took a bath. The bath was *wonderful* and helped the pain as well, but after a bit it started to be unhelpful enough also.
Got the second dose of that drug not too long after the bath, and was ok again for a little bit. Think I might have napped then for the first time. Once that dose wore off as well, the contractions were to about an 8 or 9 on my pain scale and I was crying through each of them, trying hard to concentrate on my breathing but being pretty much unable to do so because of the pain. By this point it was about 10am, so I had been in labor for about 8 hours already, but I was still only dilated to a 3. My goal for the epidural had been 5cm, but at this point I knew that I just wanted it then. I knew that I was in more pain that I could reasonably stand for long and I had a *long* way left to go, so I decided to go ahead and get it, even though I felt like I was letting everyone down (the nurse had wanted me to go for another walk, and Paul was super supportive but I felt like I was letting him down anyway for not trying harder to go further). Apologized like a billion times.
Now, earlier they had told me that the only other person there delivering at the time already had her epidural so I would be first in line whenever I wanted it. Unfortunately though, there was a c-section that just happened to happen right when I asked for it, and the anaesthesiologist has to stay in the room the whole time for that. So they told me she would be able to get to me in about 40 minutes (which at that point literally seemed like an eternity to me). They gave me a 3rd dose of the other medicine in the meantime (it loses its effictiveness the more times you use it), but I knew that it would not last me 40 minutes. I was crying soooo badly at this point, I probably looked like a completely wreck.
Thankfully, another anaesthesiologist happened to be somewhere and heard we needed help so came a bit before the lady could and helped me get mine in around 11am. I had heard that the worst part was the shot beforehand that they use to numb you up, so I was anticipating that hurting pretty badly. In reality, I barely felt it. Probably because I was so used to the extreme amounts of pain that I was in from the contractions at that point, I doubt any needle would have barely registered for me, hehe. I made sure he told me what he was doing every step of the way, as I like to know what is happening to me. It didn't hurt at all going in, just felt a little strange sometimes. The hardest part was being really still through the contractions and also not yelling at the nurse when she kept trying to do other things to me during it which kept bumping me when I was trying to be still.
Finally it was in and the medicine started flowing. Then it was weird, because I could see the contractions going by on the screen, but not feel a *thing.* My legs and all felt mostly like they had fallen asleep really soundly and I kept thinking how much they were going to tingle and burn when they woke up, hehe. Finally I was able to get a really good few naps in with the epidural going though, and things were much easier for a while. Oh, I also got a catheter at this point, which I also didn't feel at all thanks to being numb down there.
At some point after the epidural went in, not really sure when, they started me on the Pitocin (drug to help contractions become more effective...it is what they generally use to induce as well). I had a feeling they were going to use it, because I was progressing so slowly and my contractions, while stronger, were still only about 5 minutes apart, or when they were closer were really irregular.
OK, I get really really fuzzy on event order at this point, so I will probably get it all down, but it may be in slightly the wrong order at points. Somewhere around in here, my temperature started to be a slight fever, about 99 or so, but the concerning part was that every time she checked it, it consistently went up a bit. Baby was still being reactive though, so they weren't *too* concerrned at this point. I remember dozing a lot during this time.
Once I was on the epidural, I was stuck in bed, obviously, so I couldn't do much besides roll over a lot. Somewhere around in here they decided to put me on an internal contractions monitor instead of the external one to measure the contractions more accurately, because the Pitocin wasn't really progressing them. They were getting stronger, but not really closer together. I was scared about this, because I was worried about anything hurting the baby, but they assured me that it would not hurt her at all. (I think I probably cried...I was crying about a lot at this point. I remember when the 7pm-7am nurse came in and checked my dilation, I cried about how things were progressing so slowly, and felt bad because the first thing she knew of me was me bawling). It was somewhat nice though, because it was one less annoying thing on my belly.
Apparently according to Paul's facebook, at 10pm I was 7cm dilated, which I remember being happy about because it had been a 5 the last time they had checked. Unfortunately though, my temperature kept going up and up, I think it was probably past 100 at that point already. They were getting slightly more concerned about the baby's movements because she seemed to be not doing as many heartrate changes. They decided to put in an internal monitor for that too, which I think attaches to the baby's head. I was scared about that too, but at that point I was so exhausted I just wanted it all over with.
Yeah, pretty sure this is all out of timeline, oh well. At some point in here, I started feeling my contractions again. I suspect they had just gotten a lot stronger. So they, I think, upped my dose on the epidural as well as giving me booster shots (not at all technical terms here) of some other drug in the epidural line to help. On top of just it wearing off, when I would lay on one side for a while, it would wear off only on my top side, which was strange let me tell ya, so I had to keep switching sides.
Oh, along with the internal heartrate monitor (which took the final thing off my belly which was nice), they had me on an oxygen mask for a while (along with turning down the pitocin for a bit) to try and get her to cooperate. That was super uncomfortable for sure, and I was glad when they finally agreed to let me just have it on and laying beside my head. Oh! And I forgot to say that because of the epidural I had to have a blood pressure cuff on my arm constantly which took my blood pressure every 15 minutes or so to make sure it didn't get too low, which is apparently a thing that can happen with the epidural. So itchy! And since the baby wasn't very reactive, the doc made me stay laying on my left side for hours, which got super uncomfy.
My fever continued to rise, so the put me on a bag of antibiotics in my IV line as well. Not that I noticed being hooked up to more things at that point. I asked the nurse (because I could see the "everything is not ok" look on her face) what would happen if the antibiotics didn't do anything or the fever kept getting worse or whatever, and she told me it would mean a c-section. Once again with the crying, but I told her my main reasons for not wanting one and she tried to reassure me as best she could. (they make sure that the mommies can hold the babies as *soon* as possible after the surgery, but I really wanted to hold her and feed her right away, you know?). I began to get my mindset OK with having a c-section since it seemed extremely likely at that point.
Somewhere around midnight, they left us alone for a good long time with all the lights basically out, and Paul and I took a really long, good nap, about an hour and a half I think. When I woke up, it was a different nurse (mine had gone on break), and she was checking up on me, and checked my dilation. I was pretty groggy from just waking up from my nap, so I wasn't sure I heard her correctly when she said "you are complete!" with a big grin on her face. I asked her to repeat it and she was like "you are 10 centimeters!" She amended it to maybe 9 3/4, but she said basically completely. I was ecstatic. I really was hoping that I would get to 10cm before they decided to do a c-section so I could at least *try* pushing her out, but I really didn't expect to be there already.
My nurse came back in soon after this and double checked the other nurse, and agreed, and said it was time to start trying to push. It was around (according to Paul's facebook) 2:15 am. I told Allyssa that she got 6 pushes and then she'd better be out, hehe. (she didn't listen of course). Had the nurse holding up one of my legs bent and Paul holding the other the same way, and I had to kind of hold them behind the knees when they told me to push, and curl up into a ball. When a contraction started, I would curl up, breathe in, breathe out, breathe in, then push for 10 seconds, let it out, and do it twice more, per contraction. It was weird, because with the epidural I couldn't feel the pushing itself, like, I couldn't tell those muscles were doing anything, I only knew I was accompishing anything because the nurse would let me know.
Apparently I did pretty well with it, and she was definitely moving downward each set of 3. Paul got to see that she had dark hair at this point, because the nurse had her fingers inside me and he could look inside and see her head. Nothing was painful at this point, other than my lower back where the epidural had started to wear off a bit again. After a while though, I started to get really tired from it (hadn't had anythign to eat in like 30 hours at this point, so was hungry, plus my blood sugar was really pretty low). My biceps were hurting from holding myself curled up as well. So after an hour of this, the nurse went to wake up the doctor (he had just slept at the hospital so he would be available when she finally was ready to come into the world).
She came back in alone (I was expecting to see the doc) and told me that he wanted me to take some tylenol (for the fever mostly) and take a half an hour nap before we started pushing again, so that I would be rested and ready to go. I wasn't going to complain, as I was exhausted from it. I took the tylenol, and they also gave me another pain med booster to help with the back pain. I asked the nurse how much more pushing she thought I had to do, and she gave me the "well, it can take up to 3 hours" blah blah blah thing, and I was like, no, not in general, for me specifically, what would you estimate. She was like, well, yeah, it will probably take another 2 hours. Apparently Ally was having trouble getting under my pelvic bone.
I napped for half an hour quite well. Don't remember if Paul napped then too or not, he was sometimes pretty stubborn about actually napping. I got woken up abruptly by my nurse, doctor Dyson, and the charge nurse coming into my room. Without saying anything to me the began setting up the room for pushing and delivery...getting out all the supplies, taking off the foot of the bed and replacing it with stirrups, etc. It was very disorienting. Then Dr. Dyson was feeling inside me to see where the baby was and all, and still no one was talking to me, and I was all freaking out and asking "won't someone please tell me what is going on? What is happening?" etc. Paul and my nurse kept trying to calm me down but still no one was really answering me.
Finally I got a sort of "don't know yet, still checking on her and how she is doing, give us a few minutes, ok?" kind of answer, and realized I was overreacting because of just waking up, and apologized profusely (likely with more crying). Paul was sooooo amazing from this point on (not that he wasn't the rest of the time, but I particularly remember him being just super great from this point). I was told to put my legs up in the stirrup things (not like normal ones at the docs office...they were more like leg holders I guess, but I still had to hold my own legs and curl up to do the pushing). I told the doctor that my arms were killing me and I didn't know how long I could hold them up like that, and he said basically that I had to, because it was the only way to get me in the position he wanted for the pushing to go well. (which, despite sounding mean, was actually what I needed to hear to get myself to just freaking do it).
Paul didn't have to hold my legs anymore, so he just kinda stood beside me and helped me with words. He might have been touching me somewhere also but I really can't remember. The rest of this is both very very clear in my mind, and so surreal that I still am not sure it all actually happened. The pushing was exactly the same as before, only with more people in the room (which I wasn't a fan of, I really didn't want lots of people around but I didn't have a choice, they were all required). Everyone was saying encouraging things but the only person I really heard was Paul. He kept telling me how good I was doing and to keep going, which was good because I was *really* having trouble getting through each push.
Things were going ok I thought, but I guess the baby was still not wanting to come under the pelvic bone, so after a bit the doctor said he was going to have to use forceps. I really panicked at that point. I had heard too many bad stories about forceps, and I had also heard that you pretty much have to have an episiotomy, which I *really* didn't want. (If you don't know what it is, go look it up yourself, so not explaining it). I asked him about it, and he said no, not necessarily, so I relaxed a bit, but I was still *terrified* about hurting her with the forceps. Oh, and they had to bring in another nurse for this, apparently the policy for forcep deliveries, but I wasn't happy about that either as it meant even more people in the room.
The doc got the forceps inside and around her head, and this is the part that got *really really* painful. He started pulling her out while I was pushing, and between the forceps and the fact that her head was now actually coming out, it hurt sooooooooo bad, even with the epidural. I started babbling and screaming about the pain while pushing, and he had me stop pushing and basically said "you can't talk during the pushing or you won't actually push well enough." (Interpreted by my head...."shush you! yes it hurts, you are having a baby, now suck it up and do it and get that little girl out into the real world!")
So I went back to pushing and tried my darndest to focus on just pushing and ignoring the extreme pain I was in. I was doing more than 3 pushes per contraction now, basically just pushing as much as I could until I couldn't then resting a bit, then doing it again. Paul kept telling me how close I was, how he could see the head now, how the head was halfway out, etc. (yeah, that was fun. I ran out of steam when her head was halfway out of me...I think the forceps were even already gone at that point, but had to wait on another contraction to start pushing again, and it hurt soooooo much to have myself opened up all the way like that and have to just wait thru the pain for the contraction to start...aaaaah. Apparently according to Paul's recollections this is about when I tore).
Eventually (seemed like an eternity but it actually all wen't pretty fast) I was hearing massive amounts of "almost there! almost there!"s and then the head was completely out. They had me stop pushing immediately at that point to check for the cord being wrapped around (it was around her neck once apparently...from what I gather that is pretty normal and it wasn't hurting her or anything, but I have to stop pushing so they can fix it before going on). I thought all the pain was going to be done at that point, because all the things you see on tv and stuff once the head is out it is super easy to get the rest out. No so. The shoulders actually hurt *really* badly too. Not quite as bad as the head, but pretty darn close.
After the shoulders though, she did just slip right out the rest of the way...very strange sensation. Then all of a sudden she was on my chest, all funny colored and wiggly. I remember just repeating "oh my god" compulsively over and over and over again, like literally I don't think I could have stopped if I had wanted to. She didn't cry right away, but they took her off my chest and took her to do all the things they do right away, and she cried almost as soon as they got her over there, so I didn't freak out too badly. You can see all that part of it in the video on Paul's facebook page. Cleaned her up, weighed her, gave her a few shots, etc. During that, (I was bawling at the overwhelmingness of it all), I was getting sewn up by the doctor. It hurt a bit sometimes, but was mostly painless, especially compared to the birth itself. Apparently I had a second degree tear (out of 4 degrees), so not so bad really. I was glad I got to tear naturally, as they say it tends to heal faster and better that way.
I don't remember whether the sewing or the baby exam finished first, but soon she was right back on my chest and I was holding her. It was the oddest thing. I remember her being so warm and soft and it was soooo unreal that she came out of me. I still don't believe it most of the time. I have to keep replaying these things in my head to try and make it seem real, but it still doesn't. I honestly cannot remember when Paul first got to hold her, poor thing. I don't remember transitions at all. I was holding her, and then at some point I was eating jack in the box and Mom and Kelly were there holding her too. (dad was at work when she was born, but came as soon as he could, which turned out to be not that delayed).
She was born at 4:05 am, 7 pounds 12 ounces (*just* above average...average is 7 pounds 8 ounces...pretty amazing considering my GD and that she was basically to her due date). 19 1/2 inches long (which means nothing to me, hehe). Full head of long hair. It looked black and curly before her bath, but now it looks just very dark brown and *mostly* straight (I think it still might have some wave to it, but not sure yet). Her eyes are right now dark blue, but who knows where they will end up. She is perfect.
I was going to talk about breastfeeding in this entry too, but I think it is too much to add at this point, this is already a tome. I really really hope I didn't leave out anything big, but it is all still kind of a blur for me. More when I can.
For goodness sake people, if you read this leave me comments, I would like to know that I didn't write it all out only to have no one interested in reading it :-P