On the morning of April 24th I had my normal 39/40 week appointment ( I was due on April 26) and my doctor did an exam. How fun! He told me that I was about 1.5 cm and 50% effaced. I could have told him that... my Braxton Hicks had started taking my breath away over the previous few days, but weren't sustained long enough to go to the hospital. He warned me that I might notice some discharge due to the exam. Well, by the time I got to work, I was having some strong contractions and yes, discharge. BUT, by the time you're 39 weeks preggo, sometimes it is hard to tell if youre peeing your pants or leaking fluid and with Aidan, I actually went to the hospital thinking it was the latter when it was actually the former...so I brushed it off. All afternoon at work I kept having contractions although they weren't super regular. At one point I was looking at my wall calendar and thinking that if I went into the hospital the next day (Wed.) I'd be home by Friday. I just knew something was different this time.
By the time I got home from work I just felt like I had no control over my bladder and when Dr. F walked in the door, I calmly told him that I didn't think he was going into work the next day. All through dinner we started timing my contractions and over the course of the evening they went from 20 min apart to 14-12 min, then by 10 pm they were 5 min apart. We called my parents and told them they might need to get ready to hit the road, but we were going to wait until my contractions were 5 min apart for an hour before going to the hospital. Now this is where things got complicated because they were coming from VA. We called our neighbor who agreed to come over (after I woke up a sick Mary Frances :( I'm so sorry!!), I took a shower and straightened my hair (I looked rough in Aidan's birth pictures and I sure as hell wasn't going to let that happen again!) and then we headed to the hospital around 11:30pm. After confirming with the nurses that I was staying, we told my mom and dad to hit the road and settled in for the big event. I kept complaining about the peeing and guess what?! My water had actually broken and I was leaking fluid, not peeing my pants! Hooray! I had been waiting for a big pop and gush like the first time.
We settled in and as I got comfortable, my contractions slowed down to the point that they had me start walking the halls. Dr. F slept and I walked for about 90 min. It was boring, but the contractions kept coming until I got back in the bed when they stopped again. I also was stalled at 2 cm, despite being 100% effaced. *I totally didnt mind Dr. F sleeping. I knew if this was going to be a long labor, I'd need him to have enough energy to encourage me later on). By 6am the Dr came in (NOT MY DOCTOR! :( it was his partner, whom I didn't really like) and he decided I'd need pitocin to get labor going again. My first thought was NOOOOOOO because how wonderfully that went the first time. However, I had given walking an honest shot and I did go into labor on my own, so I knew this was the next necessary step. I also knew that despite wanting a natural labor, I was not going to feel guilty if I had to get pitocin and needed the epidural. The dr. wanted my contractions to be consistently 4 min apart before the epidural. I actually made it to 7 cm over the next 6 hrs just by concentrating on my breathing and relaxation/visualization. It was hard, but I was so proud of myself. By 11:30 am I was asking for the epidural and by 12pm it was in and I was feeling pretty good. However, like the first time, it wasn't working on my whole body. However, the anesthesiologist was awesome and re positioned the catheter a few times and actually got it to work on both sides of my body! HOORAY! She explained that my anatomy caused the catheter to move and not be as effective. 2 hrs later I had taken a little cat nap and was 10 cm! And just like that, the nurses told me I was ready to push!
Now, this is where all of my reading about natural birth came in. I knew that my body would do most of the work and if I waited until I was truly ready to push, birth would be easier and I would have the best shot of minimizing tearing. One nurse was awesome, one nurse was not so great, but Anthony was such an amazing advocate for me insisting that as long as the baby's heart rate was stable, I wasn't going to push until I was ready. Although, we did agree that if after an hour, I still didnt feel the need to push, I'd try anyway just to see how it went. By 3:30, I sort of felt like pushing, but not a really strong urge. However, we agreed that I'd push 2 or 3 times to see how it went and if necessary, they'd get the doctor for delivery. I pushed 1 time and they stopped me to get the doctor. I didn't know it at the time, but Avery wasthisclose to coming out. The doctor came in, I pushed for less than 10 min (as compared to 4 hrs with LM!!) and Avery was on my belly and Dr. F and I were crying and smiling and completely in love! I delivered the placenta easily and we donated the cord blood to the public bank. Delivering the placenta was one of the worst parts of LM's delivery because they didnt wait for it to come out on its own. I actually felt the dr. (not the same one this time) rip it from my body. It is amazing I didnt hemorage or have scarring on my uterus because of it. This time, it was out and I hardly realized it. OH, and did I mention...no tearing or stiches... HELL YEAH!!
The first thing I did was look to see if she was a boy or girl. I was absolutely not surprised to see that we had a baby girl! I knew the entire time and she is so perfect. She's already got her daddy and her big brother wrapped around her finger and I've been filling her closet with tutus and ruffles. Whew, if you made it this far, I'm impressed! So as a reward...here are some pictures :)
 |
| I love this one!! |
 |
| Getting ready to head to the hospital! |
 |
| Daddy's little girl |
 |
| she's here!! |
1 comment:
Yaaaay!!! Love this!!! So glad it was such a smooth birth. She is a beautiful baby girl!
Post a Comment