So, we'll start a few days before.
Had a doctors' appointment on Wednesday, the 26th. I didn't really feel like this cute little baby was ready to come. Probably because out of all the pregnancies I've had, this one had been the easiest on my body. I could still turn around in bed without making a huge effort. I was still sleeping relatively well, unless my heartburn decided to hate me on some nights. I could get up and down from a sitting position with relative ease. As in, it was easier to get up and down as a 9-month pregnant lady THIS pregnancy, compared to the others. I remember being pregnant with my last child and crying a lot more that last two weeks of my pregnancy than I would have preferred. My belly felt smaller. I was sure it wasn't as big as the other bellies I had to deal with. :) This also gave me the suspicion that it could be a baby girl since I was smaller. But I wasn't about to hope too much!
Back on track to the doc appointment. Daddy M wanted me to strip my membranes- if your body is ready and the doctor does this- you'll likely have the baby in the next two days. The downside to getting your membranes stripped, is it feels awful! I can only compare it to a weed-wacker being stuck up your hooo-haw and turned on. The doctor, who's never had to feel this pain, said it felt like a roto-rooter being shoved up there. Either way- it's not pleasant. (If you've never had kids and want this done, ask them to go slow. They don't need to go crazy fast.) AND I promised Daddy M that I'd do it at this appointment.
Bring it on.
We left without me feeling any real contractions. So I was kinda bummed. And angry. And emotional. And hormonal. Basically I was a basket case. We got home and I started to walk around all over to help induce contractions. The only response my body gave me for this was my usual braxton hicks contractions that hurt a little more now. A few hours of this and I hated my body for not doing what it was supposed to do. HELLO-- I got my membranes stripped. It hurt like hell, now go into labor like I've told you too.
It didn't listen. So I went to bed and cried.
Next day. Daddy M was at school all day. Then he came home and went to work for the rest of the day. My body continued to have it's usual contractions throughout the day. They hurt more. So I figured they were real contractions now. They were just ALL over the place. Super inconsistent. I would have one, then five minutes later, have another. Then ten minutes later, have another. Wait a good half hour and have another one and then jump back down to five minutes. I couldn't trust my body for crap. I ended up going to bed that night around nine, and while lying in bed, I would still have these super inconsistent and super strong contractions. I called Daddy M around 11pm and told him what was going on. He came home from work. We called a relative and asked them to come babysit our 3 boys and headed to the hospital. I was in denial that I was in labor. The only indicator I had that may have convinced me I was in labor was the fact that the contractions were extremely strong. I couldn't walk through them-- or at least not well. I had to focus on breathing through them. And it felt oh so wonderful to squeeze out a tear here and there while trying to breath through them.
*Let this be a note to you that have no had babies yet-- the rule of wait for them to last longer than 60-90 seconds and they should be 3-5 minutes apart, might not apply to your body. It sure as heck didn't apply to mine*
We got to the hospital. A 15 minute drive. And I had only 1 contraction during the whole drive. I was pretty convinced I was going to get sent home with my 4th pregnancy. (How embarrassing would THAT be.) We made it upstairs, got put in a room and the nurse's began the monitoring. I didn't have very many contractions at first, they were just extremely strong and lasted about 2 minutes. So about 20 minutes in, a nurse checked me, then asked Daddy M and I how far dilated we thought I was. He said a 6. I said a 4. She said a 5 and told us we were staying and having a baby soon!
It was about 12:30am by this time. Poor hubby had been up since 7am yesterday and now had to be up until this little baby was born.
I settled in for the party and got my epidural. I think I was to a 6 by the time the anesthesiologist came in. He was awesome. I had almost full function of my legs and numbness right where you want to be numb. :) Not gonna lie, I was pretty tired. I tried to rest, not successfully.
Around 4am, my nurse came in to check on me, we turned my body since little baby's heart-rate wasn't doing so well on the side I was on. Turning me, for whatever reason, sent my body into high gear. During transition phase I shake like mad. My legs were going crazy, my arms and teeth were on berserk mode and the nurse decided maybe she should check me again. I was a 10!
We got the doctor in and prepped for me to have this baby. She broke my water and my contractions only intensified. I am so thankful for epidurals people. Just saying. I would watch my contractions on the monitor and some of them didn't go away for at least 3-4 minutes.
I pushed for a few minutes, but this baby wasn't descending, and the heart-rate kept dropping. So they slapped some oxygen on me. Doc had me rotate my body a bit to help baby rotate it's head the right way. After a few more minutes of pushing the doctor went and sat down at a computer. Not sure why. So, my awesome nurse kept helping me push while fulfilling her other duties in the room. The doctor continued to just sit at the computer. I'm not sure why she thought she wasn't needed in the pushing process of the delivery, but her level of involvement was a joke. At one point she stood up, halfheartedly checked me and then said something like, "Well, if I walk out of the room, you'll probably progress to where I want you to." And then she left. Leaving the nurse there to do the doctor's job. About 1 minute later the baby was crowning. No doctor in the room. The nurse runs for the door and tells me to stop pushing. As the WIDEST part of the head is working it's way through me. She just wants me to stop and wait for the doctor to get back-- not the nurse's fault. I know she could get in trouble if she delivers the baby and the doctor was outside the room the whole time. I would just like to know why the doctor felt like she had to leave. Seriously. I think I said something stupid like, "You seriously want me to wait?? Right now! At this point!"
The doctor heard the commotion. And casually walks back into the room. Lazily puts her sterile gloves on. Then asks me, "So, do you want an episiotomy or a tear?" My first thoughts, were something like, 'how about we try to get this baby out first and if it doesn't fit, we talk about a little snip or a tear down there.'
I told her to wait on the cutting. Honestly, I was just irritated at this point that I wasn't pushing this head out of me. And then she says, "I think this is a pretty big head here." At this point I was done listening to Ms. Doctor and wanted to just have my baby.
Few more pushes and I hear excited voices tell me, "The heads out!" I had a nurse with me when I was first admitted that was super excited that I had 3 boys and didn't know what the gender of this baby was. She was convinced it was a girl. She was switched to some other patients and I have to admit I was pretty sad she was moved. It was fun to feed off her bubbly energy. I told her if she's still on shift when I have this baby that she should come back and see if she was right.
So here was the big moment, the big reveal! The doctor lifted up my little baby and said, "Do you see what you have?" with a massive grin on her face. I looked and saw my beautiful little girl. Exhausted, and full of emotion I covered my eyes and cried.
I have a daughter.
I looked up to see where she was. They were wiping her off a bit and I had to ask, through tears and laughter, "Could I check again? Maybe I missed something." She was born at 4:30 in the morning and I honestly wasn't sure if I was exhausted from the full day I had just had. Or the hours of labor. OR the pushing I had just gone through, but I wanted to make sure my eyes weren't tricking me and I missed a vital body part that belongs to a boy the first time around.
They showed me her again and still in shock they handed me my baby daughter.
I held her close.
Doc was still cleaning me up and told me I didn't tear at all. Thank goodness I didn't give her the go ahead to snip me. Geez. At this moment though, I didn't really care at all about anyone else in the room but my little girl and my wonderful husband. I held her for a few more minutes and then they took her to her warm little crib to clean her up. It was around this time that my first nurse came in, thrilled out of her mind that I had a girl and had to celebrate a little with me. :)
(looking like a fabulous messy little angry alien.)
So from start to finish-- this was my shortest labor--4 hours. 4 hours in the hospital at least, I did spend most of the day not sure if I was actually having real contractions. And she's my smallest baby. She weighed in at 6lb 2oz. And a dainty 18 inches long. Now Daddy M and I just had to think of a name for her. I won't say it on here, but I will say, that the first name that came to my mind was what we named her. It just felt like that was who she was. Daddy liked it and I obviously did too. So it was perfect. We were now officially a family of 6!
Couple of extra pictures of cute baby girl!! Daddy M was holding here in these next two photos. She's only minutes old here. And I'm so in love with this little picture! She's still messy, but those cute little eyes looking at her dad-- or at least trying to-- is perfect!The last section of pictures here is me being bored and hanging out with baby girl. And of course getting a wonderful visit from Great Grandpa!
No comments:
Post a Comment