June 28, 2009

  • The story of my baby's birth

    **The much awaited post. Please pardon the length and possible mis-spelling of some medical terms.**

    As you all know we were scheduled for induction on the morning of June 18th. We were to arrive at the hospital at 4:00 on the evening of the 17th. We left the house, ran an errand, got a bite to eat and were are the hospital for about 4:15. By 5:00 they got us through admission and we were in our room. We brought pastries with us to sweet talk our nurses, I know they all do a great job (and boy did they) but a little bit of sweetness never hurt anyone. Besides, it's only right to take care of those taking care of you if and when you can. I can honestly say it paid off first shift!! By 6:00 I had my IV of fluids starting and the midwife with our group had come in to place the Cervadil (looks alot like a flat plastic tampon, they place is right on your cervix to help soften your cervix for dilation). That was an uncomfortable process (the placement of the cervadil) since Lillie was still so high. But we got through it and were on our way. They got me hooked up to the monitors (fetal heart beat and contraction) and I was bed ridden for 2 hours to let the cervadil start to work. After the 2 hours was up I was allowed to have potty breaks, having to unhook from the monitors each time, and I was having contractions. We were hopeful. Her heart beat was good and strong so everyone was happy. Mom stayed till about 8:00 and once she left we settled in, as best we could with all the poking, proding, monitoring, etc. for the night. Thankfully they gave me ambien to sleep and I did manage to get some rest.

    At 5:00 on Thursday morning our midwife came in again to check my cervix. No change. Yes I'd been having contractions, but they weren't productive enough to move her down and get the cervix dilating. My cervix was soft, but that was all that could be said. Pitocin was started and again, we were hopeful. Lillie's heart rate still looked good and strong, I was still having contractions which did increase with the pitocin, certainly by 9:00 (when the our doctor got there to check me) we would have progress. Mom arrived at about 7:30 with a fresh batch of doughnuts for our nurses, we aren't too proud to bribe people! Haha. Our nurses were not only fabulous but went to such lengths to hand pick our nurses at each shift change to ensure we got great care on each shift. When our physician got there at 9:00 and checked me she was still in virtually the same place she was upon admission the evening before. They'd been cranking the pitocin up every 30 minutes and we were about half way to my limit. She'd come back and check me at noon. Noon, no change. She said my cervix was very soft, so soft you could hardly tell that's what it was... but no dilation, no change, she was still very high. Each "check" was so uncomfortable because my cervix was still so high, it was worse than anything else at that point. She'd be back at 5:00ish after office hours. 5:00 still no change. Shit! Are you kidding me?! I'd been having contractions every 2 - 5 minutes all day long, nothing extreme, I can't say that they were more than very uncomfortable... they didn't last longer than I could stand, but they were there. I'd been in bed, on clear liquids all day barely even able to get up to go to the bathroom because I was hooked to so much stuff. The bed sucked, my back hurt (I couldn't tell if it was from the bed or the contractions) and I just wanted to get up and move around. We talked about our options. The first was to keep on the path we were on, back off the pitocin a bit and see if that helped (I was at max dose). The second was to stop the pitocin, allow me to move around, get a bite to eat and then start a drug called Sitotech (spelling??) its basically a tiny little pill that is placed directly on your cervix, again to help soften and dilate, it is much stronger than cervadil (dynamite in a pill) and has been used without pitocin very effectively to get labor going. Then, if there was change, start the pitocin again the morning. The last option was to go in for a c-section then. I personally needed a break. I needed to move around and eat, I needed to get out of that bed, walk, go to the bathroom without dragging all the monitors with me. I wasn't ready to sign up for a c-section at that point, so we went with door number 2, sitotech. She took me off of all the monitors, stopped the IV and I got up and walked, had dinner and a bath. I was still contracting and still hopeful that just a break and moving around would encourage our little one to come on down! Mandy came up to the hospital to visit a bit. We all sat around, I had dinner though right now I swear I can't remember what I ate. Mom went home around 7:00 I guess, the puppies needed to be fed and they had been outside all day. Mandy was going to stick around till the doctor got there, but she wasn't coming till 9:00 - 10:00 to place the new med. It was already 8:00 and I could see Mandy winding down. So she headed home. Around 9:30 our doctor came in and placed the pill, she'd be in every 4 hours to place another and check things out. Upon placement, no change, go figure. I was a bit emotional and really feeling discouraged... but trying to remain positive and hopeful for the labor that I wanted to happen. I'd had no pain meds at all at this point, didn't see any real reason. I suppose I could have justified it, there were points where I was ready for something to give me some relief, but I pushed through. I was exhausted. Luckily they gave me something to sleep and sleep I did, a bad sign that nothing was happening.

    I got checked again around 1:00 AM, no change, more sitotech. I got checked again at 5:00, no change. Ok, let's talk. Here are the options: Keep on this path, sitotech and add pitocin, see where that takes us. Or, c-section. We knew the pitocin would start contractions (which had apparently tappered off through the night since I slept so well our doctor had to wake me just to check me and administer more meds), but the problem was the baby moving down. She felt certain that the baby just wasn't coming down on her own. Wasn't sure if it was a size thing or position thing. We talked about my concerns about electing for a c-section. She said she thought no matter how much longer we kept trying I would end up with one. So why continue to torture myself? After discussing it all we all (Tancy, Me and our doctor) decided that the c-section was the best thing to do, and quite frankly inevitable. By 5:30 they had me back in the OR. Tancy barely had time to call Mom to let her know. Neither of us had time to even brush our teeth! LOL. Which for some reason concerned me greatly at the time.

    lillie's birthday 001 Here I am, they had already started, Tancy had just gotten back. I was happy to know that our baby would be here soon. Surprisingly enough I wasn't scared at all. The anestesiologist did a great job with the spinal block, I barely felt it. Honestly, the IV hurt worse than the block! Everyone that took care of us was so fantastic, we could not have asked for better care.

    lillie's birthday 002 Tancy, excited and proud. This was the only picture they would let her take that wasn't of me or the baby (once she was fully removed from my belly and under the warmer... liability issues I suppose).

    I felt some pressure, nothing major. More than anything I felt a little stuffy, like hay fever or something. It seemed to be over pretty quickly. The only thing that took forever was sewing me up once she was out. I got to see her just for a second before they took her off, then it seemed like forever since I saw her again. Luckily Tancy was with her, and I could hear her cry when they checked her out, so I didn't worry about it too much. I was just excited to see her and hold her for the first time.

    lillie's birthday 003
    Welcome to the world Lillie Tru, born June 19th at 6:54 AM, weighing 7.1 ounces (according to her birth certificate, though Tancy swears she was 7 pounds even) measuring 20 1/4" long. She wasn't the big baby we were expecting... and she was cocked in such a way (not exactly breech) that she just wasn't coming down on her own. She has a full head of soft, fine, dark brown hair and steel blue eyes. She has long fingers and long toes and big feet! I love those feet. She is absolutely perfect and beautiful.

    As soon as they would let me I held her and started to nurse, she took to it right away, like a champ. I could not have been happier!! I had to stay in recovery for a while before they would take me back to my room, which had moved to a c-section room (a room with a shower only instead of a tub/shower combo) instead of the room we were in before. Our favorite nurse came in and checked on us in recovery and would stick with us until she picked up another labor and delivery patient... then she would have to give us over to a mother/baby nurse.

    Once we got back to the room Mom was there, she'd been there since I was in the OR, the nurses had told me she was waiting anxiously in the hall, the showed her to the room because they didn't think it was right for her to be in the hallway (I told you they took good care of us, they wanted her to be more comfortable). She couldn't wait to see her new grandbaby. I was still high as a kite! I couldn't feel my legs at all. That was an odd thing. I had a catheter in, but happily couldn't feel it either. Our doctor came in and checked on us, she was off call (technically she had been somewhere during the c-section, but we didn't want the doctor with our group on call doing anything... so she stayed and took care of us), what a great doctor! We love her!! She gave me the run down of what was going to happen, the c-section had gone well, nothing remarkable and we were all right, she wasn't coming out vaginally, the section was the right choice, and not made too hastily either. She told me the catheter could come out that evening, although she would leave it in through the night so I could get some rest. I would have to get up and get moving around in the evening, at least from the bed to the chair. And by morning I would have to be up and walking around, at least the room. Our least favorite doctor would check in on me later... ugh... well, at least he didn't deliver the baby! Everything was good!