Details on the Birth

WARNING: DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU DON'T WANT TO READ ABOUT A BIRTH (giving birth is a little disgusting and a little (or a LOT) messy) and sorry it's so long. It's more for my sake so that I don't have to write it out in my personal journal but can read it next time I have a kid. It's amazing how quickly you forget some stuff.

I went to the doctor yesterday for my 38 week appointment. At my 36 week appt I was dilated to a 3 and 50% effaced. At my 37 week appt I was to a 4 and the head was engaged (meaning it had dropped and was at the cervix). Yesterday I was at a 4+, practically a five he said, 70-80% effaced, and the bag of water was bulging. My doctor said he was going out of town Friday morning to Sunday and asked if I wanted my water broken on Thursday (Oct. 15). He said he was worried I wouldn't make it through the weekend. This was a hard decision for me to make because the whole pregnancy the only thing I really wanted to do was let this baby come on its own without ANY kind of help. No stripping membranes or anything. The doctor said he thought I would be fine with just getting the water broken but that pitocin might be used if things didn't progress.

I wanted to deliver with this doctor, I was in pain almost constantly now, and my in-laws were coming into town anyway on Thursday. It was just too convenient and perfect to pass up so I had him put me on the schedule to be induced at the hospital. They have to call you in for inductions if they have room so it wasn't a guarantee I would get induced that day.

It's almost comical to me to think about all this because my doctor (Dr. Lunt) got called into a delivery about 3 minutes after I was put in the exam room. They said it would be 10-15 minutes before he was back. It ended up being closer to 30 minutes after he saw the patients ahead of me and I almost left with the intention of just seeing him the next week because I wanted Chris to be able to get back to work that day and he was watching Max for me.

Anyway, about 6:30 I was contracting off and on. Not unusual after a checkup but Chris asked me to call a friend to make sure they were available the next day for the induction and that night, just in case. I took a bath around 8pm and the contractions slowed way down. But afterwards, around 8:45pm they had picked back up and so I started timing them. They were already 3-5 minutes apart but not terribly painful yet and I wanted to make sure they would last. I called my sister Kristen because she goes natural and I was interested in some tips to get through the next hour as easily as possible and to make sure I was in labor. She suggested going for a walk and gave me some different ways to sit and things to do during the contractions. While on the phone with her for 12 minutes I had 3 contractions so I knew it was probably full-blown labor. I went for a walk with Chris around our little cul-de-sac and we stopped and asked our friends if they could come sleep at our house in 45 minutes when we went to the hospital. We then went home and got as many things as we could done to try to prepare for the baby and someone else to be in our home (cleaned a little, brought the dog kennels in, packed the hospital bag completely). Then we headed to the hospital.

The nurse recognized my name as an induction for the next day and I was admitted around 10:30. I was dilated to a 5+ or 6 and all the way effaced. They started the IV with fluid so that I could get the epidural. I was wavering on getting it since the contractions weren't awful yet and there is a part of me that would like to experience labor both naturally and with medication. I decided to go ahead with the epidural because I wasn't prepared with techniques to ease the pain at all and they really wanted me strapped to the monitors as much as possible. I got the epidural and the nurse couldn't find the baby's heartbeat so she broke my water to put a thing on the baby's head to monitor it from there. I was so happy she broke my water. In my mind it helps labor a lot and I was already progressing, but I really liked that they didn't wait for the doctor to do it right before I delivered. The baby was doing great. I ended up getting the shakes pretty bad at this point. It was a combination of the medicine from the epidural and going into transition so who really knows what the major cause was. I got nauseous at this point too and was feeling pretty miserable so they gave me some Zofran and I was able to fall asleep for about an hour or so. I was 7-8 cm at this point and not progressing super fast but doing fine.

Around 2am the nurse checked me and I was at 9 cm. She said I was doing great but I could have some pitocin if I wanted. I was numb enough that had no problem with that idea. Around 2:45pm or so the pressure had increased and when she checked me she said the baby's head was right there. They got the room ready (which takes a little while!) and then called Dr. Lunt. The nurse had me try pushing one time to see what happened and immediately told me to stop and that the contractions were doing enough. Dr. Lunt arrived, waited for a contraction, told me to push, to stop while he cleaned the head and got ready for the body, told me to push again, and the baby was out. One contraction. AWESOME. He held up the body, the umbilical cord hiding the gender perfectly, moved the cord, and we all saw and said at the same time - It's a girl!! It was very cool. I don't think I could believe it. They let me hold her for a minute and then cleaned her up. She weighed 7 lbs. 12 oz. and was 20 inches long. A full pound heavier than Max and one week earlier to boot!

I tried to hold and nurse her after that but the shakes came back and I was shivering so bad I felt like I would drop her. So Chris just held her for a little while. My trembling went away after about 30 minutes and she nursed great. This was such a different experience from Max that I can't even begin to compare the two. She's very cute and sweet already. We didn't sleep until about 5:30 this morning and then only for an hour and a half before Chris went home to take care of Max. I've been up since then and not sure when I'll really feel like I can sleep. Hopefully soon!

The craziest thing about this? They had three nurses, of the seven who were supposed to be working today's shift in labor and delivery, call in sick last night and they said there was no way I would have been called in to be induced as I was last on the list. I am so thankful I was still on that list though because it made me go home and mentally prepare to have this baby now instead of two weeks from now. It really helped and I got to go into labor on my own anyway.