I am going to attempt to put to pen my Son's birth story.... but the days blurred together after awhile so hoping I can remember it all. I am sure the majority of my family that was there could fill you in on so much more detail than I could!!! LOL
July 22
I started to have light contractions that evening as I was doing some scrapbooking for Joshua's baby book. I thought FINALLY after 40 1/2 weeks he wanted to come out! I had contractions here and there that evening but nothing timeable so I went to bed hoping they would come on during the night and we would be on the way to getting that baby out!
July 23
I really had no timeable contractions still but I was having some odd contractions that seemed to last longer than a few seconds but were still very far apart. So around lunchtime I called the Dr. office and let them know what was going on and I was told to go to the hospital to check it out. Well we got there and everything seemed to just go away. No contractions and I was still dilated to a 2 as I was the week before. So we left the hospital and went shopping and to eat hoping maybe things would pick back up. But nothing.... all night... nothing... I cleaned the house and just did busy stuff just seeing if I could bring on contractions by being active. But nothing happened.
July 24
I woke up at around 6:15 dreaming I had a sensation that I had started my period or something... but when I went to the bathroom nothing was there. It was odd, so I went to the kitchen got a drink and was standing there and felt that sensation again... it was odd, so I went back to the bathroom and sat down and a gush of water started flowing... :-) My water broke...
Still no contractions though. But since my water broke we were going to have to head to the hospital. I woke Steven up and we got ready and finally headed in about 8 and got to the hospital sometime around 9am.
We got admitted and they check to make sure it was my water that had broke and sure enough it was. I got hooked up to the monitor to see if I was having any activity but no contractions still. I was told that the dr. had ordered Pitocin to be started but I asked if I could walk around to see if I could get things started up. We walked for a good while and nothing happened. Finally around 1pm they started the Pitocin drip to get me going.
When the contractions started they felt about as they had the day before when I had a few myself. For a few hours I was able to talk and joke and it didn't bother me. But it finally got to the point where I needed to breath thru them after a few hours. I think around 6 hours in I really had to work at breathing thru contractions and relax. I still had not dilated any past the 2 and they kept uping the Pitocin.
I had a great support team that helped me seriously relax alot. Im not sure who all did what but I could not of done it alone at that point without all the help of everyone. My husband did an awesome job I would say understand all my mumblings when I needed something. :-) About 9 hours in I would say the Pitocin was up so much that I was really really starting to feel pain. I was so glad I practiced breathing thru pain because I would of totally lost it by that point I think if I hadn’t. My husband right there talking me thru them was amazing comfort. I think that by that point I had the nurse check me and she told me I was dilated to a 3-4 (she told everyone else that it was really a 3 but didn’t want to tell me that lol). My contractions where not really getting anywhere besides hurting much more.
About 10 hour in I was finally to a point I was so relaxed with my breathing thru contractions that I remember being in a state of "not there/sleeping state" while relaxing thru contractions. And all of the sudden out of the blue around 12 hours in a contraction hit me that was 50X worse than what they were. I jumped out of my skin. And at that point I was in a relaxed state that I when it hit me I thought I was gonna die. Well it turns out the nurse had snuck in and pumped my Pitocin up ALOT and snuck out really fast. They had been doing it slowly but I guess she thought I wasn’t going fast enough or something (I was still a 3) so she felt the need to pump it up really high.
And because I had been thrown completely out of my relaxed state I could NOT get back into it. I was having a hard time even just breathing thru it. The contraction though they weren’t doing much - I wasn't dilating anymore!- were to the point I could no longer handle it. So I asked for a epidural. The anaesthesiologist was there in seconds to give me relief! I felt alittle pressure of the needle going in but never felt a prick or anything but instead felt the most relief I had in my enter life. lol
Once they got me all done with the epidural the nurse pumped my Pitocin way up... and go figure my contractions didnt go anywhere. In fact from what everyone was telling me as they were watching the computer they seemed to go DOWN! So after awhile of this they decided to give mt body a break from the Pitocin and take me off it for awhile. And not long after they took me off it my body kicked in and I was having better contractions then on Pitocin! After awhile of this I was able to fall asleep for awhile. Not sure how many hours in but the nurse checked me again as I was feeling some pressure and I was finally dilated to a 7. They turned back on the Pitocin again to see if they could speed thing up more. And once again it seemed to go nowhere.
I went for a few more hours like this with no major progress at all. I forget what time in the morning but it was im guess close to like 5-6am the nurse made everyone but my husband go ahead and leave the room to see if I could get more rest and maybe something else would happen. I was able to fall asleep again and woke up an hour or so later with more pressure than ever so I told my husband to call the nurse so they could check me again to see if something else had happened cuase it felt totally different than before. The doctor I guess was avaible at that time and he checked me and sure enough I was dilated to a 10... never more happy news was that to me!
I guess they had turned down my epidural at that point because I was starting to feel my contractions again. And had that major urge to push SO BAD. I finnaly got set up to push and my husband, and both moms where in there with us.
I pushed for over 3 hours....... I have never felt that I have worked so hard in my enter life. Pushing with my own contractions (they turned my Pitocin off once again for pushing) every min or 3-4 pushes each contraction for like 10 sec each... for over 3 hours.......
At one point, I guess my mom said it was about an hour in as I wasn’t watching the clock and had no idea I had pushed for over 3 hours, I had asked the nurse if I was really making any progress or was she lying to me... lol she said no you really are!
My mothernlaw told me later about half way in she realized she was the only one saying I was doing good and getting somewhere and she realized that the nurse no longer looked like I was getting anywhere. After 3 hours I was dying. When they told me how long it had been I gave up. I couldn’t do it anymore. They called the doctor in to check me and he said that they could use the vacuum if I wanted to help me push him out. But he said if his head got out and his shoulders got stuck they would still need to do a c-section. I was in tears and didn’t want to go thru another 30min-1 hour of pushing to try using a vacuum and still not get him out.
I wanted him out now. It was about 11:am at this point about 28 1/2 hours after my water had broke. Once we had made the decision to go ahead and do a c-section I wanted them to give me something more for my pain. It was the longest 15-20 mins to get me prepped for the c-section. I still had the major urge to push and since I had been turned down on the epidural I was in such pain it felt good to push myself without really bearing down. They finally got me all prepped and into the surgery room and by the time the anaesthesiologist had gotten me numb again I was so tired I was falling asleep. They kept telling me I would feel pressure when they did it and I felt all that but once they started pulling him out I could feel horrible pain. I thought I was screaming but my husband said I wasn’t screaming that loud.... :D But however much noise I was making as I felt them pulling him out the poor anaesthesiologist must of thought he didnt numb me enough cuase I remember him shooting out of his chair to look over the drape and he sat down and told me they were pulling him out. He was stuck good..... poor lil baby had a ridge on his head where he was stuck. And he would of had to have more than half his head size for me to be able to get him out!
Steven showed me Joshua for a few mins before they took him off to the nursery to get all checked out.
I was in recovery for awhile and around 4:00 pm I got to a room and they brought me Joshua and I got to hold him for the first time. He was a great baby and nursed right off.
Later that evening they told me that he had showed signs on a test that he had a infection from being in a broken water sack for 29 hours and that he would need antibiotics but they had to do that in the Nicu. My heart dropped. And from there we had a long road of recovery in the Nicu.
My recovery was much more than I had figured I might end up with. lol I woke up that sunday morning early when the nurse came in to give me more meds with musle shakes from my chin to my abdomen. From pushing for oer 3 hours my body hurt so bad. It took awhile for the meds to kick in for my muscles to calm down but I had a hard time getting out of bed for the first time becuase my uper body hurt so bad on top of the c-section. But I did it and the more I did it the better it got.
Back to Joshua, He had to have a IV by belly button as they couldn’t get a iv anywhere else it kept blowing. So I couldn’t hold him for a day and a half. He was off food by mouth as he was throwing everything up they had given him (he sugars where low so they where giving him bottles). I was finally able to start nursing him on Monday (I forget now the days where a blur) but we had a major struggle as he hadn’t had food for a day and a half by mouth and he was so frustrated he wanted it bad but my milk hadn’t come in yet so he would get so mad and not latch on. Thankful that evening I had a awesome nicu nurse that worked with me to get him to slowly with each feeding latch on better and better until that morning my milk came in and he was so happy. I was then discharged Tuesday morning but they let me keep that room as a nicu parent and pay a hotel rate for it. It was nice. So I made trips to feed him every 2-3 hours.
But by wed morning they got extremely full on the post ward so I had to move to another part of the hospital that was 3 times the distance I was walking to get to him at the nicu. I was dead. My body was worn out from no sleep... the 30min-1 1/2 hour I was getting in between each feeding was not cutting it. But Thursday morning I was told that dr. had ordered if they could put in a reg iv they could take out his belly button one and he could room in with me. Only problem was they had to find me a room in the post floor as that was the only place they would allow that. So they looked and looked for a room but none was avaible. I lost it and broke down bawling in the Nicu when they told me that. I didn’t think I could take any more of it. I was doing it for my baby but my body was at the end of it. I felt like I had been run over by 20 trucks.
That evening my husband made a trip down to the labor section to see if they couldn’t get me a room if anyone had been discharged. And sure enough one had opened up! They told me that I might have to go back to where I was if someone came in to deliver but I prayed hard no one would have a baby that night and that the ones that were using the rooms would have their babies and go to the post section so I could keep my room. It was so nice to have Joshua in with me. I could wake up and nurse him and fall right back asleep. We finally got Dr. orders that he would be done with his antibiotics sat early am so we could go home sometime sat afternoon! So happy!
Poor lil Joshua hadn’t been thru enough he developed a yeast infection on his lil bottom from being on a week of antibiotics. He is doing much better now after getting meds from his dr on monday.
He is such a happy good baby.
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