Birth Story

HI Im back...emerging from the baby fog!!

Before I get started on this I had hired a birth photographer to be present at our birth and photograph the event.  She put up a sneak peak on her blog her recap of the day is beautiful there is nothing graphic so if you want to hop on over and check out her recap she did a fabulous job---->> Fresh Birth Photography

now for my recap:

So last monday night we went to the hospital at 5pm as our dr. office instructed us so I could get checked in and set up for my induction the next day.  We went to eat at Chuys before hand as my "last meal" and then headed up to the hospital.  We arrived at 5 and proceeded to sit in the waiting room till about 730 pm as there were a couple emergency cases who came in before us and there were no clean rooms.  We were a little frustrated as the waiting room was very uncomfortable and I knew they weren't going to do anything with us till after shift change so I don't know why they didn't just tell us to get there at 7 but whatever we finally got a room and the nurse got started right away starting an IV, checking me (which I was barely 1cm dilated), getting me hooked up to monitors and then she inserted the Cervidil.  A little disk of extened release medication that helps prepare the cervix for an induction.  The monitors were so uncomfortable and Landon kept moving off the monitors so the nurse had to keep coming in to adjust them.

getting settled in

I had been having little painless contractions and some cramping for several days but once she inserted the Cervidil I really started having more cramping.  Me and hubby kind of just hung out and watched season 1 of Modern Family.  I was having a hard time sleeping so finally at about midnight I went ahead and took an Ambien to help me get some rest as the next day would be a busy one.  I finally fell asleep...

AT 3AM I awoke to a sharp contraction and then a warm feeling...my water broke... the grossest feeling by the way kinda like you peed the bed but it just keeps coming and every time you move or have a contraction, more comes...eew.  I called the nurse and she came to test the fluid to be sure it was not urine...which it wasn't...and remove the Cervidil since its contraindicated if your water has broken.  She also checked me and I was already 4 cm! NO sooner than  my water broke I started having pretty painful contractions.  I was able to dose in between contractions but was never able to really go back to sleep.

Finally at 5 am I was able to take a shower before they started the Pitocin and the warm shower actually helped my contractions, by this time they were pretty painful and I had to stop whatever I was doing and wait for them to pass...the Pitocin wasn't even started yet!

Before they started the pitocon at 6 am they checked me and I was already at 6cm.  I had hubby call the birth photographer so she could get there since things were moving pretty quick!  The pitocin was started and by 630 the contractions were so strong I was having a hard time breathing through them and letting my body relax through them and I was already riding off the bed....it hurt so bad as Ive heard pitocin contractions are more powerful I was not expecting this!!

I really wanted to do it without the epidural and it took a lot for me to ask for it especially so early.  Once they came in and put in the epidural it wasn't giving me any relief they ended up having to give three boluses of the medication through the epidural before it finally started to work, they had given me some demerol and phenergan through my IV while I was waiting to get the epidural so I was pretty drowsy at this point.

Next thing I remember waking up to get checked again and I was already 9 cm this was at 11am! Baby was still kind of high so we just needed to wait a wee bit longer for him to drop a little lower and to reach 10cm.

Around this point I also was starting to feel pressure from the contractions which then turned to pain from the contractions.  I knew I was already almost complete and didn't want to get my epidural re-bolused since I didn't want to be completely numb during pushing, I wanted some kind of sensation to know I was having a contraction and it was time to push.  They came in and gave me a partial dose of the meds just to kind of take the edge off which really didn't do much but I knew by this point I just needed to power through and get this baby out.

Finally at 1:15pm we were ready to start pushing...by 2:15pm on May24, 2011 Baby Landon made his arrival and it was the most overwhelming emotional experience!! He was beautiful and I could not believe this baby was inside me!! He looked huge and I couldn't wait to find out how big he actually was!

He weighed in at a whopping 7# 13oz which may not seem like much to some but I would have never in my life guessed he would have been nearly 8 lbs!! He was absolutely perfect!!