Little Dude's Birth Story

During my last trimester of my pregnancy with Little Dude, my hips and back gave me a lot of problems.  By the time I hit 40 weeks, I was a lot of pain, barely able to walk, and ready to have the baby NOW.  However, since my other three pregnancies went to 42, 41, and 42 weeks respectively, I figured I still had some time to go, especially since both of the 42 week pregnancies had to be induced.

One day before my due date, I felt an urgency to finish up all the last minute things I had on my to-do list such as packing the suitcases for the kids, packing the hospital bag, getting the baby stuff out, etc.  I spent Monday and Tuesday working on things from my to-do list in between resting because of the pain in my hips and back.  On Wednesday, March 5th (one day after my due date), I woke up not feeling well.  My lower back ached, and I was having a lot of cramping and contractions.  I spent most of the day on the couch with a heating pad on my back.  Things got progressively worse as the day wore on and I couldn't help wondering if it was the beginning of something, but I didn't let myself get my hopes up.  Around 4 in the afternoon, I went to the bathroom and realized that I'd lost my mucous plug so I knew that things were going somewhere, but since that had happened 2 days before going into labor with Little Man, I didn't read into it too much other than to be happy that it probably meant I wouldn't have to be induced again.

Home from the hospital at 1 day old

Hubby took the kids to church that evening while I stayed home because I was in no shape to go out.  Right after they left, the contractions started becoming stronger and more frequent.  By the time they arrived home an hour and a half later, the contractions were becoming pretty regular.  However, I was still in denial since I didn't believe that I could go into labor that "early."  I started timing the contractions and by 10:00, they were about 6 minutes apart and strong enough that I finally felt certain that this was it.  I called the birthcenter and let them know we were on our way and then called Hubby's mom to come stay with the kids.  By 10:30 pm, we were on the road.  In the 40 minutes it took to get there, the contractions became much worse and were less than 4 minutes apart when we arrived at the birthcenter.    

The nurse checked me at midnight and I was dilated to 4 centimeters.  I was a little disappointed because the contractions were pretty strong and painful by that point so I had been hoping to be a little bit further along.  The doctor wanted to be sure that I was progressing before formally admitting me so we settled in to wait until 2 am when I would be checked again.  By 2 am, I was in a lot of pain with terrible back labor and ready to get an epidural.  The nurse checked me and I was dilated to 6 centimeters so I was admitted and the anesthesiologist was called.  He arrived a little before 2:30 to start the epidural and it didn't take him long to get it in.

Sleeping in the pack n' play

The relief I was expecting from the epidural never came though.  It did absolutely nothing for the pain even though the anesthesiologist kept increasing the dose to try to make me more comfortable.  The contractions were incredibly intense and getting closer together.     

I should have seen the signs that I was in the transition stage of labor-I was shaking, throwing up, having hot flashes, feeling a lot of pressure, etc.  I didn't think I could go from 6 cm to 10 cm in an hour though!  A few minutes after 3 am, I started to throw up again and as I did, I felt an incredible pain and pressure in my pelvis that didn't let up.  I yelled for the nurse and when I told her what was happening, she ran to hit the call button for the doctor and the next thing I knew, the room was full of nurses and the doctor was throwing her gown on as fast as she could.  Two quick pushes and the baby was out.

Random fun fact: The doctor who delivered Little Dude was the same one who delivered Little Man.

Little Man shared his special John Deere blanket with his little brother

The doctor laid him on my chest as soon as he was born and the first thing I noticed was that he was completely green, like a little alien.  It turns out that he had had a bowel movement before birth, but because my water didn't break until after he was delivered, nobody realized it.  He was born still in his amniotic sac which broke on its own after delivery.  This is pretty rare and only happens in about 1 in 800,000 births  Thankfully, he was born so quickly that he didn't get a chance to inhale any of the meconium so he was fine.  He was observed for a while that night and periodically throughout the next day just to be safe though.

We could have stayed in the hospital until Saturday, but opted to leave on Friday instead.  I wanted to rest at home instead of in an uncomfortable hospital bed and Little Dude was doing great so we didn't see the point in staying an extra day.

Little Man shared his special John Deere blanket with his little brother

My recoveries after having Little Man and Star were fairly easy (aside from the cellulitis I got after having Star), so I was expecting this one to go smoothly too.  Unfortunately, this pregnancy messed up my back and hips pretty badly so it's been rough, plus I'm just not springing back from giving birth the way I had hoped.  Thankfully, Hubby's mom kept the three older kids for a full week giving me time to rest at home, and Hubby has been absolutely wonderful helping out around the house and with the kids.  My parents and my younger sister have also set aside their own plans to come over and help me out.   

Star's Birth Story

I was scheduled to be induced on Thursday, September 27th, at 11 days overdue.  I called the birth center Thursday morning and they asked me to call back at 10 am to see if things had settled down there enough for me to come in.  At 10 am, they were still really busy so my induction was rescheduled for Friday.  It actually turned out to be a good thing though because I had a very relaxed day with the kids and was able to finish a few sewing projects.  The next morning, I called the birth center again and they told me to go ahead and come in to be induced.

We got there at 8 am and the doctor came in to check me before he put the Cytotec in.  I was still at 1-2 cm which is what I had been on Monday when I was checked.  I was kind of discouraged about that, but I wasn't leaving that hospital without a baby!  A few hours after the Cytotec was put in, I started having some mild cramping and a few contractions, but nothing worse than what I had been having for the last few weeks.  The doctor came back after 4 hours to see if I'd made any progress and put in another dose of Cytotec if necessary.  I was barely at 3 cm so we settled in for another 4 hours of waiting for the Cytotec to kick in.  Within a few hours, the contractions were getting worse, but still not anything too bad.  They were pretty irregular and didn't seem to be getting me anywhere.  Sure enough, when the doctor checked me again 4 hours later, I was only 4 cm.  We'd been at the birth center for over 8 hours by this point and had been really hoping things would move a little bit faster than they were.  The doctor decided to break my water to see if things would speed up.  Before he broke it, he asked me if I was sure I wanted to do that as there would be no turning back after that.  Ummmm, I was almost 2 weeks overdue and had been at the birth center all day with cramping and contractions.  YES, I was ready!

About an hour after my water was broken, the contractions started to get pretty painful and the baby's heartbeat started to dip.  I was started on a saline drip which got the baby's heartbeat right back up where it needed to be.  I was checked again at around 8 pm and was still at 4 cm, but the contractions were becoming pretty unbearable and since I knew we still had a long way to go, I asked for an epidural.  Around 9 pm, the doctor decided to start some Pitocin to see if that would work since nothing else was really getting things done.  Thanks to the epidural, the Pitocin didn't make much of a difference in my pain level, but it finally did the trick!  In less than 3 hours, I went from 4 cm to 10 and was finally ready to push.

The nurse called for the doctor and had me start pushing while we waited for him to get there, assuming I would be pushing for a while.  During the second push, she suddenly told me I had to stop pushing and wait for the doctor.  He ran in, threw his gloves and gown on (which seemed to take forever since all I wanted to do at that point was push) and caught the baby on the next push.

At this point, Hubby and I got what was probably the biggest surprise of our lives when the doctor announced that we had a baby girl as the ultrasound back in April had clearly showed a boy or so we thought!

Just born!

The nurse laid the baby on my chest where she promptly peed on me.  I couldn't stop crying and absolutely couldn't believe that I had another little girl!  I had been kind of hoping for a girl before the ultrasound, but had gotten used to the idea of a boy so having to change my mindset so suddenly was a huge shock.

While the baby was being cleaned up, I called the grandparents.  I called my mom first and the first thing I said was "She's here!" to which my mom replied, "She?!?!  No, it's a boy!" It took a minute to convince her that I wasn't pulling her leg.  I asked her not to call my sister (who, being pregnant, had asked me to wait to call her until at least 7 am) because I wanted to be the one to talk to her myself in the morning.  Next, I called Hubby's mom who was also completely surprised, but thrilled nonetheless!

About an hour after the baby was born, a nurse came in to give me the pneumoccocal vaccine which my doctor wanted me to get because of my severe asthma.  She gave it to me in my leg several hours before the epidural wore off.  By Saturday evening, the injection site was red, slightly swollen, and sore, but I wrote it off to not moving my leg around enough after the shot.

5 days old

The next morning, I was discharged and we packed everything up to go home.  We were waiting for the pediatrician to come in and discharge the baby when all of a sudden, I was freezing, aching all over, and extremely tired.  I climbed back into bed and tried to get warm, but was shivering so badly that the whole bed was shaking.  The nurse called the doctor back in and he decided to start me on several antibiotics through an iv since my symptoms and high fever had come on so quickly.  The nurse piled 6 extra blankets, including 2 warmed blankets on me, but I still couldn't get warm.  By this time, my whole thigh where I had gotten the shot the day before was extremely painful, swollen, and bright red.  After a day of sleeping and antibiotics, I felt a little better and my fever came down considerably.  My leg was still so painful that I couldn't bear anything or anyone to touch it and I could barely walk.

8 days old

Monday morning, I spiked another fever and all my symptoms came back, although not as severely as the day before.  The doctor decided to keep me one more night.  During the night, the pain in my leg improved considerably to the point where I could move it around.

Two days after we were supposed to be discharged, we finally got to leave although I had another 7 days of oral antibiotics to take.  The doctor came to the conclusion that somehow the injection had caused cellulitis in my leg.  He said it was a good thing that it had happened while I was still in the hospital and not after I got home!

8 days old

So basically, the labor and delivery weren't that bad and I felt great afterwords, but one little shot is what did me in!  It's been over a week since my symptoms started in my leg and although it's still a little swollen and sore if one of the kids kick me in the leg (which happens way more than I realized!), I'm feeling almost 100% again.

I think I've finally decided on a name to call Baby Girl on the blog!  I'll introduce her in the next post.   :)   


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