Birth Experience

Where do I even begin.....

This was definitely a long journey (long for my husband and I) to finally get to this one moment. The moment where I birth our son, and finally get to meet his sweet little self.

My pregnancy was only enjoyable in the third trimester. My experience with this pregnancy could be a whole other blog post since there was so much that went on. From having horrible all day sickness for majority of my pregnancy to being admitted to triage three times. The third time I was admitted to triage, I was feeling a lot of pressure and contractions along with feeling like I was in a fog. They checked my blood pressure and it was high. I believe 150/95. My normal blood pressure is 110/60. That raised a red flag to them, and they checked me for preeclampsia. It came back negative but they wanted to start monitoring my blood pressure every week until I delivered. My doctor was the one on call while I was in triage, and she said if my blood pressure does not go back down in a week or so, then they will have to schedule an induction.

Well..... my blood pressure never went back down, and my doctor decided it was best for my baby to schedule an induction. {My doctor stated I have developed gestational hypertension.} When she told my husband and I at our doctor's appointment, I was in total shock because we would be having our little man that following week. Like woah, I know an exact date when I get to meet him.

She said your induction will be next Friday May 4th, 2018. My husband and I's faces lit up because we were so thrilled with that exact date since it is STAR WARS DAY! We were going to have a star wars baby! I immediately said, OH MY GOSH CAN YOU WEAR A CHEWBACCA MASK OR DARTH VADER MASK?  My doctor immediately responded with, OH MY GOSH Y'ALL ARE SO FUNNY. IF I CAN FIND ONE I WILL!

Fast forward to a week later, May 4th, 2018. The day was finally here, and I was actually nervous. But still excited at the same time. I was pretty much just feeling all sorts of emotions. I heard from others that induction contractions were pretty much the devil. Others that I knew that delivered before me, did not have the greatest birth experiences. So that made me even more nervous.

My doctor did say since I went in already 3cm dilated (side note: I was 3 cm for 3 weeks--baby boy dropped really early too) my induction shouldn't be bad at all. When I arrived at the hospital at 8 am, they took us back to our room so we could get the whole process going as soon as possible. (another side note: I had to call at 6 am to make sure they still had a room ready for me when I arrived. Thankfully they did.. so at 7:30 am we left the house and headed towards the hospital)

Anyway, they started to begin the whole induction process, which was to get me hooked up to pitocin. Well my veins were so tiny, so they were having a hard time finding a good vein for an IV. It took three different people before they finally got it. So my induction did not officially start until 9:30 am. My doctor just started me out at the lowest dose of pitocin since I was already dilated.

Since I wasn't allowed to eat all day, I was worried I wouldn't have the strength to last all day. The hospital told me I could have as many popsicles, slushies, and ice chips that I wanted. My face instantly lit up because my whole pregnancy I craved popsicles especially near the end. But I think my husband was way more excited about me being able to have slushies than I was. {he kept wanting me to order more so he could have it. hehe}

Also I was initially told I could only have two people in the room with me, so of course I wanted my husband in there, but also my momma as well. Well I decided to ask again when everything started going, and they said four people. I was so ecstatic, and secretly emotional because that meant my best friend could be in the room as well. I also picked my mother in law to stay for the whole thing also. So my husband, momma, mother in law, and best friend got to experience the whole birth. How Awesome is that! {Completely forgot to get a picture with my best friend--But I did get pictures with my momma and mother in law though). My dad hung out with us the whole day, and my father in law came later after he got off work. 

Around 12:30 pm I started experiencing some low back pain, and since I have scoliosis I wanted to go ahead and get my epidural so I could make sure I could sit still enough for it to work.

The anesthesiologist said that they may have a tougher time getting it to work just because my spine isn't straight. Sure enough they had to try multiple times before it actually worked. (I was 4 cm at this point) I was actually so nervous about this part because I heard from others that it hurts so bad to get it done. The only thing I felt was the initial needle they use to numb the area but I didn't feel them doing the epidural at all.  It took about 30 minutes for it to kick in but once it did I was thankful. I could still move my feet but my legs felt so heavy. Since I wasn't able to get out of bed anymore, they hooked me up to a catheter. Which was a weird feeling, but it did not hurt at all either. The doctor on call came in and broke my water. Literally felt like I was peeing myself consistently but once again no pain.

I was thinking to myself, WOW! So far so good. Hopefully everything else keeps going like they do. Since I got my epidural and even before I got my epidural, we were all talking and watching movies and it was actually so peaceful and nice to be able to do all that.

Around 5:30pm, my contractions started really picking up but I couldn't feel them at all. Just a lot of pressure. I instantly felt like I needed to have a bowl movement. So I had someone get the nurse or doctor to check to see how far dilated I was. {At this point my husband went down to the car to get something out of it--so he wasn't in the room at this moment} The nurse came and checked me and
said... Ummm I can't feel anything but let me get another nurse to check to just make sure. When she walked out of the room, I asked my best friend what that meant since she is a Nurse Practitioner, and she said that means your cervix is completely thinned and dilated.

Oh boy! So I told her to call my husband back up here because he obviously can't miss this moment. The other nurse checked me and said she can still feel a little bit, so they told me to wait it out a little bit more. My husband was finally back in the room and he said he saw my doctor in the hallway and that she just got here. {Just in time--Thank goodness}

Since it has been almost 4 weeks since I gave birth, the timeline of everything is kind of a blur {all I know is I was in active labor for 4 1/2 hours before I started pushing}. But around 7 pm I had to have someone come back in because I was feeling like I needed to push and I couldn't hold it any longer. So they came back in and said yep it is time to push. {Once again, I could not feel my contractions but could feel a bunch of pressure down there--but no pain at all}Also before I started pushing I started feeling nauseous and hot. They gave me nausea medicine and that instantly made it go away but I was still really hot and sweating. So I asked my husband to get me a cold wash cloth to put on my head.

 It was time to start pushing {I pushed for two hours}. I would push for 10 seconds three times and then rest. Pretty much whenever I took a break my husband and mother in law kept getting me a new cold wash cloth for my forehead. This helped me out so much because I was literally sweating. Pushing for two hours is no joke. I had my best friend holding one leg and my husband holding the other. My best friend was coaching me and was counting down from 10 while I was pushing. My husband was being an amazing support system telling me to push while my mom was taking pictures. {So thankful she got to capture all of these precious life changing moments}.

 When little man was almost out, everyone yelled stop pushing since they had to go get the doctor. It was very hard for me not to push but thankfully the doctor got in there very quickly. Once the doctor was in there, I pushed i believe three times and our precious little boy was finally here. Tears filled my eyes and I couldn't quit crying. I was so beyond thankful he was finally here. 

He was the most precious thing I have ever seen in my life, and his little cry melted my heart. We got to do skin to skin for over an hour. While we were doing skin to skin, my doctor was stitching me up since I had a second degree tear. After that was done, they had to push on my stomach and that was literally the most painful thing I had experience that day. I believe they do that to get more blood out, and they were doing it every 15 minutes for awhile.

After all of that was finished, I got to breastfeed little man for the first time, and he did so good. I was one proud momma. Since they had to take the catheter out before I started pushing, they had to put one back in to empty my bladder since I couldn't go to the bathroom on my own on a bed pan.

Finally once all of that was done, everyone that was in the waiting room since 6pm could finally come meet our precious boy. This was around 11:30 pm at this point. I felt so bad that they had to all wait that long, but you never know how long the whole process will take and aftercare needs to be done as well.

We are over the moon that we have our precious miracle in our lives now. This day was truly more than I could ever have expected it to be.

 Here is the journey that it took to get to this special moment. Click Here