Despite both of us pleading with you, it came the day of my induction appointment (Thursday 22 September) and no spontaneous labor had started, so we headed to the hospital around 6 (takes a while to get there, plus we had to stop off for a bite to eat at Wendy's en route). "We" included me, daddy, uncle Kevin, Nana Linda and Papa Junior, and Nana Judy. We arrived and were admitted at 19h50, just 10 minutes before the 20h appointment time. I have admit that I was very nervous and a bit scared, but you simply could not be left in there much longer (I was 9 days overdue). It took a while to get the paperwork rolling and all that. We were placed in room 608 and prepped--this is the part I declared several times hurt worse than any contraction; the phlebotomist/nurse that placed my hep-lock IV was AWFUL!!! I have great, easily visible, thick veins that no one has ever had trouble finding--until her. She tried in my forearm, hit a valve, caused immense pain, then tried again on top of my hand, which felt most nearest to having a piece a glass shoved in very slowly. I actually said, "Please don't ever make get one of THESE again!" Grrr. Then we tried getting my laptop booted up to have the music I had selected--it would not cooperate at all (we tried several times, then it came on once we were home, go figure). Anyway, induction via Cervidil placement commenced at 22h26. I had to have 2 monitors placed around my belly--1 for your heart rate and 1 for the contractions. The induced contractions began around 2 hours later, some of which were a bit intense, but manageable. I slept between some of them, but not as much as I probably should have (I now wish I'd taken the sleep aid they offered me). I was hoping the Cervidil alone would get the real labor started--this was not the case. At 10h30 the next morning, midwife Mary came to check me. I had only progressed 20% more effacement, nothing more. 2 cm, 70% and low was the announcement. Daddy and I were both stunned; the contractions through the night had been getting into a regular pattern and it sure felt like a lot more had happened! This was my first round of what would become a series of such let-downs.
Anyhow, I was allowed to take shower (which was HORRIBLE because the shower itself was difficult to operate and control), eat lunch and walk around a little before the next step. Yep, that next step was the dreaded Pitocin (given via the IV). They started me at the smallest dose (1), and augmented very slowly until getting to 6 a few hours later. This was giving stronger and stronger contractions, which I found out after a nice pizza dinner brought in by Nana Judy around 19h, had resulted in me reaching 6cm! Yay--this meant they could break my water! Midwife Mary had a student, Kristin, working with her, and she let her try to do this first--did not succeed, so Mary had to try. It was really difficult; when she finally got it, it was soooo relieving! They warned me that the contractions would now get more intense, even with the Pitocin getting slowly turned off. If I could make progress and continue to do so without the Pitocin, I would get to move to the ABC (Alternative Birth Center) and complete the delivery as a waterbirth like I had been dreaming.
With this in mind, I was determined to get through the pain and make it to the water. I won't lie--these contractions hurt pretty bad at times, so much so that I had moved on from breathing through them to moaning through them. Midwife student Kristin had me try a couple of different positions to help the baby turn--he was 'sunny side up' and needed to roll 180 degrees to make delivery easier on me. I got on my hands and knees for bit--seriously uncomfortable. Went on the birthing ball, too--again, did not enjoy, too hard to keep a good position, especially with those darn monitors (the one for the heart rate slid off numerous times). Ended up on my side back in the bed. This went on for about 4 hours. The intensity got so bad and my fatigue so high thay my moans turned into babbling nonsense mumbles of syllables (like 'mmmmm-bbbbb-lalalala'--Nana Linda said it sounded like singing sometimes). I was getting kind of out of my head, which made me believe I was hitting transition stage. This turned out to be incorrect. I was checked about every hour to hour and a half, and I reached 7cm, but then I started having swelling at the top of the cervix. You had turned about 90 of thge 180 degrees we needed--good, but this may have caused the swelling, too. There are a few different things that can cause it, so they are not sure. At any rate, after the 4 hours and off the Pitocin, I was failing to progress, plus I was wearing out. I'd now been in labor for 25 hours with little rest. Midwife Mary said I should consider some pain relief medication to help get rest and get through contractions better. Options were Nubain, Demerol, or the epidural. I really did not want an epidural, so I thought I'd go for one of the others. Those are given via the IV and just 'take the edge off' the contractions, as she put it. She recommended Demerol, so I went with that. They gave me a test dose (half of half a regular one) and I reacted badly. My stomach hurt, felt like I was going to be sick, very uncomfortable. That option was gone, looks like I can add that to drugs I can't tolerate (coincidentally, my mom (Nana Linda) and 2 of her brothers can't tolerate it, either). So, with great reluctance, I gave in to getting an epidural around 23h30. I was again scared, disappointed, and very upset. The dream of waterbirth was over; I cried a lot and it still hurts even now if I think about it too much. The epidural took very well--I only felt some pressure from the contractions through the night. They put me back on the Pitocin, reaching level 10 dose by morning. I (and everyone else) figured I would have to be making great progress with this, especially with the opportunity to sleep and rest a bit more. Nope, no such luck. All that night was for naught--only progressed maybe a 1/2 cm and the swelling was getting worse. At this point, Midwife Sarah had taken over; she looked very sad for me when she had to recommend emergency c-section. She said you were starting to show minor distress signs and she really did not think I should try to labor any longer, my cervix was simply not cooperating. I agreed and the call was made to get it done right then. Dr. Chorezempa, the OB from the midwives' office, was the one who had to be called in to do the procedure. Luckily, I had not eaten anything after the pizza at 7pm the night before, so I was good there. They still made me drink a nasty 'shot' of liquid that tasted like salted crushed sweet-tarts in water, designed to dry up any liquid I might aspirate during the surgery--yuck. Daddy was the only one who would be allowed to be with me during the procedure, and he had to put on scrubs to be present in the operating room. Minutes later, I was being wheeled to pre-op on the 3rd floor--it was supposed to be on the same floor (6th), but due to it being the weekend and people having called in sick, there was not enough staff there, so the procedure had to be done on the regular OR floor. It seemed like an eternity before Dr. Chorezempa arrived, even though she was only about 25 minutes later than she'd estimated. I'm sure it seemed this way because not only was I anxious about the whole thing, but in pre-op, I was not on the epidural and in the time of the delay, it was wearing off, sending me back to feeling pain from the contractions. Once she did arrive, it was just a few minutes and we were off to the OR. Daddy had to wait until they had me anesthetized before he was allowed to come in. The relief was immediate when they restarted the medicine through the epidural. It felt strange--strapped my arms out to the sides and the last sensation I really felt was when the cleansed my belly skin. After that, total numbness and cold. Daddy came in and they started maneuvering all my parts around--a strange feeling. He talked to me sweetly for a few minutes and then I heard the best sound in the world: your cry! I doubt I'll ever forget how it sounded. Tears of overwhelming joy streamed down my face as I looked at your daddy and proclaimed, "we made it, we did it!" I think I asked how he looked and he said great, and that you had such big hands! Then he got to go over to where they were going to clean you off and they let him cut the cord, too. After that, he brought you over to show me and let me feel your face and hair, though I could barely tell I was doing so (I only knew because I was watching my hand). I told you I loved you, then you and dad had to go to the nursery to finish taking care of you. You were born at 12:16pm on Saturday the 24th of September--I recall them announcing this, among many other things, before they started putting me back together. This part of the operation was rather unpleasant--I gagged a few times, started shaking from the medicine, felt very weird and uncomfortable. The worst was when they had to move me from the table to the transport bed--even though it was just a roll back and forth, it was as though I'd just been put in an intense roller coaster, causing me to gag some more.
As they wheeled me to recovery, I started to get even colder and shakier, but the nausea had disappeared. The nurse in recovery was super nice--her name was Ann. She put warm blankets on me and they gave me a morphine IV to help with the pain, instructing me to self dose before it got too intense (to keep ahead of the pain, if you will). After an hour, I was supposed to be going up to see you; again, with it being the weekend, there was not enough staff and transport was an hour behind. Ann tired her best to get me up there as quickly as she could, but it still took two hours instead of the one. Meanwhile, I found out dad had a great time talking to you and just bonding with you while you waited on me. We were placed in room 638, where we would spend the next few days recovering...which I will tell about in another entry!
