Thoughts on Delivery
So the baby didn't come on her own, I was induced Monday night, 3/16.
We arrived at 10 PM but it was a busy night and we waited a couple of
hours to meet the resident who was working that night. She proposed
we work with the nurse midwife who was on, Melinda. I happily
accepted as I enjoy working with midwives. Melinda was a no-nonsense
type of person. She offered us the option to do cervidil rather than
start with the Pitocin drip but Jason convinced me to get things
moving a little faster (the Pitocin). By 12:30 AM the drip was
started and gradually titrated up over several hours. At first, I
didn't notice any additional discomfort, about 4 hours into it, I was
only about 4 cm--not much of an improvement over the 3 cm when I
arrived at the hospital. By 6:30 AM I was getting increasingly
uncomfortable. Melinda offered a pain medicine called Stadol
(butorphanol) which she promised would make me feel "loopy" which it
did (I imagined the nurse was in the room when she wasn't).
The relief was short-lived, as by 8 AM I was very uncomfortable. The
part that actually hurt was the peak of the contractions (they were
rated by the machine as a 0 to 120 in strength, the part that was from
100 to 120 was the painful part, I could deal with the intensity until
that point). By 10 AM, I had no idea how much more this part of labor
was going to continue, so I asked for the epidural. There were 5
others in line to get the epidural but because I was a "VIP" patient
(I worked at the hospital) I was bumped up to #2. The folks came in
pretty quickly--so quick there wasn't time to check my cervix, they
just wanted to get the epidural in and move on to the next in line.
Right before they put in the epidural, I had the urge to push (but
knew I shouldn't until it was confirmed I was sufficiently dilated).
After the epidural, not only did the painful contractions resolve but
I no longer had the urge to push. I was checked and found to be at 10
cm, the GYN broke my water for me. Had I known before the epidural,
I'm not certain I would have had it (all that remained was the pushing
part, but I didn't know it at the time). During the 10 hours of labor
before the epidural, hypnobabies was extremely helpful. I listened to
their CD #6 which helped me concentrate on something other than the
pain.
After a couple of hours of pushing (with the help of the OB/GYN as I
had minimal urge to push), the baby's heart beat would drop to the 80s
and 90s during contractions so they decided to get the baby out
faster, using a vacuum forceps. At 1224 baby Clara was born and was
wisked away to the pediatrician for exam since she was delivered via
forceps. It was about an hour later when I finally had the chance to
hold her and look at her. She was fair skinned with dark hair. She
cried loudly but could not be consoled. She was clearly not quite
ready to be out in the world (and had to be induced and vacuumed out
to get here!). She was small, weighing only 6 lbs 11.5 oz and 19.5
inches long.
Since then, time has flown by. I can't believe she is almost two
weeks old. She is beautiful (of course I am biased) and tiny. Even
when I super tired and she's still wide awake in the middle of the
night, the sight of her face keeps me going on. It's not easy but
she's worth the sleepless nights.
posted by jjwoodee at
2:30 PM
