We are so happy Charlotte is here! It was a long process for
this little girl to get here. My Birth Story is a little long but I loved
reading about other’s experiences and here is mine. We were in the hospital for
6 days and 5 nights…
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| 41 weeks! Happy to finally be delivering |
Our induction was scheduled for May 9th at 8:30
am. The day before, I cleaned the house and just got things ready. I was really
happy that I was able to get so much done considering I was 41 weeks pregnant.
I was a mix of emotions- sad, because I wouldn’t be able to feel her in my
belly anymore and just keep her there safe and sound and nourished, relief-
because I was able to finally know when she’d be coming and we could finally meet
her, and nervous because I was planning on a natural birth and was hoping my
strength would carry me through to the end.
When we arrived at the hospital, I wasn’t even dilated so we
had to decide on which ‘ripening’ medication to take for my cervix to soften. First
they stuck an IV in me and then some saline to keep me hydrated..well it did. I
was peeing every 20 minutes. (The saline was stupid cause I was still eating
and drinking. That was one of the things that annoyed us, when the shift change
happened and we got a new nurse, she took the saline off- whew!) We wanted a
drug called cervidil, but the way my cervix was sitting, we had to go with a
drug called cytotec. I had to take two doses and 8 hours later I was barely a
three. Disappointed yes, but I was hopeful that the pitocin would work and get
things going. Well, as you read earlier, my plan was to have a natural birth
but because I was dilating so slow and they wanted to start the pitocin, I
asked for the epidural because I was afraid the contractions wouldn’t be that
gradual increase I had hoped for. I wanted to be prepared for the big bangs of
pain. So they started the pitocin first at a very low dose and we did this for
a few hours, and I could start feeling the contractions. At about 7:30 that
evening they got a little stronger as they upped the pitocin levels. At that
time I got the epidural. The anesthesiologist was quick, efficient and really
really good!
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| Where Wes slept in the delivery room with me. it wasn't bad. |
During the evening they would up the pitocin every hour and
keep checking me. Wes and I, at this point, were exhausted. It was bed time and
it was hard to sleep with the nurse and doctor coming in so often. I would get
in little cat naps throughout the night and Wes was staying up cause he wanted
to make sure the nurse was taking care of me and not doing anything out of the
ordinary. Around midnight, I finally
told him to sleep and put some ear buds in so he wouldn’t be distracted by the
noises. If you read the post before this, I had downloaded a bunch of
meditation music to help me with labor. I had Wes listen to that to get him to
sleep.
Around 1 in the morning the next day, the resident Dr came
in to check on me. Of course I was asleep so it took me a while to come to and
Wes was fast asleep. The Dr. proceeded to say the next step was to break my
water and that should help speed up my dilation. I just agreed because I just
did- I was practically asleep and breaking the waters wasn’t news to me, I have
heard and read about it plenty of times. Wes didn’t wake up until towards the
end of the procedure, maybe the lights woke him up or something, I wasn’t sure.
So he just knew that they broke my water and I was lying on pads soaked with
water and a little blood. That was the
second thing that really annoyed Wes, the fact they didn’t try to wake him up
and did this without him really knowing or understanding. After they cleaned me up, I went back to
sleep and so did Wes.
At around 3 or 4 am, sheer panic. I was awakened by 4 people
charging at me- lights go on and all of a sudden the nurse is putting an oxygen
mask on me, then the resident Dr is flipping me over to get me on my hands and
knees and out of the corner of my eye another stranger is sticking me with a
needle. I could hear Wes jumping out of
bed and we are both in shock and bewildered and half asleep.
The baby’s oxygen level had dipped to about 58 beats per
minute, she was averaging around 140-145. They don’t know how long it was at
that level but had noticed on the charts the dip. Flipping me over was to help
her change positions, the oxygen was for me and her, and the shot was to stop
the contractions that the pitocin was creating in conjuction with my own body
after they broke my water.
They told us that my contractions were not creating dilation
and that they were so intense that they were compressing on the baby’s umbilical
cord because now there was no cushion around her from the amniotic fluid they
just drained. They told us they needed to put fluid back in me. Oh man, Wes was
really mad at this point, he basically told them they broke my water too soon.
My pitocin had to be reset because now I had no contractions
from that shot and I had to wear oxygen the whole time and I was being
monitored more than ever until they felt like the baby was getting enough
oxygen from me and was still moving.
At about 7 am the next morning, I was checked and I had
barely dilated to a 5. The Dr told me that a C-Section is probably going to be
considered but they were going to increase the pitocin for the next few hours
and see if I could dilate any more. Wes and I were so scared at this point.
One, we felt like the baby has already been through enough, she’s probably
stressed as hell. Second, the thought of surgery was scary. Just really
invasive and I’d never had a big surgery before other than my wisdom teeth. We weren’t
mentally prepared for the c-section at all.
We kept waiting and waiting and waiting, upping the pitocin
every hour. We had been at the hospital for 24 hours now and hardly any
progress. At one point I got this overwhelming fatigue and told Wes I was just
so tired. I went to sleep for a long time. The nurse and the dr came in to ,
what I thought, check my progress, but instead they took my temperature. I had
a fever! Come to find out the resident Dr who broke my water failed to tell Wes
and I that my water was green! Meaning there was meconium in it, and the baby
was probably in it as well. Since the time my water broke up to this point, my
body was getting an infection and they were now afraid it had passed to the
baby. They told us that when we delivered she’d have to get antibiotics right away.
In the early afternoon I was checked again and I finally
dilated to a 9! Oh I was so relieved! But I couldn’t push. My cervix still had
a hard area and the Dr said it wouldn’t be safe for the baby. We kind of knew
what was coming at this point and, in our minds, we were thinking maybe the
c-section should have been done way earlier then, to give this baby some rest
already. The Dr told us that we would have to proceed at this point with the
C-section because of my problematic cervix and the infection.
Wes and I just broke down. We were just exhausted and upset
that it was taking so long for her to come. We could only imagine the stress of
my body causing her stress as well and what the consequences would be. I was
crying because I was scared of the operation. Wes was upset cause he was
feeling bad for me and the baby, and that all of this was just not what we had
prepared for.
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| I had a crazy bun on top and they just put the hair net right over it. Wes said I looked like Marge Simpson |
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| Wes in scrubs, ready to see the action in the OR |
I got prepped for the OR and Wes got his scrubs on. And on
with the C-section show. The operation was scary but wasn’t as bad I had
imagined. I was numbed, although I could feel them pulling and some pressure.
Wes was standing by me after they had got me prepped and cut open. I could tell
he was scared but trying to be supportive. It is all a blur now but I remember
them saying “the baby is here” and Wes looking over the curtain and looking
down at me with teary eyes saying “ oh my gosh, she has so much hair!” Wes went
to be with the baby to make sure and watch the nurses weigh her and such. They
cleaned her up and put her on my chest for just a second so I could see her and
do some skin to skin, but I couldn’t really because I was laying flat. I could
hear her just crying a lot really. Wes went with all the pediatric nurses to
the nursery so they could get the IV’s in Charlotte for her antibiotics. I was
left with my Doctor, a couple nurses, and
the anesthesiologist then I got stapled up. I remember throwing up sometime in
the middle of my uterus being placed back in my body.
May 10th, 2014 at 5:21 pm. Charlotte June Miller
was delivered via c-section weighing at 7 lbs 15 oz and 20 inches long.
Post Delivery:
I wasn’t able to see Charlotte for a few hours after I
delivered. Wes followed the pediatricians so they could stick her with the IV
for the antibiotics. He said that ordeal took over an hour because they
couldn’t find any veins, and they poked her everywhere, he said. That made me
cry, I don’t know how he held it together watching that. They finally got one
on the bottom of her foot. The first antibiotic was a half hour treatment and
then the next one. When I finally got to see her they just wheeled her away
again so that Wes and I could move our stuff and myself into the maternity
area.
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| Wes in the nursery. He stayed with Charlotte the whole time while she got poked and drugged. |
When we got to our destination it was about 10 pm and they
put the baby in our room. No nursery at the U. which I wish they would have so
Wes and I could get some sleep, but they have a policy about not putting babies
in the nursery and keeping them with the parents. I was still numb and drugged
so Wes had to change the baby, soothe her and the nurse would come in to help
me breast feed.
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| Wes was such a good support. Changed and soothed Charlotte while I was recovering from the C-Section |
During our stay, as I am being constantly checked on and the
baby is being constantly checked on- her IV needed flushing every so often then
they’d take her away and give her all her antibiotics and, of course, gave her back to us crying. All three of us
never got any sleep. On Tuesday morning, seriously 12:01 am, after being
wheeled off to get her oxygen tested, the nurse came back and said Charlotte
had glucose levels so low it could have
caused a seizure and now has jaundice. So Wes and I are forced to watch our
baby get another IV again and now sleep in the stupid ‘tanning bed’. She wouldn’t
sleep unswaddled so putting her under the lights were a challenge and she
screamed and cried the whole time. Finally I just took her out of the lights so
she could get some rest, she instantly went to sleep when we swaddled and
cuddled her. Of course, the nurses were mad we took her out of the tanning bed, but
seriously…
With zero sleep and about 7 am all three of us just had a
major melt down and asking why is this happening right now? Can we get a break?
Can poor Charlotte just be a sleepy newborn already? NOPE. It was tough and we
lost our strength. Victor came in that morning to give us all a blessing to
help us through this trial- I was still recovering from my c-section and all
loopy so Wes was on baby duty so much that it wore him out and had to discuss
all these issues with the nurses, doctors and pediatricians, and poor baby just
couldn’t get a break and had no sleep and was getting poked and forced to do
all these things. After Victor gave us our blessing, Wes’ mom stayed behind to
hold the baby in her bili blanket (that was the compromise with the
pediatricians) while Wes and I were able to get 3 hours of snooze time. The new
shift nurse put a do not disturb sign on our door as well so we wouldn’t get
checked on. We were getting a little relief.
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| 3 days old |
On our discharge day, my staples from my c-section got taken
out and we spoke with the pediatrician and nurses about baby care. They all
basically said we have a fussy and high cryer of a baby. Well, yeah, look what
she’s been through! Ugh, I wanted to punch someone! But I didn’t and we all
couldn’t wait to get home.
During our stay at the hospital, we ran into nursing issues
but that’s another story in it of itself.
So off to newborn care, so far its been such an adventure and
lots of crying between Baby and I.
Some of her funny faces we captured..
The car seat is a good workout
Her awesome fauxhawk!
Daddy's Girl
