EM's Birth Story...

Last Friday, August 17, because I was 40 weeks 4 days I needed to have a BioPhysical Profile Ultrasound, a stress test and a Dr's appointment to see how things were going. DH and I headed over to the hospital bright and early to get the ultra sound done, the tech said everything looked great and sent us on our way. My stress test was normal and so we waited for the Dr. My Dr was on vacation so I was seeing the locom Dr. So I expected to have her say your doing great and come back Monday and see your regular Dr. So DH and I were discussing our plans for the next day, his cousin was getting married in Bath and I was debating on whether it would be ok for me to go to the wedding that far away. Dr. Benton came in and asked me if I had been drinking plenty of fluids and how I was feeling, and if I was still feeling the baby move a lot. I said yes to all of these and she said because the ultra sound shows that your fluid level is getting low and I don't know if they told you this morning but the are estimating your baby to be 9lbs 4 ounces! (Great and I thought I was going to have a small baby:)) Dr. Benton then said, you are probably busy today, and I said we have no plans till this baby is born, she said ok then I'll call OB and see if they are busy. 10 minutes later we are headed to OB to start induction. I was admitted and they started with pitocin at 12 o'clock. (before they started the pit the monitor showed me having regular contractions every 3-6 minutes). The contractions picked up and were 2-4 minutes apart but I didn't feel like they were doing a lot. My nurse, Shirley, decided to keep raising the amount of pit I was getting, I got to 10 and they finally start to get intense. I was having a lot of back pain so I told the nurse that I felt like she was a "sunny-side-up" baby, the Dr had been in to see me and check me and I really hadn't change at all. At 6 pm the labor was intense and I was feeling not only the sunny-side-up baby, but like she was hitting the left side of my pelvis instead on being lined up. So the Dr checked me and no progress and the Dr. confirmed that I was right she was off to the side. They stopped the Pitcocin and wanted to wait ans see what my body would do. I kept waiting for the labor to stop because I thought for sure the pictocin was causing all the labor but it didn't stop my contractions actually got closer together and more intense! The Dr then came back to check me and I all the sudden gone to 6-7 centimeters, and 100% effaced but the baby was still at station 1, she was not dropping. The Dr then talked to me about an epiderial. I have never had to have any pain medicines with any of my other children, even with my first who was also sunny side up, and the Dr knew I wanted to try as natural as I could but I was at the point of do what we need to get this baby to line up. She thought maybe the medicine would help my body relax and let the baby drop, and then she would break my water. So we called the anesthesiologist, which I was more scared about getting the epiderial than anything else. Earlier while I was laboring I had told my Mom earlier that I felt like I was going to end up with a C-section but the nurse and everyone told me I was doing great. My nurse changed to Brooklee, an amazing nurse, and she was with me through the process reassuring me. After I got the epiderial I was able to relax, but I could still feel the contractions! They were intense. The Dr called for a ultrasound tech to come so we could see if there was a reason why the baby wasn't dropping. (It's not fun having an ultrasound when you are fully in labor!) The tech came and my water level had dropped even lower and they were trying to see where the cord was. The closest that they could tell was that the cord was showing up on both sides of her neck, but it was hard to tell anything else. So Dr. Benton broke my water hoping for the best. I had barely any fluid left and the pressure was there like I should be at the pushing stage but I could tell that the baby had not dropped any lower. Around midnight the baby's heart rate started to drop with every contraction, I had O2 on and they would flip me all around at every contraction to get her heart rate back up. So they called the Dr in. They had put in an interal heart rate monitior directly on the baby's head and then the put in a pressure probe(I dont know the real term for this) to measure if it was the contractions that were causeing her heart rate to drop. Her heart rate was dropping more and more with every contraction, I knew before the words were spoken but Dr. Benton told me that she was concerned about the baby and that we needed to do a c-section. I told her let's do it! She said it was and "emergency" but we needed to get it done ASAP, by 1:30 they were taking me down to the OR with DH by my side, I will admit I was terrified! I have never had any kind of surgery at all and it was all happening so fast. I was so thankful that Brooklee was my nurse cause she was walking me through the whole process and never left my side. She was the baby's nurse in the OR. When we got down to the OR my friend and christian, Sandy P was the OR nurse! I knew God's hand was there on me.  The whole process happened so fast. I was strapped down and numb all within a matter of minutes and they started to c-section. Dh was there by my side. I was shaking and trying to stay strong, my Dr kept reassuring me that the baby was doing fine, here heart rate was good and that soon she would be on the outside. The next thing I heard was a beautiful cry. I cried... my baby girl had made it into the world at 2:09 am on August 18, 2012. Not the way I had planned it but through the path that God had laid out for her. DH was able to go be with the baby and they finished with me. I think I asked like 20 times how much she weighed, the anesthesiologist was laughing at me. Then I realized that I knew the guy that was sewing me up, he went to high school with me, so I started talking to him. As soon as I was done I headed over to recovery to join DH, Brooklee and my new baby girl. She weighed 8 lbs 5 ounces and she was 21 1/2 inches long! I couldn't believe it, she was bigger than A when he was born! I was able to nurse her right away she was awesome! We were texting pictures upstairs to my Mom, my Mother-in-law, and my niece K. They had all been with us through the whole process! EM and K are the only girls. K had been the only girl on both sides of her family until now, but she was glad to have EM. Sorry for the long story but i remind you this blog is a family journal for me more so than anyone else:)  If you made it this far, thank you for reading!

 a proud Daddy!

 K and EM

 Right after birth