I woke up Tuesday, August 9th, and began my normal routine. I pouted my way through the morning, because I had this date picked out in my mind as the day Caleb was coming for the past couple months, but I always thought I would go into labor during the middle of the night, so when this didn't happen, I threw myself a little pity party. I resigned to the fact that Caleb would probably have to be induced on the 17th, and was not thrilled about it. I got ready and was about to walk out of the bedroom to head to work in my foul mood, when I had the urge to pee, so I went to the bathroom and as I was standing up, I felt a little trickle. I found this odd since I had just went so I checked and it was clear and odorless (signs it is amniotic fluid and not urine), however because it was so little of an amount, I was still confused. I guess Joey sensed this confusion on my face, because he asked me what was wrong, and I informed him I thought something was happening, that my water may have broke. Well, I had not washed my hair that morning because I only wash it every other day, but I decided that if it was my water, I wanted clean hair, so I hopped in the shower and Joey ran and got a shower in the guest bedroom. After I got out of the shower, I called my OB's office and told them I thought my water may have broke (I was still only having a trickle every few minutes), and set up an appointment for 8:45. Well when I stood up from the bed after making that call, there was more of a gush and I knew it was "go time". Joey and I ran around getting ready, I ended up having to pack our last minute items into our bags because Joey had some work to take care of, and we headed off to the OB's office. She confirmed that my water had broke, and we went downstairs to check into our labor and delivery room.
Once I got settled in and they started monitoring my contractions, we realized I was having at least 1 minute contractions, every 5 minutes, over an hour, which is when they tell you to go to the hospital. It was a good thing my water broke though, because the contractions did not hurt and there was no way I would have headed to the hospital at that point had my water not broke. They started me on Petocin around 10, and from 10 to around 12:30, we were just relaxing and waiting to progress, my contractions still weren't uncomfortable at this point. At around 12:30, Joey's parents arrived and he went outside to meet them, while he was gone, my contractions kicked in big time. It was amazing how quick it happened, but I went from being perfectly comfortable to being in a ton of pain in a matter of minutes. My parents arrived right after Joey's did, so he brought them to the room and by that time I was hunched over in pain as each contraction passed. After about 30 minutes of the painful contractions, I decided it was time for an epidural. That was the best decision I've ever made :) At this point I was still only about 3 centimeters dilated.
Well from 12:30 to about 3:00, I went from 3 centimeters to 9 1/2. They took me off of the Pitocin because I was progressing so fast. Although, I was 9 1/2 centimeters, Caleb was still at a good -1, so he had not progressed far enough down to start pushing yet. This began the waiting game. Finally around 5:30, Caleb had reached a point we could start pushing. My doctor had already left for the day, so another doctor in her practice came and checked me out as we started pushing. As he was leaving, he made mention that we should have a baby in an hour ... he shouldn't have said that :) After an hour and a half passed, he came back in and was a little confused because he figured we would be done by now, but he realized that Caleb needed to be turned (he was not breech, his head was just facing the wrong way), so he got him turned and then things started progressing as they originally should have.
At 7:53 p.m. we welcomed the most beautiful baby boy, Caleb Joseph Giesen. Unfortunately, his cord was slightly wrapped around his neck, so Joey was not able to cut the cord, which I think disappointed him a bit, but at least our baby was OK. He was worth every second of the 2 1/2 hours of pushing. They let me hold him immediately and it was love at first sight, after a few minutes they took him to wipe him off and check him out. While they had him, he peed twice all over everything - Joey thought this was hysterical and was disappointed we didn't capture it in a picture. He weighed 7 pounds 8 ounces, and was 20 1/4 inches long. They brought him right back to me and let us have about 40 minutes of skin to skin contact. That is one of the most amazing things Brookwood does, and we enjoyed every second of it. They took him for a second to get a few more things done, however all this was done in the room so he never left our sight, and then brought him back to me to try and breastfeed. They helped us get started, and after he was done, they got us ready to go to our normal room.
All in all, I had a wonderful delivery. I couldn't have asked for a better experience (besides maybe a shorter time pushing), but I think 12 hours from start to finish for a first baby is pretty good. I was not anxious about the delivery, just wanted to make sure he was OK. I can't explain the relief you feel when your baby comes out, and he cries, and they tell you that everything is OK with him, but it was the greatest moment of my life.
Here are some pictures from our hospital stay.
Such a sweet sweet story!!
ReplyDeleteI'm so glad you wrote this out- you'll be glad years down the road that you can reference this!! Love you!
ReplyDeleteI just teared up! So happy for you! He is beautiful!
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