Labor Day weekend was pretty uneventful in our
household. We were recovering from
our first week back at work and preparing for a busy upcoming week of moving in
to our brand new school. The husband
had a soccer tournament in Orange County, so I spent the weekend nesting and
preparing for our maternity pictures that we were scheduled to take on Labor
Day. We had a nice dinner on
Sunday night and celebrated the husband’s victory in the tournament. As usual, we fell asleep on the couch,
woke up to have my bedtime snack and headed off to bed.
At about 3am I woke up to use the
restroom and then climbed back in bed.
A short time after I awoke to a gush of fluids. I stumbled to the bathroom half asleep
as fluid gushed from me. I
immediately knew something was not right, but was too scared to come to terms
with the fact that my water had just broken. I turned on the lights and woke up the husband. I told him “something’s wrong.” After falling out of bed still half
asleep, he instructed me to call Labor and Delivery. I told them what had happened and they said I needed to come
in. The husband grabbed me some
fresh clothes and we climbed in the car.
Our poor furbabies definitely sensed something was wrong and I felt so
bad leaving them so worried.
The
car ride to the hospital was pretty awful. I was so scared to move and lose more fluid. I also was worried because I hadn’t
felt our baby girl move since I woke up.
I prayed and prayed the whole way there. Luckily, a short while in to our 45 minute drive, I felt
some movement. When we arrived at
the hospital, I thought I could walk since I felt fine. However, as soon as I started towards
the hospital, more fluid came out.
So we grabbed a wheelchair, were sent past the emergency room and
straight up to Labor and Delivery where they were awaiting our arrival. As soon as the nurses saw the soaked
wheelchair, they broke the news.
My water had officially ruptured and the next time I left the hospital I
would no longer be pregnant. Cue
panic. Not only were we not
prepared (we didn’t even have a car seat yet, we still had two baby showers
planned and of course our maternity pictures were scheduled for later that
day). But we were also scared to
death to bring a 33 week old baby in to this world. It didn’t help that it was the middle of the night and we
couldn’t get a hold of our families.
I also despise hospitals and could feel myself getting claustrophobic,
like I would be stuck in Room 22 forever.
The doctor came in and went over the plan. They would start me on magnesium to
help with brain bleeds and hopefully slow down labor. They also gave me a steroid shot to help with the lungs and
they started me on antibiotics to prevent infection. Their goal was to keep this baby in until Friday. It was short enough to hopefully avoid
infection, but long enough for me to reach 34 weeks. The doctor was quite the weirdo (she actually told me it was
too bad I wasn’t having a black baby girl....). The nurses started to insert the IV. Four tries later it was determined that
I had “tough skin” and luckily the two of them finally found a vein in my
forearm they could use. They all
warned me that the magnesium would make me feel pretty awful. They said “it will feel like you have
been in the sun all day.” Um clearly they have never actually been on
magnesium. It actually makes you
feel like your insides are burning up.
Seriously. Plus, the warmer
I got the more claustrophobic I became.
I started saying I couldn’t do it and I honestly believed I could not
get through this. After finding out
it would get better after the initial dose (which took about 20 minutes) and
having the nurse turn it down slightly, I calmed down some. I also asked for some wet washcloths to
help cool myself down. Eventually,
the next shift of nurses came on and I was offered ice packs, which really
helped. They had to test my blood
sugar every few hours even though I wasn’t eating (they were so much better at
poking my finger than I ever was!) because of the IV fluids and steroid shot.
Finally, we were able to get a hold of my parents. They were able to go pick up our poor
furbabies and grab some things from our house since we had obviously not packed
a hospital bag. About this time,
the neonatal doctor came in and told us what to expect delivering a premature
baby. It was very scary to say the
least. Then the doctor decided to
take a sample of my amniotic fluid to send off to the lab for a lung maturity
test. She had a hard time
remembering how much fluid she was supposed to take, and she actually said I
haven’t done this in so long I can’t really remember....weirdo I tell you! She
also visually checked my cervix, which she said was still closed.
Anyways, all day long the nurses and doctors told us not to
expect anything from the test. 33
weeks was way too early for the lungs to show maturity, especially with
gestational diabetes. Some of them
actually told us it was a waste of a test. At this point, the magnesium had calmed down some and prayer
chains had started. When my
parents arrived we decided to send the husband home to get things together and
get some sleep. My mom would stay
the night with me and he would come back first thing in the morning.
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| Our "maternity pictures" |
At about 10pm, the doctor came in with great news. By the grace of God and despite all the
doubts, our baby girl’s lungs were ready to go. They wanted to start inducing me immediately. Cue panic again. My husband was an hour away getting
ready to climb in bed and I had already come to terms with Friday. I was so scared the baby wasn’t ready
to come out and I was so scared I would not have the energy to get through
labor. I still felt awful from the
magnesium and I hadn’t eaten or slept in 24 hours. My whole pregnancy I tried to be flexible about a birth
plan. Pretty much the only thing I
really wanted to avoid was being induced.
Now here I was, almost 7 weeks early about to get induced. Once again, God reminds me His plans,
not mine. I begged the doctor to
let me wait until morning. I was
hoping some sleep would give me more energy and I could also have a little more
time to process everything. She
initially told me yes, we could wait until morning. However, 30 minutes later she came in and said the
specialist would not approve the wait.
So we settled on one hour.
The husband gathered his things and I had some toast with peanut
butter. At about 11pm I took my
first dose of induction pills.
The doctor told me labor could take multiple days especially
since I was still on the magnesium.
I started feeling contractions pretty soon after that, but they were at
least ten minutes apart and not that strong. They told me to get some sleep, but it was not easy. I felt like I had to go to the bathroom
pretty often because of my IV, and it was quite the process to get me in to the
bathroom. By the middle of the
night, I was too weak to make it to the bathroom and had to start using a bedpan
(ew!). Once again panic set in as
I wondered how on earth I would push out a baby when I couldn’t even walk in to
the bathroom.
As the early morning came, my contractions got a lot
stronger. I would wake up my mom
so she could watch the screen and tell me when they were almost over (the
husband was snoring away on the couch....). The rest of the day was kind of a blur. I took another dose of pills and
received my flu shot and Tdap vaccine.
As the contractions got stronger and closer together, I started to
wonder when I could have anything for the pain. They told me I had to wait until they were closer together
and I was hopefully dilated some.
At this point, I almost slapped a nurse who reminded me I would be doing
all of this at home if I wasn’t being induced. She also said “that’s why it’s called labor!”. Finally, a few hours later, they
checked my cervix again and I was 4cm dilated. At this point, they decided I was ready for pitocin (scary!)
and I could have some pain medication through the IV (yay!). This is where things start getting
really fuzzy. The pain medication
made me so loopy!
I was so out of it, I actually would daydream about a
contraction and then have a contraction.
It was very strange. I
vaguely remember them checking my cervix again and I was 7 cm dilated. I think at this point they paged the
anesthesiologist and my mom and husband started making the calls. I do clearly remember walking out of
the restroom and looking at everyone hurrying around. I felt like I had no idea what was going on or what the plan
was, so I asked (or slurred), “What’s going on?”. The husband later told me this made everyone kind of nervous
because they thought I literally did not know what was going on. What I really meant was, when is this
baby coming out?! It seemed like
everyone knew the plan, but me!
The anesthesiologist came in and I remember thinking she was so young
and cute, she must just be the assistant! She actually ended up being amazing!
She took her time and was very careful because she said I was almost too small
for it to work. It was hard
holding still during contractions, but eventually it was in and we were ready
to go. After that, a few visitors
came in and I did my best to act like I wasn’t completely loopy :)
Don’t ask me how long later, but shortly after my epidural,
I was about 10 cm and ready to start pushing. At this point, every time I had a contraction the baby’s
heart rate would drop. I was also
still feeling pain in my lower left side.
The nurse said the baby was probably putting pressure in that spot and
no matter how many times I pushed the epidural button, nothing would
change. They gave me an oxygen
mask to hopefully help maintain her heart rate. Then it was officially time to start pushing! Let me just
say, it took much longer than I ever imagined it would. Part of the problem was the oxygen
mask. It was making me super
claustrophobic and my mouth was so dry.
I felt like I needed to clear my throat and it didn’t help with my
endurance. I also felt a little
discouraged and nervous about pushing.
From the moment we arrived, they told us a whole team of specialists
would be in the room for delivery in anticipation of our early arrival. At this point, there was only our nurse
in the room. I was half worried
that I would push her out and no one would be there to help and half realizing
that I must not be very close (despite everyone telling me what a great job I
was doing....) if no one was in the room yet. Finally, the nurse called in the doctor and everyone started
trickling in. Five minutes later,
our baby girl made her appearance.
She shocked us all with her full head of hair and her plump weight of
4lbs. 15 ounces. We were able to
snap a few pictures and the husband cut the cord. Then she was off to the NICU. The husband was able to go with her and they were able to
pass by all of our family waiting in the hall.
Meanwhile, they had turned off everything in my IV and I
felt like a new person. I
immediately started asking when I could go and see her. They kept telling me I had to wait, but
I had no idea why! I seriously felt perfectly fine and had hardly any numbness
from the epidural. Finally they
wheeled me over. We weren’t able
to hold her though for almost 24 hours.
That was so hard!
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| Our first family photo! |
We stayed in the hospital for the next two days and visited
her as often as we could. Every
time I pumped, we would walk the milk right over even in the middle of the
night. Then reality set in, that
we would have to leave without her and we lived an hour away. Once again, God had it taken care
of. One of the husband’s sisters
paid for a hotel room for two nights.
And then a lady from my mom’s work offered her RV for us to stay
in. By that Saturday, we were
officially moved in to the hospital parking lot. We are planning to stay here until our baby girl goes
home. Keep your fingers crossed
that it happens very soon, mommy is not a camper!
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| All of our sweet gifts! |
Although her birth was a complete shock and almost daily we
have to deal with our ever-changing emotions, I know we would do it all again
for our sweet baby girl.
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