Saturday, May 5, 2012

The Birth of Olivia Rose (overdue)


on the 11th of november, my husband and i went to my in laws house.. DH enjoys an occasional beer with his pop. Well before opening a bottle he says, "we're not going to have a baby tonight are we?" i said "nope, drink your heart out"… well we got home and got to bed fairly early. I was determined to go for a walk the next day as per doctors orders as i was supposed to be getting induced on tuesday. Well 1 am rolls around, (it is now the 12th)… and as usual at this hour, i feel like i need to get up to go pee. The second i stand up, i have an uncontrollable gush of fluid come out. I immediately ran to the bathroom and felt slightly embarrassed as i thought to myself that holy crap i've gotten so huge that i cannot even control my own bladder. so i sat on the toilet for a good 10 minutes and couldnt figure out what the heck was going on… finally, when i took off my pj bottoms that i had soaked through walking to the bathroom, it wasnt urine colored or smell, it was clear and mucusy and that is when it hit me like a ton of bricks. I came back to the bedroom and even debated waking DH as i know he didnt get much shut eye after the beers and had a pretty hectic work week. So i sat there another 5 minutes and when the fluid kept gushing out, i knew this was it. It was as if it were out of the movies, the "typical" wake and shake and said "honey, i think my water just broke". He rolled out of bed as i got myself together. We called our Dr and proceeded to grab our hospital bags, laptop and head to the hospital. We got to L&D triage around 1:40am. i was checked internally, went over medical history, the usual. It was now about 2:30 am. At this point i was 3cm and about 50% effaced. They called my Dr to tell him this is the real deal and to head in. From triage we were moved into our own labor suite.. I kind of wish i took pictures of it. It was almost hotel like. Mahogany wood every where, a beautiful rocking chair and a recliner for the daddy to rest on. It was bigger than any hospital room i've ever seen honestly. The baby warmer/clean up station was right there, it was baby ready. It was perfect. My contractions started picking up from about 10 minutes apart to at this point (4 am?) 5 minutes apart. I was promised that i'd get an anesthesiologist to come in and give me an epidural before they put me on pitocin because apparently my progress was super super super slow. Well they flaked and gave me pitocin before the epidural and assured me the Dr would be in shortly to give me the epi. TWO HOURS went by before i got so intolerant of the contractions that i blew my roof and had my husband bug the nurses every 10 minutes until the freaking epi came.  i was not at all prepared for the pain of the epi. I thank goodness i didnt see what was happening to me back there because my husband bless his heart looked terrified. I screamed and cried and just couldnt deal with it. The Epidural REALLY HURT! 10 minutes later (or what seemed like an eternity), it was finally in, i couldnt feel the contractions and i was a happy camper! Things seemed to be progressing well up until I hit 8 cm. I was at 8 cm for a few hours and my doctor started to worry a bit so I had an internal monitor set up. About 30-40 minutes later, it was clear the contractions were picking up and my doctor was happy. He checked me again and I was almost there! He gave me another 20 minutes and said I should get ready because we should be ready to push by then. 10:30 am rolls around, doctor checks me, and im at 10 cm and ready to go. He explained how to push properly and that he estimates we’d be pushing for about 2 hours. After the first several pushes, she seemed to be lowering quite nicely. As her head was crowning, the pressure and pain I felt, even with the epi was definitely unlike anything I’ve ever felt before in my life…. My doctor was an amazing coach. I was so darn exhausted and in pain and out of breath at this point that i started saying that i couldnt do this anymore, i was tired...  I had my dr literally yelling at me to SHUT THE **** UP, DON’T TALK, JUST PUSH!!!! Finally after exactly 33 minutes of pushing, my baby girl was born! A perfect head of hair, 7 lbs 10 oz and 18 1/2 inches long!!!!! PERFECTION!!!!!!!!

She ended up tearing me a tiny bit and only got about 10 stitches. It was the most amazing, most surreal experience of my life. I never imagined I’d be able to do this. No matter how many books ive read, tv shows ive watched and instructional videos ive seen, nothing in the world could’ve prepared me for this labor experience. I am so thankful I didn’t get induced and that she came on her own terms at exactly 39 weeks! I have never been more in love in my life. She is absolutely perfect…