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My (very) long birth story if anyone wants to read it :)
Because of GD my doctors decided to induce me at 38weeks 4days, which was this past Thursday, the 9th. DH and I got to the hospital at 6:30. My doctor got there around seven, broke my water and started pitocin by 7:30, and labor started really smoothly. I had been wanting to go pain med free really badly, so I tried as hard as I could to tough it out. I labored on pitocin for five hours before finally asking for an epidural. I was having contractions every two minutes for about a minute and a half each. I couldn't catch my breath or concentrate enough to focus my mind on anything, and the pain was getting to the point where I thought I was going to lose control of myself. After I asked for the epidural it took the anesthesiologist about an hour to come in and place it. Thankfully after that it took effect pretty much immediately. They didn't give me any systemic drugs, but I still felt really drugged up and drunk for several hours, which the nurses told me was because of how exhausted I had gotten.
I progressed fairly
quickly from 4.5 to 6, then from 6 to 9 in 45 minutes. After that I sat
at 9 cm for three hours. The nurse came to check me one last time
before they started to talk about a section, and luckily I was finally
10 cm. The nurse coached me through pushing for the first 40 minutes or
so, and then the on-call doctor for my practice came in for the end.
My mom and DH helped hold my legs and it was an amazing experience
hearing DH thank me for giving him a baby, and hearing my mom tell me
she was beautiful. Catherine June (Kitty) was born at 8:45pm, Thursday,
Feb 9th, exactly one hour after I started pushing. She weighed 8lbs
6oz, was 20.75 inches long, and looked completely bizarre! 
They put
her on my chest for about 30 seconds before taking her to the warmer to
get her cleaned off. The doctor started to stitch me up from my
episiotomy and DH went to watch Kitty.
I was really concentrating on seeing my daughter, but the nurse was standing in the way. They wouldn't bring her back when I asked, and I was starting to get really frustrated when I realized that my epidural had worn off, I was experiencing excruciating pain, and the doctor had been stitching for quite a while. I was laying flat on my back with my calves held in stirrups and they had set up a sterile field on my chest. DH brought Kitty over so I could see her, but they wouldn't let me hold her- I had to stay still. My mom started to sound more and more panicky and the doctor wouldn't answer my question of how much longer it would be. I was really starting to lose control of myself because of the pain when he told me he needed to take me to the OR because the lights in the room weren't good enough for him to see what he needed to stitch.
I was having a really hard time understanding things at that point, but I still thought it was strange that the doctor was helping pull the bed down the hall (the front wheel was broken, and apparently they didn't have time to wait for another stretcher- the doctor literally yanked my bed through the L&D halls to the OR with 4 nurses pushing behind him.) They gave me a sedative and when I woke up I was being taken to the recovery room.
Mean while, DH had come back from the nursery (I told him to go with the baby before they took me to the OR) to find me gone, blood covering the floor and my mother sobbing in the corner. No one could tell him whether I was alive, where I was, or what was going on, and my mom was too hysterical to explain anything to him.
It
took me till the next afternoon to get the story from my doctor, but
apparently my uterus didn't contract the way it should have after
delivering the placenta, and I hemorrhaged pretty badly. Also, Kitty
lacerated a blood vessel in my vaginal wall during birth, and I bled
through that as well. When the doctor was trying to stitch everything
back together to stop the bleeding, my tissue was just falling apart (he
says because of the GD.) Every stitch he put in ripped out and caused
another bleed. I ended up losing almost a liter of blood, I had a
fourth degree tear all the way to my rectum, and my hemorrhoids are big
it actually scared most of the nurses that took care of me. I didn't
get to hold my daughter until she was four hours old, which was the
worst part for me.
They wanted to see how well my body could repair itself, so they waited until Saturday to give me a blood transfusion. I couldn't go the the bathroom by myself because I couldn't stand without assistance until Sunday morning. I had three units of blood before I could even sit up in the bed without help.
We were planning on leaving Sunday night or Monday morning when things got even more screwed up. Kitty (who was perfectly healthy in every way) got moved to the NICU Sunday morning because she was turning blue in the nursery when she cried. They took all day to do tests, xrays, an echo of her heart, start antibiotics, etc. Everything came back ok until she tested positive for MRSA in her nares. They moved her into a private isolation area in the NICU.
My doctor decided to discharge me Sunday even though I could barely walk to the nurses station and back without getting light headed, and so I had no where to stay. I ended up "sleeping" in the NICU in a reclining chair for two nights, which really just meant cat-napping for 20 minutes at a time.
We were finally let to take Kitty home Tuedsay afternoon after her blood cultures came back negative for sepsis. She is healthy, just dramatic.
When
something happens that she doesn't like she throws a fit, holds her
breath and pushes until she starts to turn blue. And by something she
doesn't like, I mean getting her diaper changed, having to lay on her
back, having to poop, getting swaddled, getting un-swaddled, and pretty
much everything else other than being cuddled, breast fed, or sung to.
She is the cuddliest baby ever- if she can lay on my chest, she
would sleep forever. If she's upset by anything at all, except pooping,
all I have to do it put her up to my chest and she quiets down in 2
seconds.
She is going to be a handful; we are already calling her our little monster. But I absolutely love everything about her, even her temper. DH is wrapped so tight around her finger he's beside himself. We love her so much. It's completely overwhelming.
So, today was her first whole day at home, and it has been what is probably the best day of my life. My mom was here, so I got to start getting a little caught up on my sleep, and DH and I were so happy to have Kitty right there the whole day.
This is her disapproving face on the
way home from the hospital. She (big surprise!) didn't like being put
in the car seat.
Re: My (very) long birth story if anyone wants to read it :)
omg she is gorgeous...and i love that she is spunky ALREADY!
glad that you are both healthy.
Good Lord Fred, I'm glad you're on the mend. It sounds like things got pretty scary for everyone involved.
Kitty might just be the most adorable grumpy baby ever.
Fred- I demand some sort of compensation for having to read the line "tear all the way to my rectum". I'll take it in cash or Amazon gift cards.
And this is all with HS on FB right now telling me I neeeeedz to have da babeh! Um, not after I just read "tear" and "rectum" in the same sentence, tyvm!
And Kitty's expression is awesomesauce! My kind of baby, right there!
Currently Reading: Don Quixote by Miguel De Cervantes
"tear" and "rectum" are EXACTLY why I'm scarred from baby making fo' life! Kitty really is a doll though.... and dramatic
"tear" and "rectum" are EXACTLY why I'm scarred from baby making fo' life! Kitty really is a doll though.... and dramatic
Here's to you, Fred.
You're a strong lady, but we all already knew that.
I love your little disapproving bean and am happy that you're all home and on the mend.
What else can you say but, "ta-da!"Here's to smooth healing and non-itchy stitches.
Congratulations on your little one.
That baby is PISSED OFF. I love her expression though. She seems smart already.
Sorry you had to go through all that to get her here. Take care.
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