My super long birth story!

NotMrsSmith11 · June 2013

On Monday (Memorial Day) 5/28, we went to the hospital for prepidil and two hours of monitoring. I had been dilated to 1cm for a week and a half. My OB hoped the prepidil would either trigger labor on its own, or make my cervix more favorable for induction. We were in L&D for a couple of hours, but nothing happened.

Tuesday night we headed to the hospital to be admitted for induction. We got settled in our room, and I was hooked up to the monitors again. They gave me cervidil to keep in overnight. Neither H or I got much sleep, because the monitors kept falling off so the nurses kept coming in to replace them.

Wednesday morning they removed the cervidil and took me off the monitors. I got to shower and have breakfast. Then they gave me cytotec. I spent most of the early part of Wednesday walking around the hospital floor with H and my parents. I was feeling a little crampy but otherwise not much was happening. I had another dose of cytotec at some point.

Around 2:00, the nurse suggested I try to take a nap, since I hadn?t slept. As soon as I laid down and got comfortable, my water broke. It felt kind of like a giant baby kick, and then stuff started pouring out of me. H called the nurse to clean me up, and I started active labor almost immediately. I had wanted to hold off on meds as long as possible, so I just tried breathing through contractions. I tried laboring on the ball and leaning over the bed. My contractions were about a minute long and about a minute apart almost immediately, and I labored that way for a couple of hours.

Around 4:30 the contractions got really strong. Epidural time. It hurt more than I expected going in, but it was over pretty quickly. The contractions went away, and for about a half hour I felt pretty good. But then I started feeling an intense pins-and-needles feeling in my legs. They tried adjusting the epi, but the feeling wouldn?t go away. It was pretty awful, and I wasn?t allowed to move. The nurse came every half-hour to help me reposition, but other than that I had to lie still. I was pretty miserable and I kept telling H I just wanted to go home, ha. He tried rubbing my legs and distracting me but it was awful. Eventually I dilated to 6cm, but then things stalled. Around 10:30 the nurse called my doctor, who recommended a C-section since I had been having regular, strong contractions for hours and had been stuck at 6 for four hours.

The anesthesiologist came in to top off my epi. Just after he did, he got a call that another patient needed an emergency C-section so I was being bumped. The pins-and-needles intensified from the increased meds, and I was basically just on the verge of hysteria for the next hour. By the time they were ready and wheeled me into the operating room I was a mess. My doctor was super nice and reassuring and H was doing his best to keep me calm.

As they were prepping me, I was freaked out that I could still feel and move my legs. I had expected to be numb and it was a very odd sensation. The doctors kept reassuring me that it was normal but I wouldn?t feel any pain once they started. As they started cutting, I told H to just keep talking in my ear, and I was talking to myself as well. I remember the anesthesiologist told me he could give me something to calm me down as soon as the baby was out.

After they had me opened up, they were still having trouble getting him out. I remember my doctor telling me he was being stubborn, that he was up near my lungs and wouldn?t come down. They tried the vacuum, they widened my incision, but they finally had to do chest compressions (like CPR) to squeeze him down. I wasn?t numb that far up so I was screaming in pain with each one, but the anesthesiologist told H to get the camera ready, so I knew it was almost over.

At 1am on Thursday, they pulled him out and he started screaming immediately. My doctor leaned over the drape and said, ?He?s so cute!? The anesthesiologist injected something in my IV and I immediately started to feel much better. H went with the baby and was talking to me from the other side of the room, saying how perfect he was. Finally they brought him over to me and I kissed him and we took our first family pictures. Before long I was stitched up and they took the epi out. By the time they wheeled us out to the recovery room I felt a million times better.

The birth really sucked but my recovery has been pretty easy. I was up and walking around in a few hours, and my bleeding and pain have been minimal. We?ve been struggling a bit with nursing but things are getting better. If you made it through all of this, here?s a pic of my gorgeous boy!

[IMG]http://i44.tinypic.com/2cn8hh3.jpg[/IMG]

cinderin · June 2013

He is super cute! Congratulations and thanks for sharing.

TudorRose11 · June 2013

He definitely is one gorgeous boy!! Congratulations! Sorry for the rough birth, I can imagine the fear going in and still having feeling. I would be hysterical too.