Here is my birth story: I was put on bed rest shortly after getting my appendix out at 20 weeks. First bed rest is totally BORING! Testing positive several times on the fetal fibronectin test…STRESSFUL! You are probably wondering what the heck that is a fetal fibronectin test…so was I. So I learned is that if you have regular contractions, which I was having every few minutes and not the Braxton Hicks, you get to take this wonderful test every two weeks to see if you are “threatening” to deliver early. Nice terminology right?!? Why the heck would I want to threaten to deliver early?!? Anyway, this test has a 33% accuracy test that you will deliver in the next two weeks. Well, I tested positive each and every time I took it. I have to say the the 10 weeks leading up to delivery weekend were beyond stressful. The only positive I had was that at each of my weekly doc appointments I never dilated or effaced at all. Yeah! The irony of the whole situation was that at my 38w5d appointment (Friday Oct. 29th, 2010), the doc said that if I didn’t make some progress soon I was going to have to be induced. Go figure! First you have to keep the little bugger in and then you have to maybe be induced to get him out. Any how, they were going to give me a week to make some progress…
I have to say giving me a deadline is the best way to get me to get things done. Well that and I really really wanted a Halloween baby I kept telling the hubs that the little man was coming on Halloween. He kept asking, “how do you know?” I didn’t know but my heart was set on it.
So Saturday rolls around and we head out to our favorite Indian buffet with my parents. They, whoever they are, say that spicy food helps induce labor. Not sure if thats what kicked me into a tailspin or the fact that I was almost 39 weeks pregnant. Guess we will never know. Well, just a few short hours after lunch…the cramping began. These were some serious cramps. Was it because I hadn’t had my period in almost a year or something different. I waited a couple more hours waiting for my parents to leave for their party. The second our front door closed, I called my friend Carrie in a panic. She answered thank goodness and in her calm, cool, collected self said “hey lady! whats going on?” Insert cheery, cute Carrie smile. Ummm, I said, I don’t know if I am in labor. Are cramps part of the deal? She said, Yup, you better get to the hospital. Called Jessica, our doula, and off we went to the hospital. When we checked in, I found out that I was 70% effaced and 4cm dilated. Fabulous! I was just starting to think that natural labor wasn’t all that bad. Yes, it was a little annoying having an IV hooked up because I had to had to have antibiotics for Strep B flowing through an IV before I gave birth but I was still mobile. Jessica breathed with me, held my hand, calmed me down, helped supported the hubs, read the monitors and probably a million other things that I honestly cant remember. Each time the nurse came in to check on me and the baby, I was another couple centimeters and completely effaced. By 9pm that night I was dilated 9cm…only a centimeter away from pushing. I was starting to panic. Not because I was about to have a baby but because I was supposed to have a Halloween baby…OK, this is when I learned the whole careful for what you wish for thing. Little did I know that the next three hours were going to be a sheer nightmare.
For the next three hours my contractions were one on top of the other, back labor started from the baby turned the wrong direction, my water still had not broke and I was starting to panic. The doctor came in and broke my water. And still nothing…I was stuck at 9cm. The hubs knows me well enough that when I start panicking and telling him the pain was too much, I was being serious. He quickly got the nurse who paged the anesthesiologist right away. 30 minutes later, I had the epidural and pertocin to hopefully get the baby to drop and help me to dilate the last centimeter. Somewhere in there, I passed out because my body does not react well to drugs. Little man Crownholm’s heart rate dropped to 60bpm from 160 bpm and the panic in the room began. Doctors and nurses came flying in, fetal head monitors went in and I awoke to someone putting shots in my arm to stop the contractions. Thank goodness Jessica was there to support my hubs and he stood by not totally knowing what was going on.
Somewhere in there I feel asleep until 7:30am…Halloween morning and still no baby. No dilation and we were off to have a c-section. Boo! I was even more scared about having a c-section than delivering naturally. The fact that I would be awake while having a pretty serious procedure done. The good news was that the baby would be out in 30 minutes. Well whether I liked it or not, it was going to happen. They pulled our baby out and I know you are supposed to have the “OMG they are so precious looking” reaction but we didn’t. Baby C came out with a whole head of hair on a serious cone head. To make matter worse, his face was all smushed up on one side and paralyzed looking. The hubs and I had the reaction of “WOW! Thats our baby???” We will just say he was not quite a looker post birth. Did we absolutely fall in love with him…YES! Something else people don’t tell you post birth is that you will shake uncontrollably for what seems like forever. I wanted to hold our baby but I was far too shaky. It took almost a half an hour before I was able to hold him. And when I did…it hit me. We were parents, this was our son and we had truly began our family.
While I was not one of those women who falls in love with their baby the minute he/she is born, I did fall in love with my baby shortly after birth and truly bonded with him thanks in large part to breastfeeding.
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**This is a sponsored conversation from Mums the Word Network and The Stork OTC. All opinions are my own**