::Photo credit to the amazingly talented Laura M. Collard::
Sunday night i called the charge nurse to figure out what time we would be coming in. I knew from looking at the induction schedule that I was 2nd on the list of 8 people to be induced and the odds of me getting to come in around 7am were pretty high. Stacie was charging and told me to expect a call around 6:30am and I also informed her that Shelley, (the nurse who trained me to labor & delivery) would be my nurse.
Trying to go to sleep the night before you know your going to have a baby is like trying to get a little kid to sleep on Christmas Eve... impossible. Somehow after folding 3 loads of laundry, showering, doing my hair, and getting the house straightened up I climbed into bed at 10pm. At 2:30am I awoke to the pups barking and my dad up and about and wrestled myself back to sleep until 5am when I heard Bennett awake in his crib. I jumped up, grabbed a banana & some water thinking he was gonna be up for good all while resisting the urge to barge into his room and spend the next hour cuddling with him. Needless to say he went back to sleep and I did not. From 5-6am I anxiously finished packing my hospital bag and getting ready for the day. I ventured to Einsteins to pick up bagels for everyone and sat on my bed, phone in hand, until Stacie called me. 6:24 the phone rang and she told us to get there around 7 or as close as we could. Lance and I headed out into the garage only for the battery on his plow truck to be dead of a doornail inhibiting him from pulling out the truck to get his worker set up for the day After a half hour of attempting to jump it we left the truck and Bennett in the care of my dad and went on our way to the hospital. We arrived and checked in only to be greeted with smiling faces and congratulations from my co-workers and managers. Then the fun began.
Prior to starting anything my body was already contracting every 7 minutes. They weren't painful but obviously helped a little. My IV was placed at 7:45am fluids running, Melissa (or Dr. Brown) came in and broke my water at 8:00 while Shelley (my nurse) started the piton at 4milliunits/hr. I was dilated to a 1cm, 50% effaced, -2 station, mid-position. (I later joked about how impressive it was that she was able to break my water while I was only a 1cm/50% and Melissa said her mom said her long skinny fingers would make her a great piano player, but they really just make her an awesome OBGYN!) Right after my water was broken I had Shelley call the anesthesiologist and give him a heads up that as soon as the c-section was over I would be wanting my epidural. Little did I know that within the next couple of minutes my contractions went from 7 minutes apart to 2-3 minutes apart... talk about starting things up quickly! At 8:45am my pain level was creeping up to a 5/6 and I started to have to think and breathe through contractions. Just as the anesthesiologist walked in to place my block I had about HAD it with my contractions and was able to ask for some IV pain medication. At 9:15am my epidural was in and I couldn't have been happier. At 9:40 I was already dilated to 3cm, 70% effaced. We increased my pitocin to 8 and I continued to contract away. Lance called Laura (which I felt was jumping the gun, but luckily he did) and she headed down from Bountiful to be our memory catcher. At 11:10 I was having some early decelerations, dilated to 3cm, 90% effaced and the head had dropped to -1 station and we found out she was facing sunny side up (posterior) with a little caput (or cone head forming). We decided to stick me in the funny position known as high sims in hopes to open the pelvis and get her to rotate on her own. By 12:48 I was starting to feel some pressure and was then dilated to 6cm and completely effaced. I let Lance & Laura finish their lunch as each contraction meant increased pressure for me. Finally at 1:10 I was complete and her head was at a +2 station. Shelley paged Melissa and Melissa called back and exclaimed "you won you won!" which meant I was the first of her 3 patients to be ready for delivery. Melissa came in and got dressed. She checked me and Jillian was indeed still facing the wrong way. With a little manual rotation Melissa was able to turn her head to face the correct position for delivery. I began pushing at 1:20 and pushed through 2 contractions. After the 2nd set of pushes her heart rate remained low and wasn't recovering like it had the previous time and Melissa instructed me to just keep pushing and get her out. After a regular fist push she told me to do small half strength pushes which caught me off guard because I didn't think we were that close yet, haha but we were. Jillian was born just 1 minute later at 1:24pm!! A total of 4 minutes of pushing.
It was at that moment between seeing her in Melissa's hands and her being placed on my chest that it hit me. I just had a baby. I just became a mom of 2. For whatever reason I wasn't able to fully comprehend that until she was there. Alive in my arms.
Jillian came out a little stunned and took almost 20-30 seconds to finally breathe and begin to cry. She was a little floppy and didn't cry continuously like we like so we had her go over to the warmer to get a little more mad and pink before cuddling skin to skin. 1 minute APGAR was a 7 for color and tone and at 5 minutes she had perked up to a 9.
I of course has consistently high blood pressure throughout my labor. It hung out for the most part in the
140/90-100 range which just validated the fact that I was meant to be induced. While it was a rather fast labor of 5.5 hours and 4 minutes of pushing I am so grateful for my amazing nurse and coworker Shelley for taking such good care of me and so grateful to Dr. Brown for her skills and for being such an amazing doctor for me personally and making my delivery experience perfect. Also thanks to both of them for being such great examples to me in the work field of labor and delivery.
