Philippa Grace's Arrival

first.time.mum · #1 June 21st, 2012, 05:11 PM

please bare with me...I'm not great at writing things like this,

On June 6th I had been having fairly regular braxton hicks all day and was noticing what I thought might be some leaking so I decided to go to L&D to get checked out since I wasn't due for another week, but the OB had predicted her as being a 37-38 week baby due to predicted size. Once there they confirmed no leak, but I was 1cm and the contractions were tracking stronger and more regular than I had thought. They sent me home and listed me as "early labour". Saw the OB the following day and he told me to get walking and that he didn't expect to see me at my appointment the following Tuesday (this was Thursday). Well between Thursday and Tuesday, DH and I walked a total of 35-40km (I only wish I was joking) I was having lots of contractions, they even got 2-5 minutes apart, but they always stopped. At my appointment on Tuesday my doctor walked me through the "what if I'm overdue" protocol. I didn't want to be induced, but the hospital policy here is not until 41wks3days anyway so I still had time. He sent me home with instructions to keep walking.

It was a frustrating week to say the least. In the wee hours of the morning on Friday the 15th, my due date, I started to really notice the contractions being more cramp like than before. They were 10-15 minutes apart most of the day (not a big deal, they'd been like that for over a week, but these were somehow "different"). That afternoon my sister texted saying her boss was offering DH and I AMAZING tickets to that night's baseball game. I knew DH would want to go and figured if I turned them down, the contractions would just stop again. At least going to the game would distract me. As I was getting dinner ready, I started to notice that the contractions were getting hard to time and tell distinctly apart (back pain). But we headed out to the ball game. On the way to the subway...I started to really doubt myself so instead of heading downtown, we took the subway (oh how I wish I was joking) to the hospital to "just get checked, we can go to the game when we're done). By the time we got to L&D at 7pm they were no more than 3 minutes apart but I was still only 1cm so they sent me to walk "BUT DON'T GO FAR!" They wanted me to walk for 2 hours and said they were impressed with how I was coping so far. Within 45 minutes we were back in the assessment room because I was no longer "coping". I was having clusters of back to back contractions 5-8 followed by a 4 minute break and then they'd go off clustering again. The nurse asked if I wanted to be checked and I asked how I could possibly have progressed in 45 minutes. She was curious so I let her check...and she just looked at me and said "I hope you didn't want morphine because it's too late now". I was suddenly a 3-4, and could be stretched to a 5... by this point the contractions had me in tears and I was really struggling to keep my cool through them (read "I was failing to keep my cool"). I had the choice between Epidural and Tub. I wanted to go without drugs so I asked for a tub but within 5 minutes I was having a total meltdown and we decided that I wasn't a good candidate and I opted for the Epidural. BEST DECISION EVER (for me). Because I wasn't getting any break between contractions at all. They broke my water trying to get them to regulate a little but it didn't really work, which I only knew from the back labor pain which the epidural couldn't touch.

Of course, that slowed the labor down and I settled in for the night. Hit 10cm around 8am (I think) with lots of pressure, we decided to let her come down until 9am and then start pushing. After 45 minutes of hard pushing, baby was still really high and they started to get concerned as I was running a fever and the baby's heartrate was getting higher and higher. With a family history (pretty much every woman) of emergency c-sections and an expected high birthweight baby, they suggested that I should consider a high forcep delivery or a c-section but that if I wanted to keep pushing I could. They did say that with the forceps they'd want to do it in the OR just in case it went bad. Because I knew my fever was affecting the baby (I also had A LOT of meconium in addition to the fever), I chose a c-section so that no more complications arose and I felt there were more risks with the high forceps option.

The c-section went really smoothly, they took me in pretty much right away, I had three doctors, a pediatrician, a respiratory therapist, and at least 6 other people (they were apparently more worried about the baby than I thought). She surprised us all (they took bets on her weight as she was coming out) and was under 10lbs. She was 9lbs4oz, 21.5'' long and perfectly healthy, praise the Lord. DH got to take her skin to skin right away after they cleared her airway and checked her heart and kept her that way until I got to recovery where they helped me to start breast feeding right away and kept her skin to skin for the next two hours. She was WIDE AWAKE the whole time big bright eyes looking all around. I couldn't believe it because I'd had a lot of drugs through the night and had expected her to be sleepy.

Pippa was born at 12:59pm on Saturday, June 16th.

I spent two days in the hospital, then came home. Other than some breastfeeding issues which have now been resolved, we're all doing great. Pippa is a beautiful baby and we're having fun getting to know her.

...I probably forgot some crucial information in there... but that's all I can remember for now

Goingfor3 · #2 June 21st, 2012, 07:35 PM

Thanks for sharing!!! I don't blame you at all for choosing the c-section. I was always terrified of forceps (never had them) and with the meconium...good call mama!!!