Harvey! Warning-- Super LONG!

topato · #1 January 21st, 2013, 06:57 PM

The Epic Tale of the Arrival of the Harvey.

On Friday, I picked up the sinus infection that my husband came home with earlier that week. I'm prone to them-- I get two a year on average, and I know what they feel like. I always get dark circles under my eyes, super awful sinus headaches, runny nose, a slight itch in my throat... and no fever.

Check to all of the above. I was completely miserable, kinda annoyed at my husband for sharing, and I spent the day in bed. Saturday was a bust too-- I knew I wasn't really allowed to take anything but sudafed, which I didn't have in the house at the time, so again, I spent the day in bed. I sent my husband out for bagels which were the extent of what I ate all day, slept, and watched tv.

When I woke up on Sunday (afternoon!), still feeling super crappy with my runny nose and sinus headache, I had diarrhea. What the hell, that's a new one. I hadn't eaten anything but bread the day before. My first thought was that maybe what I was interpreting as a sinus infection was actually the flu? My second thought-- isn't random diarrhea a sign that labor is really really soon? After a few more bouts, I decided that my son would be here by the end of that day. lol.

I had been having a lot of long stretches of false labor, so when the contractions started on Sunday night, my husband and I decided to ignore them for a while. Because, yeah right, I had made an out-loud prediction that the baby would be coming that day, there's no chance it was actual labor. The contractions weren't bad, but... they didn't stop.

We broke out the contraction timer app around 8pm, and the contractions were all a minute long, and were coming every five minutes. Now, the doctor had said to call when an hour like that had passed. ...No way, man. We waited. In fact, I was insistent that my husband and I just go to sleep, because it was just going to pass anyway, and I was super tired from feeling like CRAP.

Yeah, he really didn't think he'd be able to sleep because he was worried, and eventually convinced me to pick up the phone. Psh, ok ok. By the time I called, it was midnight, the contractions were four minutes apart, and they were less tolerable.

When we got to the hospital, my heart rate was super fast, the contractions were every three minutes, and i was *barely* one cm dilated. The doctor said that it seemed like legitimate labor, but that it was sooo sooo early, to go home and come back when i was 3 cm dilated.

Huh? How am I supposed to know when I'm at 3 cm! Ok, come back when "your pain is 50% worse." ...what?? We left at 5am (that's Monday morning).

Well I got ZERO sleep when we got home, since the contractions were still coming every three minutes all night, but they didn't feel like they were getting stronger. I stopped timing, hoping for rest, but, nope. At around 11:30, or noon, I decided to soak in the tub to ease the pain. My heart was going a mile a minute, and I woke up my poor husband to see what he wanted me to do.

I ended up calling my Ob for advice, and they had me come in to check if i'd made any progress. I was 2 cm. So, yes, progress, but no, still to early to go back to the hospital. How am I supposed to know when to go in, I'm already regular, this is insane! He told me to wait til 5pm, then just go to the hospital, I should be at least 3 cm by then.

We got there at 6. My contractions were now downright painful, though I was still dealing with them. The hospital was super busy, so it was closer to 8 before they could check me, anddddd I was 2 cm dilated. There was talk of sending me home again or giving me a morphine rest, but they decided to keep me an hour to check me again.

I paced in the hallway for most of it. Still 2 cm. Are you serious?

The doctor (same guy from early early that morning!) was concerned about my pain level, even though I was insistent that it wasn't too bad, since my heart rate hadn't dropped below 125 the whole time I was there. He decided he'd do the morphine rest.

Now, I'd never heard of that, so I'll explain. They inject you with some morphine and hook you up to extra monitors for four hours. If it's false labor, the contractions stop, and you go home comfortable. If it's real labor, the contractions continue, just slowerrrrr, and they are more efficient. ok, ok, whatever, just please don't send me home to wait it out some more. I clearly don't know what I'm waiting for!

The morphine definitely slowed the contractions- the nurse checking my monitors said they were more like every 6 minutes now, and to get some sleep. That wasn't happening. They may have been slower, but they felt more powerful for sure. I wasn't writhing in pain, but I was nowhere near comfortable enough to sleep.

I can't tell you *exactly* when the morphine wore off, but my husband can-- it was when I started SCREAMING BLOODY MURDER. Now THAT was pain. They hurry to get the doctor ANDDDD

2 cm. $%$@$#^$^#

But my heart was still really racing, and the pain was suddenly super intense, so the doctor (yep, still the same dude from the first night!) called my on-call ob to tell them what he thought they should do-- epidural and induction.

I was really upset about this. I hadn't wanted to do an epidural until I absolutely needed to (if at all), and that decision was being made for me. But they were worried about my pulse, and I was worried about my baby, so I went with it. Thank god, because the next step was pitocin and the insertion of that balloon thingy to manually dilate my cervix. AGH.

This all happened around 3am (it was Tuesday at this point), and since I was officially admitted, we called our parents to let them know our little man was on his way. We didn't realize how slow the process would go. Wow.

It was maybe 11am before the balloon fell out, meaning I hit 4 cm. They broke my water at that point. Then, waiting. I was more comfortable for sure, and tried to grab naps when I could, since it was almost 2 days since I'd slept. But, I'm the world's lightest sleeper so I didn't get more than five minutes at a time.

At six pm, they checked my progress, and I was at seven cm. But *maybe* five minutes later, I was in intense pain! Crying, having a hard time breathing, feeling the baby pushing his way down into the birth canal.

The nurses come running in, bc what the hell, you've had an epidural!! HOLY CRAP. My pulse was now even higher, around 140, and was setting off alarms because the machines couldn't distinguish my heart beat from the baby's. In that five minutes I dilated to 9cm, and they could feel the baby's head forcing its way through.

They're yelling at me that I can't push, that I'll tear my cervix and bleed out, and I'm yelling that I'm not! They inject stuff into my epidural pump thing to take away my urge to push, but, since I wasn't pushing, it didn't do anything. They inject it again. Then a third time. My mom keeps reaching across me and pressing the epidural button to give me boosts, but I can feel everythingggg.

Then the nurses start thinking that there's something wrong with my epidural, and the decision is made (somehow) to inject me with a massive amount of medication-- enough where they'd be able to perform a c-section-- just to see if the epidural was still properly in place. They tell me *as they're administering the dose* that I will not be able to feel anything or even really move for at least two hours. This happens before I can object-- because how am I supposed to push now if I reach that 10cm mark while this stuff is in effect?

You'll have to wait. #*$&(*&

In a few minutes, I hit complete zombie mode. I cant move, am barely conscious, and don't feel anything AT ALL. But two hours? Not even close. Within the hour, I had all the feeling back in my legs, and could feel my Harvey continuing to force himself out. I'm yelling in pain again, and crying, and trying to calm down my mother and husband, who are in the room with me. I spiked a fever in time for them to check and find that I'm the full 10 cm.

They grab my on-call ob, a bunch of nurses, and THE SAME DOCTOR FROM THE FIRST NIGHT! hah

In less than twenty minutes of pushing, Harvey was here-- which was not surprising to me, since he was so eager to come out before it was time.

But my fever was up to 101.7, and the skin-to-skin that I had wanted was three seconds long, with his back to my chest- I didn't even get to see his face before they wisked him away. They immediately started me on antibiotics, even before they stitched me up and delivered the placenta. The nurses shouted his vitals to me, which I had to be reminded of because I was delirious from my fever. ...He *also* had a temperature, and his heart rate was a little erratic, so they put him in NICU.

I was up and walking around an hour later, but the fever was really messing with me. I was shaking, and babbling, and couldn't focus my eyes properly. I was allowed to see the baby several hours later, though I had to wear a mask and was not permitted to touch him until I'd received more rounds of antibiotics and my fever broke the next morning. (He's got a full head of dark hair and deep blue eyes-- he looks just like his daddy!)

Thankfully, the antibiotics they gave to my Harvey seemed to do the trick. His fever went away quickly (faster than mine!!), and his tests came back good. After the first night, they moved him into the soon-to-be-discharged room of the NICU, and I was allowed to start breast feeding him. He ended up being ready to leave the hospital even before I was-- I still needed another hour's worth of antibiotics.

We both got home on Thursday night and are doing really well. I'm not in any pain (and I really haven't been at all since the delivery), and my freakin' sinus infection symptoms are finally subsiding. I'm not sleeping, like most new moms, but I have more energy now than I've had in forever. Not to mention, I don't remember ever being *this* happy. My Lil' Man is a total doll.

He's grounded, though. <3