VBAC
Lucky_N_Love
member
It was quite an exciting morning as Andrew entered the world quickly and in full force after making us wait for 2 weeks. I couldn?t be happier with how things went and I am so happy to have such a wonderful blessing join our family.
VBAC=Success!
Lucky_N_Love
member
in VBAC
Hello there! I am not really an "active" poster on this board but I did do lots of lurking as was preparing for my birth so I wanted to announce that I had a successful VBAC 2 weeks ago with my son.
It was always nice for me to read of other women's stories so I wanted to pass that on to more moms. I will post my (very long) birth story below if anyone wants to read it.
Readers Digest Version--With my first pregnancy I had an emergency C-Section and this time after a very short labor of about 7 hours I welcomed my son into the world with a Med Free VBAC at 42 weeks! I couldn't be happier.
The Birth Story that was worth the wait! Our little boy was
due December 28th 2012, and all I feared my whole pregnancy is that
he would come early and add chaos to Christmas. I was mostly being selfish in
that I wanted to be able to enjoy all of the yummy food, family and presents of
Christmas and not be in the hospital. Well Christmas came and went, and I still
felt wonderful. For an almost 40 week pregnant woman this was no small
task. Then our due date came and went.
Then we rounded towards the end of 2012 and all we wanted was our little boy to
be here (and maybe the tax refund that would come with it)
The further and further past my due date the more obnoxious
things became for me, for my husband and for the doctors. We would get phone calls and
messages every day from our loving family and friends asking if baby boy had
come to join us. We wished that the answer was yes, but unfortunately he just
was not ready yet. I continued to go to
the doctor multiple times a week for the baby to be monitored just to be sure
he wasn?t in any distress. He was healthy, happy and 100% comfortable right
where he was.
After the adventurous Birth Story from Big Sister Audrey, I
was attempting a VBAC (Vaginal Birth after Cesarean) so I was a bit limited as
far as any inductions that could happen, although I would have declined even if
it was not a ?special birth? as I knew my baby would come when he was
ready. As we rounded to almost 42 weeks I
began to mentally prepare myself that I may need to have another C-section and
tried to make as much mental peace with that as I could. I made a list of
questions and discussion points and talked in detail with my doctor ?just in
case?
We had been working with our Doula, Connie, on different ways
to naturally induce this little guy along and tried many things in desperation on
January 10th the night before my 42 week doctor?s appointment.
That next morning I was awoken around 6am with some pretty
strong cramps in my lower stomach that felt like menstrual cramps. Granted
those are not fun, I wasn?t convinced it was anything to get excited about and
I tried to keep sleeping. They kept on happening so I began to glance at the
clock on my cell phone and noticed they were happening pretty regularly about
every 6 minutes or so. I then got out of
bed to try and manage through some of the pain downstairs on the yoga ball
while I watched the news.
As things began to get stronger I called my husband on his cell
phone (It was too painful to actually walk upstairs and wake him ) I told him he should
come downstairs and sleep on the couch near me in case things began to progress
more. At this point I also began texting with my doula just to keep her in the
loop that today could be the day. She told me to keep moving around as much as
possible and let gravity do the work while I ate something to keep my energy
up. At this point I started picking up the house a bit and scrubbed the toilet
in case today was the day and people would be over. I knew we had our doctor?s appointment at 9am
that I was still planning on attending but decided that I did not want to take
Audrey so I text messaged my brother to come over and stay with her. He arrived
at 8:15am and while waiting for him to arrive I decided we should grab our bags
?just in case?
The whole drive to hospital (where my doctor?s office is conveniently
located) I had my eyes closed and would ?Ooooooo? through each contraction on
my knees as I had found this was and
continued to be the only comfortable position.
I had learned about using low toned ?Ooooo?ing? from a mama friend who
has had several non-medicated home births as a way to help focus on opening up
the cervix versus tightening up. Totally
works and helped me through the entire birth.
When we arrived at the doctor I (according to hubby) was scaring all of
the pregnant women in the lobby as I leaned over the chair and Ooo?d. So
thankfully they took me straight to a room.
If I had known this was the trick I would have tried this on the days I
was in a hurry and waited for an hour.
Things had gotten pretty intense since I woke up just 3 hours ago and
even I started to wonder why I was here for my appointment. I did get a look of ?what the hell are you
doing here and why haven?t you checked into the hospital yet?. Dr Wood did a quick exam as I was preparing
to smack him if he said ?minimal progress?. Thankfully for both of us I was dilated
to 4cm! He said to head on downstairs to get checked in, to which I replied ?no
thanks we?re going to walk around for a little while? Because I knew once I
checked in there was no going back from being monitored and bothered etc. so I
wanted to labor some more in my own way. This worked out for my caffeine
addicted sleep deprived husband who NEEDED some coffee anyway. So we headed
down to the vending machine room at the hospital. At this point I began to feel
nauseas and vomited getting off the elevator. Thankfully the same thing
happened in labor with Audrey so I wasn?t as shocked or scared this time. My
super star husband was quick thinking and yelled ?Go for the plant!? When that
did not happen he did a magnificent job of cleaning me and the floor up J hubby sipped his coffee and probably played
games on his phone as I leaned over a chair on my knees with my eyes closed in
my own little labor world for the next hour. I gave him the task of communicating
with our parents and doula via text message from my phone. I believe it was around 10:20/10:30 when I
decided we should go and check in before I was in too much pain to even make it
upstairs.
I remember as I jumped into the wheelchair on my knees (eyes
still closed as I don?t think I opened them until the baby came out) they asked
?Does she have an appointment?? If I wasn?t in so much pain I am sure I would
have had some smart ass comment for them, but thankfully my darling husband was
able to vocalize the situation for me and they bypassed all of the paperwork and
took me right up to triage. Fortunately, we only spent maybe 10 minutes there
as Eli was able to give them a time frame and that I was 4 cm dilated over an
hour ago so they needed to get me to a room right away. We got to our room a bit before 11am I
believe and not too much longer my doula arrived with her bag of tricks and we
continued to get our labor on. Again my eyes still closed and on my knees leaning
over the back of the bed. At some point I was checked not long after getting to
the room and I was about 8cm. Inside my head I was nervous to hear this because
that is where I felt things ?turned bad? with Audrey?s delivery, but I kept on.
For the next hourish hubby and Connie were amazing!!! Eli
rubbed my back like he never has before and Connie kept a constant stream of
water, Chap Stick, wash cloths, lavender and encouraging words coming. We were getting SO close and the urge to push
this little guy was coming on full force. I knew that I would push him out when
I and he was ready and I attempted to follow my body as much as I could. At one
point the nurse said ?Woah honey you
cannot be pushing the doctor isn?t here yet? I didn?t care I knew he was not
just going to fall out, and if so no one would just let him fall on the floor.
I continued to follow my body?s cues. I felt like I was in my own little world
and had no concept of time. I just kept thinking of women who push for hours
and wondered how long I could really keep doing this. Though I was still most comfortable in my
position of choice it was becoming more apparent that baby boy wasn?t coming
out in that position and they were becoming more and more concerned about his
heart rate dropping so I turned onto my side then the other side then finally
my back after multiple more attempts. During this entire time the wonderful
nurse Stacy (who probably hated me) had the monitor on my belly constantly as
it would not stay on by itself in the positions I wanted to be in. Thankfully Connie
was able to help communicate my whispers
and thumbs up to the nurse to tell her when contractions were starting and
stopping so they could continue to monitor the baby as best as possible. The last probably 10 minutes are fuzzy with
pain, joy and excitement as the doctors were demanding more and more pushing
and asking to use the vacuum to get the baby out. Apparently I said ?no? when
first asked and they let me keep trying and then asked again where I consented
as to get the baby out as quickly and safely as possible. Not too many minutes
later at 12:53pm Andrew Joseph took his first breath and let out a couple
of cries and snuggled up on my chest. This was ?the moment? I had longed for!!
I snuggled with my little man. The pain was gone and he was here I could
finally open my eyes and take it all in. I looked around the room at so many
people smiling at me including my awesome husband who had a look of terror/excitement/fear/happiness
and who knows what else Andrew continued to snuggle with me as we
were delaying cutting the cord until it had stopped pulsing. I was also
informed that I was a small 2nd degree tear that doctor was going to
fix up for me while I just continued to stare in amazement at my little miracle
from God.
It was quite an exciting morning as Andrew entered the world quickly and in full force after making us wait for 2 weeks. I couldn?t be happier with how things went and I am so happy to have such a wonderful blessing join our family.
This discussion has been closed.
Re: VBAC=Success!
Congrats! Great story. And don't feel bad about the nurse holding the monitor, they had to do that for me too.
Yay ! Hope it is a good omen ;