Walter John
vampirina
member
Hi Everyone! I've already shared a little bit on FB, but haven't had the time to share here! I'd like you all to meet Walter John, Wally for short, born September 7, 2016 at 5:23 am weighing in at 8lbs 1oz and 20 inches long! After all this waiting DH and I are over the moon to be with our little BOY!
I crawled out of bed at around 130ish AM to go the bathroom, because you know pregnancy problems, and all the sudden there was an uncontrollable gush. I managed to make it to the toilet when more gushing commenced so I yelled for DH to wake up and help me out. He was freaking out with excitement when he realized that our baby was definitely coming! I couldn't get off the toilet without water going everywhere, so DH started frantically packing the bag for the hospital (because we are incredibly poor planners) and I was just sitting there telling him what to put in the bag as he ran around like crazy. We were admitted to the hospital around 2:30 am and after confirming that my water was indeed broken, was finally given a room around 4 am. I was having contractions, but they weren't super strong, so DH and I tried to rest a bit and sleep, but were totally unsuccessful - too much was happening. At around 9am I was checked and hadn't progressed much, so we decided to place a Foley balloon, which got me to 5 cm in about 2 hours. At that point we were hoping I would contract on my own because I really wanted to avoid Pitocin, but alas no progress was made. At around 3ish, we started Pitocin and I could tell the contractions were ramping up but despite the pain level, they weren't effective contractions. I think I had maybe ONE contraction the entire labor that seemed typical - where the contract spreads across the entire uterus in hard knot. The rest were more in my cervix only, but were still really painful.
I was on Pitocin for quite a while without an epidural, but once we hit "level 16" I just couldn't handle the pain anymore and received the Epi. I was a little bummed I "caved" and got the epidural that I didn't plan for, but it was just too much for too long at that point. Immediately after the epidural, I was able to sleep a little and they were able to ramp up the Pitocin to max levels.
Unfortunately, it didn't work and I had to go in for a C-section. Once in he OR the epidural wasn't strong enough so they had to place another higher spinal, but that went the wrong way, which made it impossible for me to feel like I was breathing (I was breathing just fine, but it felt like I had a horse on my chest!) So I had to be put under general anesthesia for the birth, which was my worst fear going in this - that I'd essentially "miss" Wally's birth.
A few hours later, I woke up in recovery and they wheeled me up to meet my baby. I had no idea if it was a boy or girl because I wanted DH to tell me and all the doctors and nurses made sure anyone who cared for me in recovery used the words "baby" and never him or her (she was seriously awesome!) DH then showed me our little guy and told me his name. It was one of the best moments of my life to hold that little man for the first time!
It wasn't the birth story I wanted to share but its the one I got, and I'm so incredibly thankful that Wally and I are both healthy and safe! I'm glad the doctor let me labor for as long as did and at least try for a vaginal birth before convincing me to do the C-section. I feel a lot more at peace knowing I gave it my all to have the experiences I wanted, even if things didn't go as planned.
Re: Walter John
DS1 -- 9/30/2016
Sebastian 3-11-14
Simon 5-2-15
Baby #3 Due 9-29-16