March 2018 Moms
ShawnnaO
member
Labor & Birth Stories!
ShawnnaO
member
Here’s a thread where we can talk and AW about the details of our labors and the births of our babies! It’s also a place we can go to give congratulations and ask questions so we don’t clog up the birth announcements thread.
Re: Labor & Birth Stories!
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Me: 28 Him: 30
Married: 11/15/14
TTC: 02/2016
IF DX: MFI (low count & morphology) & mild PCOS
June 2016 BFP - MC @8w2d
August 2016 BFP - MC @6w1d
June 2017 - 50 mg Clomid + Ovidrel + IUI = BFP 7/6/17!!
Beta #1 = 422 (14dpo), Beta #2 = 810, prog - 12.3 (16dpo), Beta #3 = 5023, prog - 18.9 (20dpo)
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@DDRRT1982 ALL THE BIRTH STORIES! This is my favorite thread to lurk in other BMBs.
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Me: 28 Him: 30
Married: 11/15/14
TTC: 02/2016
IF DX: MFI (low count & morphology) & mild PCOS
June 2016 BFP - MC @8w2d
August 2016 BFP - MC @6w1d
June 2017 - 50 mg Clomid + Ovidrel + IUI = BFP 7/6/17!!
Beta #1 = 422 (14dpo), Beta #2 = 810, prog - 12.3 (16dpo), Beta #3 = 5023, prog - 18.9 (20dpo)
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I'm due March 1, so this is all too real for me right now. Anyone planning on working with a doula for their birth? I really want to do it unmedicated (option to change my mind), and we just hired Christine the Doula. Can't wait to report back on how it goes.
XO
I went in Wednesday evening to start my induction at 36+6 due to cholestasis. I had the same thing with my first and so I knew it could be a long process. I started out at 2cm dilated and 50% effaced. When I first got hooked up, I was having tons of contractions that weren't very painful and weren't doing anything, but they weren't comfortable doing any interventions until they simmered down. I was given IV fluids and that did the trick so cervidil was placed. I had mild contractions through the night but was able to sleep. The cervidil was removed after 12 hours, so around 10:30/11 the next morning. The midwife checked me and I was 2-3cm and still 50%, so not much progress. I was able to take a shower and eat lunch before getting hooked up to pitocin around noon. I had to stay in the room since with pitocin I needed to stay hooked up to all the monitors... and no shower (I loved the shower when I was in labor the first time so this was a bummer!). DH and I watched the Eagles parade (we're in PA) and I finished my letter to my toddler in his baby book and letter to baby in his baby book while walking around the room and using the birthing ball. I was so focused on the change for my 18 month old that working on the baby book while laboring was really nice to connect and focus on this baby. I had regular contractions all afternoon. Basically from the time pitocin was started until I delivered they were 2-3 minutes apart. Nothing too painful, more so uncomfortable and I was easily able to breathe through them. I was checked again around 4pm I think it was and went from "barely a 3" to a "definite 3". I was pretty bummed, but I was able to eat dinner! After getting the cervical check the contractions got a little stronger. I sat in bed for a while trying to rest because I was exhausted from the day. I got checked again at 7/7:30 and was at 4cm and the midwife broke my water. Basically right after that the contractions got way more intense. I knew I was getting close to wanting the epidural. I was going to try to go without but I thought I'd still be laboring for another 12 hours or so and I wanted to be able to rest so they went ahead and got fluids in my IV and got ready to call anesthesia. I'm sooo thankful I decided to get it. I always wanted the natural birth experience but it just was not going to happen... I was in a lot of pain and even though I could get through the contractions I was having a hard time relaxing. I'd be interested to know if I had made an dilation progress from when my water was broken to when the epidural was placed but I'll never know! Either way the epdirual was in at 8:30 and I felt great within 10 minutes. I rested for a little while. Both the day nurse and evening nurse were amazing. The evening nurse stayed and we were chatting on and off when she came in. During that time I started feeling a little funny... I had a little dizzy spell and was a little short of breath and then got the shakes. I was also feeling some pressure but didn't think it could be the baby yet. I mentioned all these things to the nurse and she thought the midwife should check me again. This was around 9:45. It was a new midwife and I hadn't met her through my appointments so she literally introduced herself for the first time while sticking her hand up me and said yep you're ready to have a baby... complete and almost +3 station. I was so surprised and my DH and I laughed about it because we had both resigned ourselves to having a baby on Friday instead. The midwife and nurses got everything set up within a few minutes and set me up to do a practice push. Not even one second into that she said "nevermind I need to get my gown". I pushed twice during one contraction and then she told me to stop as baby was delivering himself! I really think it was getting the epidural that allowed me to relax and for my body and the baby to do their thing! I started pushing at 9:59 and he was born at 10:01 on February 8th at 37 weeks exactly! I only had a very small first degree tear that was on the scar tissue of my tear from my first. We got to do an hour of skin to skin before one of the nursery nurses realized Cohen was breathing very fast. I thought it would be a quick fix but after being checked by the neonatologist he was whisked off to the NICU where he is still working on being ready to come home! He's making lot of improvements every day. I'm officially discharged but able to stay in my room still until they need the room. Pumping is going great (I think my milk should be coming in soon!) and I'm feeling well physically. Hanging in there emotionally and trying to stay optimistic that our NICU stay will be short. I'm loving our skin to skin and touch time sessions. His stats are holding steady and he does great when one of us is holding him.
Can't wait to read all the other March baby's birth stories soon!
Feb 1st at midnight I started my 5th major bleed in the hospital. Toco showed contractions, but I wasn’t too uncomfortable and the doctor decided to see if bleeding would stop naturally like it had before. By morning I had another biophysical profile and growth scan. Baby just barely got an 8/8 where she had always passed super fast.
My doctor asked if I was ready to have a baby the next day, but after noticing the toco reporting contraction she decided to check how dilated I was at that point. I was at a 4, so she decided baby was coming today!
I was wheeled down to labor and delivery by 2pm. Ate oatmeal and a banana, and had my water broken. An hour later I still wasn’t feeling contractions, but they were about 3mins apart. Dr rechecked and I was at 6cm. She decided to start a very low dose of pitocin, but reassured me that she would be going slow so my husband could be at the hospital after our older daughter went to bed.
Another hour passed and i started feeling contractions. Every time I would contract I would gush blood, so my doctor convinced me to get an epidural just in case this turned into an emergency c section. Afterwards she checked and was shocked to find that I was at a 10 and ready to go!
All i could feel was a slight butt cramp, and a heavy feeling that meant I needed to push.
After 2 sets of 3 pushes baby was on my chest! My doctor told me she was a girl, and because they whole thing only took 3 hrs my husband never made it. They let me cut the cord. After delivering the largest bilobed placenta I had ever seen, I started gushing blood again. That’s when the fun started. The placenta was intact, but ultrasound showed that my demised twin never absorbed, so 3 doses of cytotec up my bum and an IV I had never heard of. So super glad I got that epidural as my doctor had to reach to the top of my uterus and scrap poor little Dax out. By the end I had lost a little over 4 pints of blood, needed a transfusion, and super happy my husband missed all of it. He cried just seeing the piles of bloody buckets and linens around the room when he did arrive and doesn’t find any of my jokes funny.
As most of you know, baby and I were discharged, but Agatha had to be readmitted into the NICU. She is on the up and up, but I appreciate all of you cheering us on SO MUCH! I love this little community and I look forward to reading all of your perfect birth stories!
I woke up at 4:07 on Tuesday morning and realized I had to pee, per usual. As I got out of bed, there was a rush of fluid, and I assumed I'd peed myself. As I was creeping around my apartment trying to clean it and myself up without waking my husband, I realized that I was still leaking liquid - and that's when I realized something was obviously up! I reviewed my pregnancy book, posted here, and finally called my doctor, who told me it wouldn't hurt to go to the hospital and get checked. I woke my husband, who got himself fully ready for work, assuming he'd go in late after the hospital. I also assumed it was a false alarm, so even though I had my hospital bag packed and ready, I left it at home.
We got to the hospital and were checked into triage around 7. They did a swab to see if my water broke that came up negative, but didn't want to send me home because I was also having some light cramping and back pain. A nurse came to check that baby was head down with a quick ultrasound - she was - and then did a vaginal exam. Lots of fluid, and another swab - this one confirmed that my water had indeed broken. My husband and I just stared at each other. "So... is this actually happening?" was all I could say to the nurse, who responded "Let's put it this way: you're not going home without a baby!"
There were no rooms in delivery available at first, so they kept us in triage, hooked up to a monitor that was tracking my contractions. At this point, I was only 1 cm dilated and about 70% effaced. They were planning on giving me pitocin to move things along, but all of a sudden, my contractions intensified and they realized it wasn't necessary. What was necessary? The epidural! I had recently talked to my doctor about anxiety surrounding labor, and his advice was to get the epidural as soon as possible to calm myself dow. I was terrified as the anesthesiologist gave it to me, but it made life so much better once it kicked in.
The next few hours were a whirlwind: we called our families, we were moved to a real room, and I continued to be monitored. Baby's heartbeat seemed to drop a little with each contraction, but the doctor said it wasn't something to worry about just yet. Family came in and out. Around 9 PM, I was 10 cm dilated and fully effaced, but baby was still at station 0, so there was more waiting. My husband and I camped out in the delivery room, watching 30 Rock, and we actually both fell asleep. At 11:30, we were woken up by my nurse and doctor, who came in and said it was time to push. While I was feeling some light urges to push, it really came as a surprise that it was go-time. For whatever it's worth, my husband and I took things much more in stride since we were so taken by surprise: he held one of my legs and was helping count down, and even kept watching the whole process - which no one expected him to do!
Pushing was smooth sailing until the very last minute. I've had multiple miscarriages, and all I could think as she was about to be born was that something would go wrong at the last minute that would keep me from ever holding her in my arms. So I started hysterically crying and they had me stop pushing to talk me down.
Once I started pushing again, it was no time before Nora was born. The actual pushing-her-out-of-me was painful, but much different than I expected. She cried immediately and they placed her on my belly. Because she was a month early, a pediatrician immediately grabbed her to assess her. My husband, who was watching everything, ran into the bathroom and (almost) threw up. All in all, I pushed for an hour and forty-five minutes (which I wouldn't call ideal).
At this point, I realized the doctors were stitching me up, but something felt wrong. They were very intent on what they were doing and I could feel everything. The pediatrician gave Nora back to me, but I was in too much pain to hold her - he handed her to my husband. A lot started happening then. The doctor said I had uncontrolled bleeding and said they'd be calling more people into the room. All of a sudden, fifteen people rushed in, all focused on me: there was someone involved with hospital safety who had to oversee everything, an anesthesiologist to up my pain meds, a team with antibiotics, a team with blood transfusion supplies, a surgical team just in case. And then sitting alone in the corner with our just-born-baby is my poor husband, who has to helplessly watch this all go down and tend to our baby daughter.
There were about thirty really scary minutes, but in the end, all wound up okay: I had a series of 2nd-degree tears that happened to be by very active veins or arteries or whatever, and that's what made them so difficult to control. I got a blood transfusion. Life will go on!
Shortly after being born, Nora's blood glucose levels were checked and they came back low. She was supposed to be sent to the NICU, but after eating and taking a glucose gel, they came back up and she was able to stay with us. She had jaundice that meant she had to be under lights for most of her first day of life, but her levels have looked good ever since. She also had to be tested because she was a "car seat risk" - they had her sit in her car seat for 90 minutes while monitoring her vitals to make sure she could tolerate that position. My little woman made it through everything with flying colors. We came home on Friday, and life has been good ever since!
Married: 5.27.16
Baby Boy Due: 3.18.18
Got back to the hospital just in time for 3pm shift change on LnD, checked in ready for some cervidil. It was inserted at 1900 and we waited.... and waited lol. 12 hours later and I had dilated to 2cm, but was 100%. My OB decided on Pitocin at 0730 and by 0800 we were rolling.
The drip was titrated only once before I started to feel some contractions. With the second titration at 0930, I was ready for IV meds. I had made the decision for no epidural, but I needed something to take the edge off the waves. I received a Nubain/Phenergan combo that made me more sleepy than anything. My OB came in for a cervical check then broke my water to see if I would progress as I was still at 2-3cm. Those contractions became STRONG waves and by 1000, my husband, mom and coworker had kind of floated away in my mind. I was in my own zone, standing over a birthing ball then sitting on it, over and over.
By 1200, I required more pain meds and basically begged my OB for more. I had my eyes closed from that point until birth as it helped me focus. The intense feeling to poop tripped me out as I knew it was going to happen but didn't realize how hard it would be to stop that feeling. Everyone needed to get gowned up and things were happening rapidly. At 1245 or so I was allowed to push and after 9 pushes he was out! 7lb, 8oz and 19 3/4 inches long on 02/20/18. I'm just getting discharged today as I still have hypertension and ridiculous edema but this face is SO worth it
As you may recall, two weeks ago I had a cerclage that wasn't completely removed due to scaring around the cerclage. However, at my next appointment I was dilating just fine, so my doctor thought it wasn't interfering with progression. At my 38 week appointment (yesterday) I was even further dilated to a three/four and he didn't think it would be much longer before delivery. He stripped my membranes then too. It wasn't painful and I had virtually no bleeding afterwards. What's funny is that it seemed my BH contractions went away after the stripping. I had an induction set for the following week, so no big deal if it didn't stimulate anything. However, at 0100 today I woke up thinking I had to use the bathroom. I got up, did my thing, and went back to bed. Then I started to have a dull ache with what I thought was just a BH. The dull aches started to increase in intensity. Quickly I began to notice a pattern and started timing the contractions. At 0130 they were nine minutes apart. I decided to get up and move around to see if they would go away. They quickly increased in frequency to six minutes apart and also became more painful. I woke my husband up at 0200 and told him I thought I was in labor, but was going to shower to see if they went away with the warmth of the water. They just increased in frequency and intensity. I finally admitted this was the real deal. We started to discuss what we were going to do with the kids and determined it was best to call our babysitter. She fortunately responded and headed over to our house. (Thank goodness we did not have to bring three very small kids to L&D.) By the time she got to our house at 0330 I was having to breathe through contactions and felt lots of pain down below. We got to the hospital at 0400 and the staff did their usual procedure of evaluating me before calling my OB, which I understand. However, I was in so much pain that I just had my husband call my OB so he can start the process of getting orders for antibiotics and an epidural. When they checked me I was still only three to four centimeters, but definitely contracting every two to four minutes. They determined the scar tissue and my tensing up was probably inhibiting progression. I got the epidural shortly after. With the epidural in place they were able to move the bands of tissue preventing dilation. My body progressed naturally from there. By 0900 I was 9cm. It took another hour and another splitting of scar tissue to get me to a 10. At 1000 I was set up for delivery. I started pushing and after two pushes he said I was going to tear. I told him to just do an episiotomy because I didn't feel like I healed as well with a tear last time. The next push my doctor delivered the baby's head. He then allowed my husband to deliver the shoulders and the rest of the body. She was placed directly on my chest at 1024 am. Being an RT I did lots of stimulation and asked them to suction her mouth when necessary. She came out fast, so she had a little fluid stuck in her upper airway that was easy to clear. We did a hour of skin to skin afterwards, which she definitely liked. While I was doing that, my doctor examined me and noticed I had a pretty significant laceration on my cervix. He spent a lot of time fixing it and I was so thankful I had gotten a delivery dose of epidural medication. He also sewed up my episiotomy. It's amazing what doctors can do to you without you caring while you are holding your brand new baby. I was so in to her that I didn't care that I had two nurses holding equipment pulling on my cervix while he was sewing for a while. It's only now I can imagine what that must of looked like. After that was done they let my epidural wear off and I was sent to post partum. I really couldn't be happier with how the delivery went because it was quick and she tolerated the birthing process so well.
My little Samantha Rose reminds me so much of last baby with her calm temperament and alertness. She is already nursing well and I am eager to have my milk come in so I don't have to worry about weight loss and jaundice. She was born at the exact same gestation as my daughter, but is almost a full pound bigger and an inch shorter. I am hoping she does well with clearing the bilirubin like her sister, especially since she is a little bigger. My recovery is going to be a little more intense with this being my fifth delivery and a cervical laceration on an already compromised cervix, but we are keeping up with pain meds and it's helping. I am anticipating discharge on March 1st, which is the 15th anniversary of the day I brought home my oldest son after a three month NICU stay. I think that's pretty neat.
me 34 | him 37 | married 6/6/15
• April 2017 - TI #3, 100mg Clomid BFP | CP
• May/June 2017 - IVF#1 - BFP - Due 3/7/18
General TW for this post.
As I've shared elsewhere both my twin boys developed IUGR around 30 weeks, and slipped into severe IUGR sometime around week 34. They were both cephalic so the plan was to induce week 38. At week 36 I was diagnosed with mild preeclampsia. My MFM said if they had been a good size she would induce then, but because of the IUGR she split the difference weighing my health and theirs and we scheduled an induction for week 37.
On 2/20 I was admitted and we started with a Foley. They noticed when they placed the Foley that I was 1cm dilated and must have lost my mucus plug without knowing it, plus Baby A appeared to be descended partially into my pelvis. Part of my agony that first night was from my wrist. The preeclampsia made it hard to find a vein, and I have small veins, but instead of being patient with me some sadistic mean nurse gave me an IV lock in my wrist without lidocaine. I did not realize I had to ask for lidocaine. Ladies, make sure you get some. Also don't get an IV lock in a part of you body your normally put weight on constantly to get in and out of bed.
The contractions and bloody show started shortly after the Foley was inserted and lasted throughout the night. I was so freaked out about all the fears I had of this complicated birth and the state of my kids' and my health that I was in a constant panic attack. They begged me to take something for the anxiety and I refused. Finally an OB and a new nurse, my guardian angel nurse who deserves a medal, convinced me the morning of the 21st that I had to take something because the panic attacks were slowing labor and my preeclampsia was worsening and we couldn't afford the time. So I reluctantly took a .5 ativan and tried to rest.
The Foley worked and I was 4.5-5 cm dilated and 75% effaced by the time it came out, but they had to pull it out. Then they started pitocin, increasing every 20 minutes. At this time it became clear the preeclampsia was no longer mild. I developed a textbook case of clonus and they brought a bunch of nursing students in to examine my feet. I had never heard of clonus but I guess it is a bad sign with preeclampsia so they all agreed it was time to move things along and break Baby A's (we'll call him P now) water. I got an epidural I think around early evening. My guardian angel nurse found another vein, gave me some lidocaine, and pulled out the wrist IV, which was seriously almost as bad as some of the contractions.
That night, things started to turn. There was concern over Baby B's (we'll call him N now) heart rate. Whenever the nurses turned me to the left it went down, so my epidural was uneven and I felt all contractions on my left side. The pain was getting worse and the dilation wasn't improving. They started to have trouble tracking P's heart rate and placed an internal monitor. I dozed off briefly Wednesday night and woke up sweating like crazy, called the nurse. I had a bad fever, around 102 or 103. I later found out I had chorioamnionitis, and endometritis, which had developed sometime after P’s water was broken. They stopped the Pitocin and started me on 4 or 5 antibiotic drips as well as a Tylenol drip to bring the fever down. I was put on oxygen for an hour or so. All this appeared to help, but labor had slowed pretty much to a halt, still only dilated to 4.5-5 cm, and my clonus and blood pressure continued to worsen. The doctor tickled P’s head, got no response, and said he was in fetal distress. She thought I would at least need another 5-6 hours of labor, probably more, and that P was not going to tolerate labor for that long, given his lack of stimulation from the head tickle. There was additional concern that because his water was broken, he had been exposed to the infection that had caused my chorioamnionitis and endometritis. She said it was time to switch course to a c section and I agreed.
I don’t want to upset anyone, but as a side note I’d like to point out that although she told me P would die without a c section in the next 5-6 hours, this c section was not considered an “emergency”. They only call it an emergency if there is no time to fully prep you. This pisses me off because the situation was clearly an emergency, it’s just they did have time to clean my belly, throw on some iodine, give me my 3rd IV lock in the case of needing a transfusion, and wheel me into the OR. Someone saying, “Hey your kid will die in a few hours without a c section” feels like a pretty clear emergency to me. So now I’m forever skeptical of those statistics saying emergency c sections are not common.
During the surgery someone announced “Male 7:34 am” and I waited for the cry, but none came. There was a lot of commotion and I could hear a team of extra people enter the room. Then someone announced “Male 7:36 am” and moments later I did hear a cry, but the commotion in the room seemed to be getting worse. Both babies required chest compressions and CPR was performed on P. They brought N over to me and he was so, so tiny, but alert and clearly alive. I asked where P was over and over and no one would answer. Leading me to think he was dead or near dead. MH returned and said he was following P and had to leave. We had agreed before he should if something like this happened, and I’m glad he went, but this meant I was all alone for the rest of the surgery just bawling and getting no answers when I asked about P over and over while being stitched and glued together.
Meanwhile, P and N were both taken to the NICU. N was put there in an open bassinet at first just because he was severe IUGR/SGA and needed general monitoring. P needed an x-ray to determine whether any ribs were broken during CPR (none were, thankfully). They put P into an incubator with a CPAP, and an IV lock for food and several antibiotics as a precaution since the labs to see if he had gotten the infection would take 2 days. I saw him for the first time hours after surgery when they let me touch his leg with one finger through an opening in the side of his incubator.
I think a day later the CPAP was removed and he was able to breath on his own, and then another day after we found out that P did not get my infection, so they got rid of his IV lock and let him eat. He continued to improve after that, pretty quickly actually. He had a little jaundice that cleared. N had temperature control problems and is a horrible feeder, so they both ended up in the NICU for the same amount of time. We had amazing NICU nurses who taught us the special ways to feed and care for babies of their size, and explained how they were different from premies but also different from full term babies.
I have so many feelings for people who have kids in the NICU for long portions of time and I know we lucked out big time in that regard, especially considering how hairy things looked before, during, and immediately after surgery. MH and I are probably forever scarred from this ordeal, but now that both kids are here at home with us we are moving forward, and just focusing on growing our little dudes into normal size babies. I still have preeclampsia postpartum, but it seems to be improving. And we were assured by the pediatricians that there will be no longterm clinical significance to P or N as a result of their rocky start.
@sarahhedger7 I'm definitely getting her a present and nominating her for an award at our hospital, yeah. She was amazing. She was also one of the nurses who helped revive P.
@baybeesunflower Thank you. Endometritis is not the same as endometriosis--it was a complication of the infection (chorioamnionitis). I was told by my RE last year that I could have endometriosis too, but I never got the test for that since it is so invasive, and I don't know if that is at all related to the chorioamnionitis/endometritis.
you for sharing your story. You have 2 very strong boys! So glad you had a happy ending. We are all here to support you if you need anything.