Multiples
zombiemommy
member
Short version:
Malcolm Finley was born via csection at 5:40am on Friday, November 16th and was swiftly followed by Brendan Bailey born at 5:42am. Malcolm weighed 6lbs, 7ozs, and Brendan weighed 6lbs, 6ozs.
Long version:
At 8pm on Wednesday the 14th we were scheduled to check in at labor and delivery to begin induction. At 7pm, the hospital called to say they were swamped and they'd call us when they were ready for us. After hours of not receiving a call, I called back at 10pm and they told us we could head over.
Once in L&D, they went over preliminary details and then started me on the balloon catheter to get me dilated. I was 1cm when I arrived, so we had a ways to go. The catheter didn't hurt, it was just kind of awkward and made getting up to pee kind of difficult. The docs also started me on a small dose of pitocin, and we waited.
Apparently the saline catheter method of dilation takes between 6-12 hours to get you 4cm dilated, but I was lucky and the cervical catheter had done its job by 6am on Thursday the 15th. So far, this was going well. They upped my pitocin and left me to dilate further.
At 11, the external monitor on Malcolm starts going totally bonkers, and my pgal brain starts freaking the heck out. They try to reposition the monitor, but can't find him. The resident comes in with the ultrasound and dumbly fumbles around. She keeps saying "he's there" and I'm like "no crap, but is there a heartbeat?"
Her reaction? "I can't tell but I think his chest is behind your hip bone. Let's put in the internal fetal monitor". That's the one that goes in through your cervix and attaches to the baby's scalp. I'm panicking, but thankfully they get the monitor in and there's my boy's heartbeat looking nice and normal. Sigh of relief.
By noon, I was at 6cm, and the doctors were pushing to break my water and get me on the epidural. I was having contractions, but none that really felt "epidural-worthy", but I figured I'd want it before my water was broken.
Enter the anesthesiologist. He is cold and quiet, and the insertion of the epidural takes a couple tries. I feel...a little dullness, but certainly not the total numbness I'd been told to expect. However, I'm not in pain so I ignore it.
We break my water. It feels very warm and there sure is a lot of it. The doctors leave me to dilate further and up my pitocin again.
From noon until 6pm, I make no progress, except that I hit extremely painful contractions and the epidural isn't doing diddly crap. I'm crying and grabbing on to the edges of the bed. The anesthesiologist comes in again, but this time it's a new guy who is like the biggest *** in history. He gets snappy with the nurse, and asks me if I'm "uncomfortable" as I cry and wince through contractions. No crap, buddy. But instead of investigating the viability of my epidural or upping the levels, he gives me narcotics that knock me out for hours.
Early in the evening, I make it to 8cms. I'm getting hopeful! By around midnight, my doc comes in and says I'm almost there--like over 9cm. She ups my pitocin and says she's going to take a one hour nap and then we'll start pushing.
After an hour, the extremely painful contractions thing happens again and the super jerk anesthesiologist comes back and once again gives me narcotics rather than investigating my epidural. Cue another 2 hour drugged out nap. My doctor, mind you, is nowhere to be seen.
I wake up after 3am on Friday, and a resident checks my cervix and tells me there's still a little lip of cervix blocking Malcolm's head. Great. My doctor comes back in and is noticeably salty that it's taking so long. She says we're going to try to push and see if she can help Malcolm's head get through the cervix. We try pushing for about twenty minutes, but it's useless. He's not going anywhere.
My doc looks at me and says it's time for csection. My water has been broken for too long and my temperature is elevated--they're concerned about infection.
My reaction? Fine. What the heck took them so long? My doctor says she wishes that I'd stalled out earlier, to which I want to say "being stuck at 6cms for over 6 hours wasn't enough of a stall?!", but I keep it in. I'm tired and frustrated and ready to see my boys.
We head in to the OR, and I keep insisting that I'm still in pain and can still feel a fair amount--too much, I'm concerned, to be cut open. Once again, cue the narcotics. They make me a foggy mess and cause me to shake uncontrollably, but I'm not numb below the waist.
While they're setting me up, they hold my husband in a different room and don't bring him in until the very last minute, but I guess that's pretty common.
Now to the surgery--holy Jesus. I'm sure I wasn't feeling EVERYTHING, but I was feeling enough to be crying and screaming as they pulled the boys out of me. I was so drugged and in so much pain that I couldn't even enjoy looking over at my boys as they were placed in the bed to my left. I looked enough to see that they were adorable and alive, but that was about it.
As they sewed me up, the pain intensified and I started shouting obscenities. At one point my husband says that I passed out, but honestly the whole thing is pretty cloudy in my head. I just remember being in way more pain than I expected with an epidural, and after talking to others, I'm skeptical about the level and/or placement of my epidural.
All that aside, my delivery resulted in two healthy, nice sized baby boys and a sore but alive mama. That's all that matters to me.
Malcolm spent 36 hours in the NICU and Brendan spent closer to 60 hours there because of their blood sugar levels and they had to be given antibiotics due to my infection from my broken water. I know we're lucky that it wasn't longer, but it was still hard to be away from them. I couldn't really get out of bed for like 24 hours, so I didn't get to see or hold them until Saturday afternoon/evening. Because they were fed formula in the NICU, getting them on breastfeeding was tough, but by the time they came home they were formula free, so my worry was all for nothing!
Since getting home, we've needed a crazy amount of help. Like literally there is almost always a third person in our house because the boys won't sleep in their pack n play or crib. I absolutely recommend getting bassinets or some tighter sleeping area, but it might just be a matter of time. We've had success with the swing and, oddly enough, their car seats.
Lost our first little peanut on 1/17/2012 at 9 weeks and 5 days. We miss you little blessing, but we know you were too perfect for this world.
My multiples/parenting/pregnancy/miscarriage blog
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My boys are here! Birth story with PIP
zombiemommy
member
in Multiples
Short version:
Malcolm Finley was born via csection at 5:40am on Friday, November 16th and was swiftly followed by Brendan Bailey born at 5:42am. Malcolm weighed 6lbs, 7ozs, and Brendan weighed 6lbs, 6ozs.
Long version:
At 8pm on Wednesday the 14th we were scheduled to check in at labor and delivery to begin induction. At 7pm, the hospital called to say they were swamped and they'd call us when they were ready for us. After hours of not receiving a call, I called back at 10pm and they told us we could head over.
Once in L&D, they went over preliminary details and then started me on the balloon catheter to get me dilated. I was 1cm when I arrived, so we had a ways to go. The catheter didn't hurt, it was just kind of awkward and made getting up to pee kind of difficult. The docs also started me on a small dose of pitocin, and we waited.
Apparently the saline catheter method of dilation takes between 6-12 hours to get you 4cm dilated, but I was lucky and the cervical catheter had done its job by 6am on Thursday the 15th. So far, this was going well. They upped my pitocin and left me to dilate further.
At 11, the external monitor on Malcolm starts going totally bonkers, and my pgal brain starts freaking the heck out. They try to reposition the monitor, but can't find him. The resident comes in with the ultrasound and dumbly fumbles around. She keeps saying "he's there" and I'm like "no crap, but is there a heartbeat?"
Her reaction? "I can't tell but I think his chest is behind your hip bone. Let's put in the internal fetal monitor". That's the one that goes in through your cervix and attaches to the baby's scalp. I'm panicking, but thankfully they get the monitor in and there's my boy's heartbeat looking nice and normal. Sigh of relief.
By noon, I was at 6cm, and the doctors were pushing to break my water and get me on the epidural. I was having contractions, but none that really felt "epidural-worthy", but I figured I'd want it before my water was broken.
Enter the anesthesiologist. He is cold and quiet, and the insertion of the epidural takes a couple tries. I feel...a little dullness, but certainly not the total numbness I'd been told to expect. However, I'm not in pain so I ignore it.
We break my water. It feels very warm and there sure is a lot of it. The doctors leave me to dilate further and up my pitocin again.
From noon until 6pm, I make no progress, except that I hit extremely painful contractions and the epidural isn't doing diddly crap. I'm crying and grabbing on to the edges of the bed. The anesthesiologist comes in again, but this time it's a new guy who is like the biggest *** in history. He gets snappy with the nurse, and asks me if I'm "uncomfortable" as I cry and wince through contractions. No crap, buddy. But instead of investigating the viability of my epidural or upping the levels, he gives me narcotics that knock me out for hours.
Early in the evening, I make it to 8cms. I'm getting hopeful! By around midnight, my doc comes in and says I'm almost there--like over 9cm. She ups my pitocin and says she's going to take a one hour nap and then we'll start pushing.
After an hour, the extremely painful contractions thing happens again and the super jerk anesthesiologist comes back and once again gives me narcotics rather than investigating my epidural. Cue another 2 hour drugged out nap. My doctor, mind you, is nowhere to be seen.
I wake up after 3am on Friday, and a resident checks my cervix and tells me there's still a little lip of cervix blocking Malcolm's head. Great. My doctor comes back in and is noticeably salty that it's taking so long. She says we're going to try to push and see if she can help Malcolm's head get through the cervix. We try pushing for about twenty minutes, but it's useless. He's not going anywhere.
My doc looks at me and says it's time for csection. My water has been broken for too long and my temperature is elevated--they're concerned about infection.
My reaction? Fine. What the heck took them so long? My doctor says she wishes that I'd stalled out earlier, to which I want to say "being stuck at 6cms for over 6 hours wasn't enough of a stall?!", but I keep it in. I'm tired and frustrated and ready to see my boys.
We head in to the OR, and I keep insisting that I'm still in pain and can still feel a fair amount--too much, I'm concerned, to be cut open. Once again, cue the narcotics. They make me a foggy mess and cause me to shake uncontrollably, but I'm not numb below the waist.
While they're setting me up, they hold my husband in a different room and don't bring him in until the very last minute, but I guess that's pretty common.
Now to the surgery--holy Jesus. I'm sure I wasn't feeling EVERYTHING, but I was feeling enough to be crying and screaming as they pulled the boys out of me. I was so drugged and in so much pain that I couldn't even enjoy looking over at my boys as they were placed in the bed to my left. I looked enough to see that they were adorable and alive, but that was about it.
As they sewed me up, the pain intensified and I started shouting obscenities. At one point my husband says that I passed out, but honestly the whole thing is pretty cloudy in my head. I just remember being in way more pain than I expected with an epidural, and after talking to others, I'm skeptical about the level and/or placement of my epidural.
All that aside, my delivery resulted in two healthy, nice sized baby boys and a sore but alive mama. That's all that matters to me.
Malcolm spent 36 hours in the NICU and Brendan spent closer to 60 hours there because of their blood sugar levels and they had to be given antibiotics due to my infection from my broken water. I know we're lucky that it wasn't longer, but it was still hard to be away from them. I couldn't really get out of bed for like 24 hours, so I didn't get to see or hold them until Saturday afternoon/evening. Because they were fed formula in the NICU, getting them on breastfeeding was tough, but by the time they came home they were formula free, so my worry was all for nothing!
Since getting home, we've needed a crazy amount of help. Like literally there is almost always a third person in our house because the boys won't sleep in their pack n play or crib. I absolutely recommend getting bassinets or some tighter sleeping area, but it might just be a matter of time. We've had success with the swing and, oddly enough, their car seats.
Lost our first little peanut on 1/17/2012 at 9 weeks and 5 days. We miss you little blessing, but we know you were too perfect for this world.
My multiples/parenting/pregnancy/miscarriage blog
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Re: My boys are here! Birth story with PIP
congratulations on your boys!
I am sorry you had such a painful experience...that sounds terrible.
PAIFW/SAIFW
DS1 born July 2002 (previous marriage).
TTC since Oct 08. DH Dx w/testicular cancer March 09.
MFI due to retrograde ejaculation/azoospermia.
5/2 IVF #1 cancelled due to large follie.
6/14 start Lupron for IVF #1.2. 6/22 start stims.
7/4 ER and Biopsy.
7/9 Transferred 2 (1-4BB and 1-3BB) embryos. 4 frosties.
7/15 +HPT 6dp5dt. 7/18 Beta #1: 193. 7/20 Beta #2: 415.
8/10 1st u/s - It's triplets!
Unexplained Infertility
After two Clomid cycles, three injectable IUI cycles, two IVFs, two miscarriages, and one lap surgery, IVF #2 has brought us our little boy!
TTC #2
After months of being postponed or cancelled, FET #1.3 (Natural FET) brought us twin girls!
Oh my goodness, they are adorable! So sorry you had a stressful labor, but yay two healthy boys!! Congrats!
Also, my boys will not sleep in the PnP either. Sometimes they will nap. Try a RnP- mine sleep like sweet little angels in them.
Is that a rock n play? Like this?
Lost our first little peanut on 1/17/2012 at 9 weeks and 5 days. We miss you little blessing, but we know you were too perfect for this world.
My multiples/parenting/pregnancy/miscarriage blog
Yep! I have the snugabunny ones. They are more cushioned and supposed to lessen incidence of flat head.