XP: Our Birth Story ~ Caden Michael

hbach83 · March 2009

It's an interesting story!

Timeline:

Saturday 2/21 - 1:40am: I woke up and rolled over to look at my bedside clock and my water broke. I woke up DH and he made a mad dash out of bed. We called my friend to come sleep at our house to be with DS, while we packed a few last minute things.

1:55am: Called the L&D triage phoneline at the hospital. I was told I'd get a call back within a half hour by the on-call doc, and if I didn't - to call them again.

2:10am: Contractions started. Very mild at first, but it only took a few of those for the real pain to start.

2:25am: Doc was supposed to call back by now. I decided that since my contractions were barely a minute apart already (that happened fast!!!), that I didn't need to call back and we decided to just go to the hospital.

2:40am: Arrived at hospital and stopped at the L&D desk to get checked in. I was in rough shape at this point. They escorted me to triage where the "fun" really started. My contractions were no longer plural and it was one big, long, never-ending contraction. The triage nurse kept trying to get me to lay on my back to check my cervix, but I could not even move to that position, it hurt so badly. She finally managed to check me and I thought I'd get the familiar "Can't feel your cervix, it's too high" (since that's what I'd been hearing at my 36 and 38 week appts), but she didn't really say anything. Pretty soon my room was flooded with nurses and I had no idea what was going on. They threw up the sidebars on the bed and brought me out of that room... I managed to ask, "Could you feel my cervix?" And she said, "Oh no. Definitely not - it's gone, honey - you're delivering now." And I was SHOCKED. Beyond shocked. We got into the delivery room and it was full of frantic blue scrubs. I was still in disbelief that it was happening right then and there and that the labor part was officially over. Within minutes, they had me in stirrups and the doc arrived just in time to wash up, throw on a gown and tell me to push. 3 pushes later, he was out. 2:53am. I did get to hold him while they wiped him off, and saw him briefly while he was in my room, but then they took him to be monitored in the nursery for the first few hours - he swallowed some meconium sometime and needed to have it sucked out.

We named him Caden Michael - 8lbs, 2 oz (just one ounce heavier than big bro was!) 20 inches long. He's the best little Chilepino we could've asked for! (I'm Chilean, DH is Filipino...). He was 38 weeks, 6 days - so 8 days early.

It was a surreal night. One hr and 13 minutes from water breaking to deliovery.

Good thing DH ran a red light on the way to the hospital..... LOL

It's been a week and I'm feeling ok -- still a bit crampy and my pubic bones are sore, but feeling better every day. Baby is good too, has a bit of a breathing issue, but the docs said it's because his airway isn't fully developed and the snorty sounds should subside by about 3-6 months of age.

I hope you all have easy labors, and I wish you the best of luck.

Heidi