Unplanned C-section Birth w/ Infection (long)

I was 4 days past due and my husband and I had just woken up; it was Valentine's day. I started having contractions, but they weren't bad. So I kicked back on the sofa and we watched a movie. After a few hours, the contractions were picking up, so I called my Dr and he said to go ahead to the hospital and get checked out. So at about 5pm that day (Thursday) we went and I was only 3 cm dilated, but my blood pressure was like 170/90. That shocked me b/c it had never been high before and I had just been to the dr a few days prior. They decided to keep me and hooked me up to a magnesium drip (for the bp). The contractions were never a bother and I went through the night with little to no progress. By the next morning at still 3 cm dilated, they decided to start the pitocin. Because of my blood pressure, the IVs and monitoring, I wasn't allowed to get up and move around the way I wanted. I was made to lay on my left side and had a hard time dealing with the contractions. I finally chose to have an epidural at around 4cm. Slowly, but steadily I progressed to 10 cm at about 5pm that afternoon. So it was time to push. I pushed and pushed with no progress. At 7:00pm the dr came in and suggested a c-section if I didn't have the baby in the next 30 minutes. After he left the nurse looked at me and said, "you know you can tell him no, right? We'll keep working with you". So when he came back in I told him I wanted to try a little while longer and he said okay. So the nurse called in some "back-up" and I had three nurses, DH and M helping. They had me in fetal position, rocking, squating, anything they could think of, but he just would come out. Luckily for me, DS was up to it too. The nurses kept saying "look he likes it! Every time you push his heart rate goes up a little! He's getting excited!" Finally at 10pm (on Friday), I just couldn't do it anymore. The nurses felt like I had lost too much blood, DH said it looked like I had tore something and that the nurses had noticed it too, and I was just too tired. So off for a c-section I went and I practically slept through the whole thing. I was just beat. When they started to pull him out though I heard a nurse shout "oh my gosh, look at his head" (which initially scared me) then another "oh my gosh, he must way 11 lbs!" DH brought him over too me and he was just beautiful. So off they went to bond while they finished sewing me up (and yes, I tore internally as well, so I got a few stitches there). I was wheeled into recovery and truely don't remember much from that night at all except for the nurse coming and pressing on my stomach. Nobody had told me about that! And it was excrutiating! It was to help my uterus contract and remove and clots, but my gosh, I'd just been stitched up a hour earlier!

Anyway, by Monday I was okay and thought I was going to be discharged. When the nurse came in and checked my vitals, I had a fever, so the dr decided to keep me. Tuesday came and still a fever so they administered some IV antibiotics. Previously, DS had been nursing, but my colostrum was running out and my milk had not come in, so there began to be a feeding issue. I had a great consultant who basically told me, our first objective as parents is to feed our child; whether it be breast milk or formula they need to eat, so DH had to start supplementing formula while I used a pump to keep stimulating my milk production. When the dr noticed that those antibiotics weren't working, he started me on 3 different ones that I got around the clock at different shifts. Because the tests weren't conclusive yet about my infection, every time they'd check my temp and I had a fever, they'd take DS from me b/c I could contaminate the nursery through him. At this point I was physically and emotionally breaking down. I hadn't planned on a c-section, which I got, now I had this infection that they can't quite figure out, my milk hadn't come in b/c of all these circumstances, so I couldn't feed DS the way I wanted and my child kept getting taken from me! Not only that, but they decided to discharge my child on Tuesday. Thank the Lord (again) for a few wonderful nurses who allowed us to keep him in his bed in my room and secretly snuck us anything we needed (formula, diapers, etc.) DH was such a trooper through all this; he never left my side for anything. He slept next to me, showered with me, and took care of me and our son when I couldn't.

Finally by Thursday my temp was low enough that they discharged me; I had been there a full week. I had to take antibiotics while at home as well and probiotics, b/c by then all the treatments had destroyed my intestines and I had little to no control over thing for a few days. The following day, Friday, I was sitting at home with DS and looked down at my shirt; it was soaked with MILK!! I was terrified that after a week of bottles, DS wouldn't want to nurse, but he took to it very well and after about another week we were exclusively breast-feeding. My birth story is not ideal, but I couldn't have asked for a better outcome. It is pure joy everyday when I wake up and get to see his smiling face.