RP from 3rd tri - my birth story, July 3rd

NoVABrideNS · July 2010

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I always loved reading birth stories, and you ladies have been so wonderful throughout my pregnancy (and way back to when I was planning my wedding), so I thought I would share. Hope this isn't too long!

My water broke at 40 weeks 1 day super early in the morning. The evening prior, DH and I went on a long walk, I baked cookies until 10pm, bounced on an exercise ball a little bit, and then had some sexy time. At my doc appt that week I was still just 50% effaced and a cm dilated. We called the doc about the possible water breaking and she told us to come into the office for a check. We got there, she confirmed that my water had broken and stretched me to 2cm. She told us to get some lunch and then head over to the hospital to be admitted.

We got to the hospital at around 12:30pm and they started a pitocin drip shortly thereafter because I hadn't been contracting at all. They started on a low dose, and it worked quickly. My contractions were almost on top of each other right away, and I asked for the epidural at around 7pm. The ob on call (not my doc, but someone I ended up absolutely loving) told me at that point that I was nearly 3cm and 80% effaced. We labored all night (had to have the epi boosted twice because of breakthrough pain), and woke up shortly after 7am to see the doc again. He checked me and said I was still 3cm, but about 100% effaced. He said we could continue to labor, but told us that we were "outside of the curve of normal" at that point and that he was concerned that the baby was still at -3 station and hadn't engaged at all yet. He thought she was probably bigger than we expected and that my pelvis might be too small to handle a vaginal birth. DH and I talked, I cried, and we decided finally to go ahead with a c-section. I was exhausted from the long labor and all of the pain, and we hadn't slept or eaten in so many hours.

That's when things got crazy. They started the procedure, got the baby out, and then I started bleeding like crazy. I ended up losing more than a liter of blood. I also spiked a fever of more than 103. All of this right after the baby was born. DH stayed with our little girl and did skin to skin contact while I was shaking uncontrollably and talking nonsense. Apparently my ute was fatigued after so many hours of unproductive labor and didn't want to contract. No idea where the infection came from. After what seemed like forever, they got the fever under control and I started contracting the way I should have. It was scary - and completely counter to everything I hoped my labor/delivery experience would include.

Today I'm doing ok. I didn't end up with a blood transfusion (even though when I saw my normal OB she said she would have pushed for it). The OB who delivered me said that because I'm healthy and young he thought I could skip it and just take lots of vitamins in the next several weeks and eat super healthy, which I was much more comfortable with. In the end, the recovery will take much longer than expected (maybe 8 wks to rebuild my blood supply), but I'm feeling better every day.

We have the most beautiful baby girl who weighed in at 8lbs 7oz and is 20.75 inches long. I cried like crazy as soon as she came out (and conveniently right before the fever took away my ability to be rational), and we're having a great time getting to know each other. Lack of sleep is tough when you're recovering from surgery and serious blood loss, but DH is a champ and has been doing so much to make the late nights easier. Our daughter has been breastfeeding like a champ since day one, which is equal parts wonderful and exhausting. We've supplemented a bit with formula to deal with her early weight loss, but she mostly gets breastmilk, so I can't be too unhappy. I cry a little every day, but the tears are mostly happy tears.

Thanks for reading and apologies for the length! I wish you all the best with your pregnancies and your early days/months of parenthood. See you on 0-3!!