Birth Story of Sophia Claire (PIP)- XP

je2161 · May 2011

Our Sophia Claire was born on May 14 (three days late) at 8lb2oz and 21 inches. She is perfect and we cannot stop staring at her!

My water broke one week ago today around 11am, and I was 40w2d. We got to the hospital and they confirmed that my membranes had ruptured. They started me right away on an IV and hooked me up to the monitors, but I was still ambulating and walking the halls. When I got there, I was about 1cm dilated and my cervix was very posterior. At 4pm, they checked again, and I had not progressed. I had been having contractions but not often enough and not strong enough to make any changes. They started pitocin at that time, and for the next 2 hours or so, I labored with the pitocin and it was getting tougher and tougher. Around 6pm, I begged for the epi because the contractions had been getting impossible to breathe through. They checked me again about a half hour after the epi and I had progressed to a 3-4. I was thrilled. The epi relieved the pain, moreso on the left side than the right side, but it helped so much! They checked me again around 9pm, and I was a 6! I was thrilled! The pitocin was working to dilate me, and the epi was keeping the pain soooo manageable. Around midnight, they checked me and I was dilated to a 9 and started feeling the urge to push with contractions. They called for my doctor to get there, but she was at another hospital 30 min away so we had to just try to wait for her to get there for a while. Around 2 am, my OB got there, and we started doing test pushes. However, the baby's heartrate was getting too high and I had developed a bit of a fever around 100.3. They had me push for about 45 minutes, and they said because the baby's head was so big, and she was sunny-side up, it would require at least another few hours of pushing! But baby's distress made the doctor worry and they decided that it was not safe to keep pushing, and so they sent me for a c/s. It was a quick 20 minutes, and Sophia came out and scored a 9 and 9 on her Apgars. She was the picture of health, and my fever broke within 2 hours of delivery. The recovery was a little tough the first day, but by the second day I was walking the halls of the hospital floor, and was feeling about 80% back to normal. It was great!

I certainly did not want the c/s, especially when the pitocin and epi combo got me dilated to a 10 relatively comfortably! But when the baby was showing signs of distress, and her health was at stake, I am grateful for medical interventions like c/s's that kept me and my baby healthy!