Riley Nicole's birth story (long)

Finally, after being 10 days post due, Riley Nicole made her appearance. Sorry this is so long!

DH and I arrived at the hospital at 7am on 10/26 for my induction.  I was fortunate that my doctor was on call so she came in to see me around 8am and checked me.  I was still only 1cm dialated but was 80% effaced.  They started me on cervadil right away and then left me in the bed for 2 hours to let it take effect.  At about 8:45, the nurse came in and said I was starting to have contractions, but I wasn't really feeling them...but at least I was having contractions, which I hadn't had the entire pregnancy!

At around 10am they let me out of bed and I was able to walk around for awhile.  I actually felt really good, not like I was in labor at all and felt a little silly for being in the hospital.  I stayed out of bed for the next few hours because I knew I was going to have to get back in there and didn't want to get sore from laying down too much.  DH, my parents and I played some games, hung out and just enjoyed some time together.  

At 2pm my dr. came back and gave me a second dose of cervadil. At this point, I was 3cm and still about 80% effaced.  I was stuck in bed again until 4pm when they let me out and I walked the hall again.  During this walk, I started to feel very strong menstrual cramps that came close together.  I started to realize that this was probably the start of real labor.   I went back into my room and just tried to stay on my feet and get through each contraction.  Finally at 6pm, my dr. came in to examine me...no additional progress and the baby was at -2 station.  I asked for some pain medication at this time because I was having some tough pains in my back and the contractions were very close together.  They gave me an injection and told my DH to go and get some dinner, because this was probably his last chance to eat.  

Sure enough, at 7pm, I started to get severe pains in my lower back and was screaming and crying in pain.  I begged my DH to call the nurse for the epi and they got that in my very quickly.  After that, it was pretty much smooth sailing from 8pm-11pm.  I took a nap in my bed and felt generally good.   My dr. came in at 11pm and said I was 8cm and 100% at this time and she would come back around 1am and if I was fully dialated, I would be able to start pushing.

At 1:30, my nurse (who I loved!) came back in and told me it looked like I was ready to be pushing.  During pushing, I had pretty intense lower back pain as the epi started to wear off.  Luckily, I only pushed for 45 minutes and out came little Riley on 10/27 at 2:41am!  She was 7lbs 10oz and perfect.  I had a pretty complicated tear but otherwise, all went extremely well!

We're happy to be all home together and enjoying our first few days.  Overall, labor was not as tough as I was expecting and I had a decent experience. 

Congrats to everyone else with their outside babies!