And 60 hours later, here she is! (long)

So it's a little late, but better late than never, right?

My due date was August 23, 2011, a Tuesday. The weekend before was a normal weekend; DH and I were preparing freezer meals and washing/vaccuming the vehicles, so I was pretty active. Saturday afternoon/evening I noticed my underwear was damp. Not like soaked or anything, so I just thought it was discharge. By Sunday evening I was still having this "discharge" and that's when I figured I had better call the hospital because, hey, maybe my water broke!

The nurse I spoke with said I should come in and get it checked out, so DH and I went in on Sunday night. I had about seven contractions over two hours that evening, but I could only feel them if I was sitting still.

We got to the hospital around 9pm on Sunday night, and sure enough, my water was leaking. Since I thought it had started the day before, my doctor decided to start pitocin right away. I got hooked up to my IV, the pitocin, my Group B Strep meds (whatever they're called), and the baby monitors. The wonderful nurse gave me a shot of morphine to help me sleep that night, right in my butt.

By the next morning (Monday) the contractions were getting noticeable. By noon, painful, and by 2:00pm, excruciating. Honestly, I hardly remember the hours from 2-8pm, when I started my epidural. I remember being in the tub, but I couldn't tell you for how long. And I remember being in the bed, and sitting in a chair for a while, but that's it. The pain was out of this world. I do know during that time I got three rounds of fentanyl, but it barely took the edge off. Sometime around 7:30 a nurse checked on me and I yelled at her, "I CAN'T DO THIS ANY MORE!" She asked if I wanted an epidural. Praise be to God, I thought.

I had just gotten checked before my epidural and was only 2cm, so I'm so surprised they gave it to me then. Although looking back, they probably figured I was going to end up a c-section anyway, with how long my water had been broken and what little progress I'd made.

I remember throwing up right smack dab in the middle of my epidural. Into a garbage can held by the nurse no less. The epidural was no big deal at all. I was in so much pain from the contractions I didn't even feel it. I did, however, feel it start to kick in. The anesthesiologist was my new best friend. I felt GREAT. Literally didn't feel a single thing. For the first time in 24 hours I was able to really relax. They checked me shortly after my epidural and I was at 5cm. They cranked the pitocin way up to get my labor moving, since I couldn't feel the contractions any more. The baby got an internal monitor, and I got a catheter. I was hooked up intraveneously to two separate drugs (pitocin and my Group B drug), had a catheter and an internal monitor coming out of my who-ha, and had the epidural lines around my neck. I also had a blood pressure cuff and a finger heartbeat monitor.

It was kind of annoying.

Around 10:30 pm my catheter started to bug me. I paged the nurse and she said it was weird I could feel it with my epidural. That should have been my first clue. Shortly after that I began to feel contractions on my left side. It probably only took another 20 minutes before they were excruciating. The anesthesiologist was paged. He thought it was weird I could feel contractions, and tried telling me the epidural was fine, and it shouldn't be wrong. I thought, "I don't care if it shouldn't be wrong - it IS wrong. I shouldn't be feeling this!" He did some sort of modification - I honestly have no idea what it was - but then said he had to leave to do another epidural, and would be back to check on me.

Longest 30 minutes of my life. Terrible, terrible. I was shaking uncontrollably from the pain, or the drugs, or a combination of both. DH said he'd never been more scared in his life. I just curled up on my side, best as I could, grabbed the bedrails, and shook the whole bed.

The anesthesiologist eventually came back and ripped out my first epidural. I got a second epidural. This one worked, but the entire rest of my labor I was so scared it would fail again! I did NOT want to feel that pain any more.

I think the nurses checked me one more time, but I have no idea how far along I was. Around 5 am on Tuesday I told the nurse I felt like I had to push. She checked me and sure enough, 10 cm! Finally! I got set up to push, and the pressure was unbelievable. I hated it. I'm not sure what was worse, the pressure from the baby or the pain of contractions before the epidural.

The baby couldn't handle me pushing on my back. DH said with my first push a bunch of the machines started beeping. The nurse pushed a button on the wall and two more nurses were in the room within seconds. They put me on oxygen and got me up on my hands and knees. I tried pushing in that position, but my contractions were too far apart to maintain it. I would literally go 5-7 minutes between contractions while pushing. Apparently when my first epidural failed the nurse had turned the pitocin way down, since I was feeling every little bit of it. I don't think I ever contracted without the pitocin.

Eventually the baby must have made its way to a position where it could handle me being on my back, because finally I was able to lay down and push. That position was the best for me. I hated pushing with oxygen on and asked the nurse if I could take it off. I was so hot and sweaty, and it was hard to get a breath of fresh air with the oxygen. She let me take it off, and it went much better for me after that. The nurses did have to remind me to breathe between contractions to keep baby's heart rate up.

It took an hour and a half of pushing, but finally the baby arrived. It was taken away right after DH cut the cord because there had been meconium in my fluid (they broke it sometime Monday afternoon). We were Team Green, so I asked DH what we had. He didn't know. He asked the doctor who delivered. She didn't know. And she asked the nurses who had the baby. It was a girl! Natalie Rose finally made her appearance, 30+ hours after I started pitocin, and 60+ hours after my water first broke. Right on her due date, August 23rd.

It was the hardest thing I ever did in my entire life, but I'd do it all over again for my little girl.