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Multiples
Quintin and Candler Arrived!
Hello everyone!
I have actually held off on posting our birth story. Our boys are doing well, but the birth was pretty traumatic. I know I read a lot of stories before the boys were born, so if you are feeling nervous about birth, don't read on!
My water broke around 2pm on 3/26. We called the midwives, and they told us to come in and test to see if it was amniotic fluid or not. My husband left work and brought me in. It was amniotic fluid, but I wasn't having contractions. They told me to go ahead and check into L&D. We went out to dinner first, had some tacos, and talked about how excited we were to be meeting our boys. It was a really nice last "not parents yet date! We checked into L&D and just waited. Around midnight, I started having contractions (and threw up that fun dinner!). My plan was a natural delivery. By 11am, I was fully dialated and started to push. I pushed continuously for 3. 5 hours. I never felt that peak in the contractions though. I never had "the overwhelming urge to push." But as an athlete, I just kept pushing and pushing and pushing. I got (who was then) baby A down to see a dime sized piece of his head. My contractions were not as they should be. They were lasting 5 minutes with less than a minute in between them, but they were not as intense as they were supposed to be. Then I just needed a break. I HAD to have a break. So I asked for an epidural so I could sleep. I got one and slept for an hour or so, and woke up feeling fantastic. We started pushing again. At this point, we had an internal monitor on baby A, and an internal monitor for my contractions. My contractions had stopped--even cranked up on Pitocin. As in full and complete stopped. We just kept pushing to see if I could do it just with my abdominal muscles. We got Baby A to seeing and orange sized piece of his head. Neither baby was in distress, but we had hit a crossroad.
Our choices were presented to us as this: Get off the epidural, crank up the pitocin WAY up and see what happens. Or--get off the epidural, extract baby A with forceps, then turn baby B to be breech (he was head down), and extract his with his feet. Or--family centered cesarean. My husband and I spent about an hour discussing it, and decided for the c-section. It felt like the most humane of the choices.
We headed into the OR. My OB allows for the husband to come in, and we also had our birth photographer (I don't have these pics yet, but I can't wait!). She made the insision, and realized that she needed to pull baby B first because A was lodged in the birth canal. So--B became A. He was still so far up and lodged in so well, that they had to use a vacuum to get him out! They pulled him out and passed him straight to my chest. He calmly snuggled in and then tried to latch on. It was beautiful. Then, they got baby A out and passed him to me. He had clearly been through the ringer! He was wide eyed and looked SHOCKED to be in the world. He calmed down though and snuggled some while they stitched me up.
Then they rolled me into the recovery room, and this is where it took a turn for the worse. My husband looked at my machines, and my blood pressure was 60/30. He called the nurse over who took it again. She lifted up the paper covering me, and my husband said I was in a "lake" of blood. Within minutes, the trauma team was called in, and the recovery room was cleared of everyone else. Things started getting blurry for me here. Apparently, I was having extreme hemorrhaging. Once they stabilized me, I was moved to ICU, where I received 6 units (pints) of blood. They wouldn't let me drink anything all night, because of the likelihood that I would be back in surgery the next day. The next morning, my OB came in and manually extracted a TON of clots (like 20+ large clots). Natural labor was MUCH easier than having clots manually removed from my uterus. Terrible. By that afternoon, I needed 2 more blood transfusions. The next day, after much begging, I was allowed to be wheeled upstairs to the NICU to see the boys. There is not a nursery in this hospital, and the boys were 7 lbs 6oz and 6lbs 3 oz, so they were just "boarders" in the NICU. They got the same level of care and attention, but they didn't really need it. I was allowed to hold them for 30 minutes the first time and 20 minutes the second time.
After 3 nights in ICU, the ICU doctors reluctantly released me to the Mother-Baby wing. That took a lot of begging too--I really wanted to be with our boys. After 2 nights in that wing, I was allowed to go home. Last night, I was back in the hospital with a bladder infection and a high fever.
It took me a while, and a few doctors explaining it, to realize what a near death experience I actually had. I almost bled out in the recovery room. I have never had anything that terrifying happen. All the same, I am grateful that the complications were with me and not with our beautiful boys. The recover continues to be hard. I was advised to give myself a month until I even begin to gradually improve. My blood levels are still low, though they are improving. My husband has been truly incredible. He has stepped in to take care of any and everything I can't do. Our families and friends have been supporting us completely through all of this. We are lucky to all be together.
Though they are mono-di, I am convinced they don't actually look too much alike! Candler is over a lb smaller than Quintin (who is a 5th--we are calling him Quintin as in 5 :-) ).
Now to the good stuff--pictures! We are having newborn pictures done in the house tomorrow, and I can't wait to see how those turn out!
Here are our amazing little boys!
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Re: Quintin and Candler Arrived!
#1 BFP 1/10/11; missed m/c discovered 7w5d
IF Dx: Endo, hetero MTHFR mutation, poor morphology
#1 IUI: 1/18/12 = BFN
#1 IVF/ICSI 4/2/12 = 2 x 7-cell and 1 x 5-cell transferred (3dt) = BFP!!
H was born at 41w2d on 12/29/12 - be still my heart!
#2 IVF/ICSI 1/19/14 = 2 x 8 cells transferred (3dt) = BFP!! EDD 10/09/14
M&W born at 37 weeks on 9/18/14 - I am the momma of 3 boys!!!
BFP#1: 11/20/11, EDD 7/25/12, Emily Iris arrived 7/29/12 at 7 lb., 3.5 oz.
BFP#2: 8/25/13, EDD 5/4/14, MMC confirmed on 9/23/13, D&C on 9/26/13
BFP#3: 2/3/14, EDD 10/15/14, fraternal TWINS confirmed 2/21/14, two BOYS confirmed on 4/15/14!
TTC #2 since July 2010
March 2012 IVF (MDL Protocol) Started stims 3/3; ER 3/11 (9R, 8M, 7F) ET 3/16 (5dt of 2 blasts graded 3AB and 3BA, 3 frosties(!!) Beta 3/26 = 386; Beta 3/28 = 827; u/s 4/11 says TWINS! Boy/Girl Twins delivered at 36 weeks 6 days