During my pregnancy I must have watched every Baby Story and Deliver Me episode there was! I never get tired of watching the whole pregnancy and birth experience, it's fascinating to me! Here's my "Baby Story":
During my 8th month of pregnancy I developed an extreme case of PUPPS. It's pretty much a horrible allergic reaction to pregnancy (usually when you're having a boy) that causes extremely itchy hives to erupt all over your body. The only "cure" is delivery. Actually mine didn't go away until after 4 months PP and heavy doses of steroids!! Anyway, to say the least it was the most agonising, itchy, painful, experience of my life...and that included two days of natural labor pains! I was actually induced two days before my due date because of this horrible condition. I was the lucky 1% of all pregnancy women to have this lovely rash. The itch you feel 24/7 is unbelievable, nothing helps, I tried everything! Anyone that's ever had PUPPS knows what I'm talking about...
I was induced on the evening of the 4th of July. At first the nurse administered some cervidil to soften my cervix and hopefully get the ball rolling. I was already 1 cm dilated & "soft" for the last 3 weeks of my pregnancy so I started contracting within hours of the cervidil. Which led to a pretty restless night. The nurse came in the morning and started me up on some pitocin to help regulate my contractions. Doc came in the morning to check me. Said with the contractions I'd been having I should at least be @ 3 cm. NOPE still 1! So, we labor some more. At this point I'd been having horrible back labor for about 8 hrs. Everyone was pretty sure that he was sunny side up and that was the reason for the back labor and no change in my cervix. I sat on a ball, rocked in the chair, anything & everything to get Mr. Aden to TURN! Doc come back in to check me again, I think around 2-3 ish and still ONE and he thinks Aden is still "floating" because when he checks me he is able to push his head and he'll float up and then rest back down. (FYI - "Checking" = torture!) Which of course means he is not properly engaged into my pelvis. In turn, is not bearing enough pressure on my cervix to cause any change (dilation). We discuss breaking my water but decide against it because the doc thought the risk of the cord coming out first is too high due to the "floating" issue. Doc says he'll be back around 5 to check my progress then. Did I mention I was going on 12 hrs of mind blowing contractions w/back labor? Yeah, no pain meds for me. James was wonderful. I would "rock" through my contractions while James applied pressure to my back. This is the only way I was able to get through the pain. Laying in a bed having contractions is ABSURD? Surely it was a MAN that invented a bed to labor in. The birthing and BF'ing classes that we attended a month before really came in handy. The gave us valuable tools in the labor process that really helped me cope and got James involved in the whole process too. What would be more irritating than laboring while your hubby watches T.V.? That was NOT going to happen with me. In fact I didn't want anyone besides James in the L&D room. It was our time to bring our baby into the world and savor the experience..painful or otherwise.
Doc comes back in @ 5 to torture me some more...turns out I was still ONE centimeter dilated! Where do we go from here? I was exhausted. I was told we had a few options.. 1. Keep going and break the water to see if that helps me progress 2. Throw in the towel and C-section or 3. Take the IV out and go home....Go home? Yes, go home and see if the baby will turn and drop properly into the canal overnight. Then we come back in the morning and start ALL OVER AGAIN... So I opt for going home and resting. That night was a blur. I was so very upset that all my dreams of a perfect vaginal delivery were slipping away and the unknown were replacing them. Through my entire pregnancy I said "I'm NOT having a C-section." Well don't they say "If you wanna make God laugh just tell him what you're doing tomorrow?" Yeah..something like that.
The next morning I'm feeling better about the whole situation. Mostly thanks to my wonderful, amazing husband that babied & pep talked me all night. He really is my rock. Anyway, so I go in & get hooked up and I'm off to the races! Well not really... I wish..it was more of the same. Something was different this time though. Aden had turned according to the nurses and my lack of back labor. After laboring through a full 12 hrs and countless "torturing" or "checking" from my fav doctor I only dilated to 4. Around 6 pm I finally was given the okay for an epidural since I had reached the magic # 4! The epidural was not fully working for me. I complained to the nurse and the anesthesiologist came in to shoot me up with an extra dose of meds. That extra dose did a little more than I expected my entire body from the chest down went numb. I felt sick and couldn't breath, apparently that's "normal". Anyway 10 minutes later we opt for the c-section since Mr. Aden just wasn't cooperating. At that point everyone just wanted him here, safe and sound. The anesthesiologist comes in again to give me ANOTHER dose of meds in my epidural for the C-section. I refuse telling her that if I take anymore I know it will knock me out. She pinches me a couple times and agrees to let me go into surgery without any more meds. Probably not the best idea, when they started cutting I could feel it..but a little local numbing meds and I'm good to go. I'll leave off here since I've already been over the actual delivery of Aden. Here's a pic of Aden & daddy right after delivery & a video of Aden shortly after his birth, getting his first bath.
Doc comes back in @ 5 to torture me some more...turns out I was still ONE centimeter dilated! Where do we go from here? I was exhausted. I was told we had a few options.. 1. Keep going and break the water to see if that helps me progress 2. Throw in the towel and C-section or 3. Take the IV out and go home....Go home? Yes, go home and see if the baby will turn and drop properly into the canal overnight. Then we come back in the morning and start ALL OVER AGAIN... So I opt for going home and resting. That night was a blur. I was so very upset that all my dreams of a perfect vaginal delivery were slipping away and the unknown were replacing them. Through my entire pregnancy I said "I'm NOT having a C-section." Well don't they say "If you wanna make God laugh just tell him what you're doing tomorrow?" Yeah..something like that.
The next morning I'm feeling better about the whole situation. Mostly thanks to my wonderful, amazing husband that babied & pep talked me all night. He really is my rock. Anyway, so I go in & get hooked up and I'm off to the races! Well not really... I wish..it was more of the same. Something was different this time though. Aden had turned according to the nurses and my lack of back labor. After laboring through a full 12 hrs and countless "torturing" or "checking" from my fav doctor I only dilated to 4. Around 6 pm I finally was given the okay for an epidural since I had reached the magic # 4! The epidural was not fully working for me. I complained to the nurse and the anesthesiologist came in to shoot me up with an extra dose of meds. That extra dose did a little more than I expected my entire body from the chest down went numb. I felt sick and couldn't breath, apparently that's "normal". Anyway 10 minutes later we opt for the c-section since Mr. Aden just wasn't cooperating. At that point everyone just wanted him here, safe and sound. The anesthesiologist comes in again to give me ANOTHER dose of meds in my epidural for the C-section. I refuse telling her that if I take anymore I know it will knock me out. She pinches me a couple times and agrees to let me go into surgery without any more meds. Probably not the best idea, when they started cutting I could feel it..but a little local numbing meds and I'm good to go. I'll leave off here since I've already been over the actual delivery of Aden. Here's a pic of Aden & daddy right after delivery & a video of Aden shortly after his birth, getting his first bath.
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