Birth of a Boo Bear
Friday morning, I woke up with heavy crampiness and mild spotting. The bleeding turned out to be part of my mucous plug. After calling my midwife, Elissa, she figured I was in prelabor, and she would see me later that day. So I get excited, Larry gets excited, and...... NOTHING. I keep up with the cramps, keep up with the unpredictable contractions, but nothing PROGRESSES. Knowing I was driving myself insane, I decide to take the boys to their Fall Festival that the homeschool group we are part of is doing that day. I was going to have Larry take them instead, but changed my mind at the last minute. It was a good thing too. I would have driven myself certifiable at home alone with no progression of labor. The Fall Festival was a load of fun, and really helped keep my mind off things. After we got home Friday night, I passed a really large part of my plug (everything that was left of it), and this time had a lot of brown (not like dark old blood red, but BROWN) discharge.
Saturday morning I woke up when Larry got up for work, and couldn't go back to sleep. I was paranoid that something was wrong with the baby. I kept imagining all kinds of thing, so up I got. Saturday was basically the same as Friday. Lots of stuff going on, but nothing progressing.... I get the boys around for their Halloween night, since our town celebrated it on the 30th this year. They turned out ADORABLE!!!! (check out my Halloween page to see pics of them..). Larry took them all Trick or Treating, while I spent a "quiet night at home". I sat here chit chatting with some ladies online, when I got to noticing my contractions were getting someone more "predicatable". So I started timing them. Every 20 minutes from 6 til I went to be just after 10.
At midnight, Larry woke me up to ask if I was feeling anything yet. (He had been doing this EVERY night for a few nights). I tell him nope.. that the cx stopped after we went to sleep evidentally. But, THANKS for waking me up and making me realize that. It was about 12:45 when I finally fell asleep again, only to be woke up about 1:30 with cx. I lay there for a while, but realize there is NO WAY I'm gonna be able to sleep through them. I get up and start timing. They were anywhere from 5-10 minutes. I got to thinking about needing antibiotics, so went ahead and woke Larry up. We talked about it and he decided to stay home while I went and got checked. Told him that I had gotten my hopes up so much the last couple days thinking "this was it" that I was afraid that was going to happen again. We knew he had work the next day, and I didn't want him to spend several hours at the hospital if they were just going to send me home again. So he couches out in the living room, so I can call him to let him know what they say. I grab a quick shower, get dressed, send out an email, and head to the hospital.
It's about 2:30 am then. I get to the hospital, and they hook me up to a monitor. My contractions are pretty intense to me, and between 5-6 minutes apart. The nurse checked and said I was about a 3 (remember, a month ago I was a 2). She also said I was still really high and thick. Not a good omen at all. About an hour goes by, with no change in cx patterns. She comes in and says that the monitor doesn't show the cx as that hard, but being it was my 4th I probably knew what I was talking about. (ya think????), so they decided to go ahead and keep me. Her statement me was "I'd hate to send you home, then you have to turn right back around sometime this morning". One good thing was that we found out I WASN'T GBS + after all. Elissa had read something wrong, and I didn't need the antibiotics after all! WOO HOOO This was at 3:30. They call Elissa at 4, telling her I was at a 3 and still high and thick. She's thinking she'll be able to sleep til 7, and then come in. LOL They checked me at 4 when I got into my regular room. I was at a 5 and very much thinned out. So they called Elissa back, told her to get out of bed. LOL!
I had called Larry at 3:30 and told him to take the boys to mom's and get on up. At 4, he still wasn't there, and I was getting lightheaded while standing up. I knew it was because I hadn't had any sleep in several days (since Friday morning really). But I knew I couldn't handle the pain if I laid down. When Larry finally made it in (about 4:20), I was near tears. He made the decision for a shot of Stadol for me. I felt guilty for doing it, but knew it was for the best. As it was, the contractions were still so bad with the stadol that I was crawling the bed. They were coming fast and furious, and I couldn't get time to "adjust" to the pain.
Elissa came in at 5, and checked me again. (I think I was about a 6 then). They spent time getting the room ready, and Elissa went out to get her knitting stuff. She brougth it back in and about 5:40 checked me again. She said it looked like I was about a 7-8. She asked if I wanted her to break my water. Said the contractions would get worse, but it would come on faster. I said sure, I was already in so much pain, what was a little more? LOL At 5:45 she broke my water, and said I was about an 8. On the next contraction, I had to PUSH! My mom made it to the hospital about right then and came in the room (I thought she was going to miss it). I told Elissa I needed to push, and when I mentioned only being an 8, she said I would "push myself open" the rest of the way.
So push I did. LOL 3 times. Between #2 and #3 pushing, it felt like my body completely gave out. I was soooooooooo tired. Elissa mentioned just waiting a while, or giving one more good push and getting it over with.... Well, I'm no dummy. I pushed! At 5:57, they put her up on my stomach and said, "Say hello to you daughter, Jackie!!!" I coudln't believe it. A LITTLE GIRL!!!!!!!!! I was sooooooooo afraid to hope for a girl. All I could say is "ARE YOU SERIOUS???" LOL I wanted to cry when they told me, but was too darn excited.
As they cleaned the baby up, gave her a bit of oxygen (she didn't want to cry), I was trying to get my placenta to seperate and expel. (Ok... I was laying there.. my midwife was doing the work). Delivery had went so fast, that my placenta was still fully attached. Also, due to fast delivery, Sky was pretty bruised up. I have a couple pictures from right after birth, where she looks like she'd been in a boxing ring. Most of the bruising has faded now. You can see a little around her nose area, but at least her lips aren't really dark. That's a bit intimidating.
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