Here is her birth story:
As of my appointment last Tuesday, I was still only 3 cm along after sitting at that for several weeks. the Dr. did a nice sweep to hopefully get my labor moving and give my body the extra push to go into labor. Well after several months of constant contractions my body decided to start to go into labor. Last Wednesday I had contractions for 8 hours 2-5 minutes apart and fairly intense but by evening they spread back out and the intensity died out. Thursday morning I woke up and felt the same as normal in terms of contractions, every ten minutes or so, just tight and not painful. We dropped Landon at preschool and Mom and I went shopping. By the time we got home I had lunch and planned to just relax during nap. By 4 pm I started feeling very nauseous. After throwing up my entire lunch for an hour I decided I would try to nap. My contractions were getting stronger and closer together so I hopped in the shower to clean up and see what they did in water. Our doula had said that was often a way to tell if you were in real labor vs. false labor depending on if they sped up in water or slowed down. They got even closer to I got out and got dressed, told Logan it was time to go, and off we went. Unfortunately, since it was dinner time, Mom and Landon were off trying to pick up Chinese so I wasn't able to say goodbye to my little guy before we left to go to the hospital. However, he was VERY excited and didn't seem upset that we were headed out to go have Hailey.
At 8 pm we arrived in L&D triage, I was 4 cm, 80 percent, still -2 station. They also did a quick ultrasound to make sure she was still head down...I could have told them she was ha ha. We got moved to our room around 9:15 and I started out on the birth ball and hung out and had some broth since I had skipped dinner. At this point, my contractions were still strong and about 5 minutes apart. Our back up doula, Liz (our normal one had left out of town for a training that afternoon-go figure) got there around 10 PM and suggested I move to a different position because my back was hurting, called polar bear, it did help but it certainly slowed down my contractions. During this time I was hooked up to the IV antibiotics that I needed since I had group B strep. I was check again and I was 5 cm and 90%, but not progressing all that quickly. They checked again after I tried to rest for a bit and hadn't had any change in several hours. I stalled out at 5 cm, 90 percent. It was either go back home, break my water, or pitocin. After speaking with our doula and me adamantly saying that we weren't going back home, I chose to have them break my water the following morning at 8 am so I could try to get a bit of rest for a few hours...although that didn't really work since my contraction were painful enough not to sleep through and constantly needing to be checked on by the OB and nurse.
At 8:15 am on the 19th, the OB broke my water and the contractions ramped up immediately. At this point I felt like I wanted the epidural, but I had asked Liz and Logan to make other suggestions unless I was suffering in pain and not getting a break. I labored on the ball, leaning against the bed, facing backwards on the toilet, and was planning to sit in the shower with the birth ball but that plan was quickly changed when I felt a bunch of pressure during a contraction and yelled I felt like I was pushing. My doula yelled for the nurse and an OB. A different OB came in to check me and was surprised to find I was fully dilated and ready to push. She asked me to push back on her hand and was like yep, this is it. Things moved very quickly then. My original Dr. showed up, several nurses, etc. showed up in the room. After 6 contractions and a lot of stretching by the 2 Drs., Hailey was born at 925, an hour and ten minutes after my water broke. I made the right choice not returning home since I would never have been able to make the hour drive back to the hospital had my water broke! Going med free was the hardest but one of the most rewarding decisions I have ever made. Recovery has been so much better than after my son's birth, even though I am sore from delivery. We had a great support group from the doula, nurses, and OBs. They kept me calm even though I was starting to freak out from the pain during pushing. They kept telling me her head was right there even though I didn't really believe them. I remember yelling I wanted an epidural during pushing and they were all like nope, sorry. Delivery her head was the hardest part, then once her shoulders were out she just came right out.
They put her right on my chest immediately and she stayed there for over an hour. We waited for the cord to stop pulsing and Logan cut the cord =). The Dr. delivered everything else, even though my placenta gave her some trouble. I only had a slight tear that required one stitch to fix. I was STARVING so now that my placenta was delivered and my GD totally gone, I could eat whatever I wanted. My nurses ordered me pancakes with syrup, eggs, bacon, and gave me all the juice I wanted ha. It was fantastic! While I was eating breakfast, they took her to be weighed, measured for length, and do several other tests. Once all that was done, they determined she received a 9/9 for apgar scores and then measured more as a 40 week baby in terms of development instead of 39. Once she was done there, we hung out and did more skin to skin in the room until it was time to move to the recovery wing of the hospital.
I am going to stop there and then will make another post in a few days of our recovery and all the things Hailey had done in our room-which was SO different than from Landon.
