My Birth Story - Three Weeks Later

Baby B is here!  She arrived three weeks ago (big reason as to why I haven't blogged in that time).  I am so thankful she is here, and life just feels right, having her in our family.  I cannot remember what it was like without her now, as strange as that may sound.  Anyway, a few days after arriving home from the hospital, I had a rough draft of my birth story written out, but it was all factual and stuff.  Didn't read well.  I wanted to rewrite it... but took until today to finally do so.  Just a warning, there might be some TMI in here for those who are squeamish about that sort of thing.

Thanks again to everyone who was praying for me!  Your prayers were felt!

And now...

Baby B's Birth Story

“The baby will come today… baby has to come today!  I just know it,” said I for the 5^th day in a row.  It was 13 days past my expected due date, and I had been having false labour for almost that long already.  I did NOT want to be induced, and we all know that at 14 days overdue, induction is pushed.  Thankfully, my doctor hadn’t even suggested it yet, but the way he talked about my next appointment sounded like if I didn’t have the baby by then, we’d be scheduling one.

12:15 rolled around.  I did not expect to make it to my Thursday appointment, and decided beforehand that if I did, I’d get a sweep done.  I was 3cm and 70% effaced now.  Dr K asked me if I knew of natural ways to try to kick start labour, and suggested trying to use a pump.  At this point, I was willing to try it if it meant not needing Pitocin.  I was having false labour again, and decided to time things anyway.  6-7 minutes apart.  Once at home, even though I was tired and really wanted to nap, that seemed virtually impossible with the kids as awake as they were.  Plus, M would be coming home in less than an hour (I tried napping at my mom’s for a bit with no success due to A and these Braxton’s).  So, I pulled out the pump.

Shortly after using it, the contractions went to 5 minutes apart.  When they looked like they might be slowing down, I started another session and immediately they moved to 3 minutes apart… and much stronger.  These did not feel like before.  M had just gotten home.  I was excited… but doubtful.  I picked up the phone.  "Honey, I think labour might be starting, but it is weird… no, I don’t think you need to rush.  Yes, they are 3 minutes apart, but it feels different."  He was inside within 5 minutes.  M heard the ‘L’ word, and all of a sudden the house was full of excitement.  ‘Mom, are you in labour?  Is the baby coming?  YAY!  Let’s get ready to go!  Hurry, baby is coming, I’ll help you’.  At this point, I was praying this was for real as I really did not want to disappoint her and say ‘oops, false alarm’.  After all, you’d think I’d know the difference at this point.  I’ve had 3 kids already!

We dropped the kids off at my parents and headed to the hospital, even though I really wanted to just go for a walk or take a nap… things still didn’t feel like active labour.  We got to the hospital around 5pm. Nurse C checked me, and then asked if I could let the nurse in training check me as well, as I was easy to measure.  However, even when they both said I was 5cm and fully effaced, I was doubtful, mostly due to what happened last time.  She figured I was right on the edge of active labour, once again strange to me as usually when we get to the hospital I’m in full on active labour with the same measurements.  I went from feeling like we’d be holding our baby in about 2 hours, to ‘oh no.  How long will this one take?’  I was able to walk through the contractions with no difficulty, which I found strange.  But I was extremely tired as I hadn’t gotten my usual nap, and so, even though I knew that keeping active would be best, I went to lay down... that's when things got frustrating. 

The contractions moved to 6 minutes apart, and then kept changing from 3, to 6, to 1 or 2 minutes apart… some weaker than others, all the while feeling like false labour with strong contractions this time.  I started asking about an epidural, even though I was afraid it might slow labour, but I wanted to sleep so badly.  They checked me again around 8pm.  Nurse C got a strange look on her face, and then asked to check me during a contraction. I was about 6 cm (she said there was no change before when she checked me).  At this point, knowing my body was exhausted, I was asking for a pause button so I could take a nap and start over.  I was ready to give up… only 1 cm in 3 hours?  Feeling defeated, I went to the washroom.  The epidural tech came in but I didn't know that (she became my nurse, and told me she was the tech after delivery).  They wanted to check me again to see if I could get the epidural, even though it hadn’t been long.  I waddled over to the bed, and then tried to sit.  “Um,” I said as I stood back up, shaking my head.  I could not sit, or lay down.  I stood by the bed, leaning forward through contractions, not knowing what to do, wondering why contractions still felt the way they did, and thinking I must still only be 6, maybe 7 cm.  I was beginning to wonder what would happen if I needed a caesarean, and I remember telling the baby to get into position, “You are coming out TODAY”.  After what felt like a few more minutes, but could have been an hour for all I knew, I forced myself to lie down.  The nurse checked me again.

“Oh!” she said with some surprise in her voice, “you are 9 cm now… maybe more!”  I heard a voice in my head that said 'You've got this'.   But now that I was lying down, I did not want to get back up.  I figured only one more contraction should get me there, anyway.  It didn't. 

At this point, things were crazy… almost surreal.  The contractions were 'ok'.  I could deal with them.  They didn't feel like 9cm, as usually by 7 or 8 I’m asking for the gas or something… anything, to help me cope.  I didn’t want the gas.  At one point, just after a contraction, I looked up at the new nurse in front of me and told her "now the baby is hiccupping.  Seriously… she’s hiccupping!"  Throughout, she had been kicking and moving, and the nurses were having trouble checking her heartbeat. She decided to kick the Doppler a few times, too… just to let them know she was having none of that.  Something else that I found really different from my other deliveries was that during the contractions I could hear what everyone was saying and understand it all.  They whispered, but I still zoned in on it.  I even read the forms they were writing things in as they moved by with them.  ‘So, I went to the bathroom at 8:20pm.  Interesting.  I wonder what time it is now?’  There were always two nurses in the room with me at this point, and they swapped out the equipment they had brought in while I was in the bathroom, to a bunch of other stuff.  I also remember seeing the doctor 'hiding' in the corner sometime shortly after being checked... they must have called him in.

Time doesn’t pass the same when you are in labour.  I had no concept of it.  I only remember things taking much longer than I was expecting to get from ‘almost there’ to ‘pushing’.  I could hear the nurses talking to the doctor, as well as a doctor in training, saying she could hear that my contractions were progressing things by the sound of my voice.  I moaned through all of them, something I did not do with my other babies.  When I felt my body finally start to push, I waited for the gush I had with my previous two babies.  Nothing.  I moved to hands and knees before the next pushing contraction… still no waters.  ‘Wow… that is one strong bag’, I thought, wondering why I wasn’t feeling her descend further.   I heard the doc ask to break my water.  Another contraction passed.  “Will breaking the water make her come sooner?  If it would make things happen faster, yes”.  No crowning after 3 contractions… it was disheartening.  I never even noticed him breaking it, but then they wanted me to lie down again so they could get her heartbeat.  I could feel her move down with the next pushing contraction, but then I felt her move back in after it ended.  I briefly wanted to cry… and then I got angry.

“No!  You are coming OUT!”

The nurse tells me to push really hard to get that baby out.  Another contraction hit and I felt her crowning again.  When it ended, I was asked if I wanted to feel the head.  I wanted to… I really did.  “No,” I said, afraid she'd go back in.  Plus, I was so tired; I just wanted to breathe through this break.  Next push, and her head came out.  The nurse on my right said "one more good push, get the shoulders out".  I waited for the contraction, and then I felt her arrive! 

It was as if knowing that hard work was done gave me renewed energy.  I was so alert when they put her on my chest at 9:44pm.  I saw her bright eyes, vernix covering her back and head (which told me she wasn't nearly as overdue as the date would suggest), and I pulled her a bit further up to see if I could get her to my breast.  I was so happy I felt I could burst!  It took a while before I felt the contraction for the placenta, and felt my body push it out. 

Then it all happened again.

There was a gush and the nurses went crazy.  The lights went on.  Dr. K was asking why I didn't already have an IV, and the nurse told him I had asked not to have it.  I was able to hold the baby for a little while longer (I did my best to ignore everyone else) while they put an IV into one hand, hooked up another in my arm, a pill in my butt, but thankfully no catheter.  The nurses mentioned how easy it was to put the IV in.  The shakes started again as they took the baby to weigh, measure, and clean up, but they were not as bad as with my last birth.  I heard them say she was 8lbs, 4oz, 51cm long (I quickly calculated 20 inches), and her head circumference was 35cm.  They commented on how chunky she was, and wanted to grab the other scale to compare as they figured this one must be wrong.  It wasn't.  My husband said "so, she didn’t actually haemorrhage this time?"  Yes.  Yes I had.  I was happy when they gave the little one back to me.  She immediately started suckling and 'crawling' her way up my chest.  The nurse was so impressed with how active she was, and was calling the other nurse over to watch.  “Look, this is what you call casual nursing!  Years ago they would insist you need to be sitting up to nurse.”  Baby got a good latch with no help from me and fed 40 minutes each side. 

While the nurse was impressed with baby, she was not impressed with my uterus.  It would firm up, and then get 'boggy' again each time they would check it.  They kept checking me all through the night, keeping the one IV on, trying to bring the drip down bit by bit.  I was really thankful when they were able to remove the needles (the one in my arm had actually bent).  My back hurt terribly.  The one nurse figured I likely had some back labour.  "She was moving so much in there, I can imagine your back would be very sore".   I had baby skin to skin all night long, hoping that it would also help.  Baby was content and quiet, just this little 'head' visible around the blanket.  Yeah, that bassinet maybe had her in it for a grand total of 15 minutes the entire time I was at the hospital.

Nurse R came in the next morning after I had my blood test.  “You lost a lot of blood,” she told me.  I asked how much, and she hesitated a bit.  “Well, it was over 1L with everything weighed overnight.”  “Oh… that’s not bad!”  Honestly, I didn’t feel like I’d haemorrhaged.  I had more energy than I was expecting (except for being tired with no sleep).  She said she was surprised by my haemoglobin count.  It was higher than expected, at 111 points, but I was to stay a second night.  By the time I left the hospital (before lunch on Saturday), it was 125.  To put this in perspective, the average levels for pregnancy are 120-160, and my level at 28 weeks was only about 120! 

I feel so relaxed with Baby B.  No stress to figure out what is wrong, she is mostly content when in my arms, and she sleeps ok at night… although for the first couple of nights at home she wouldn’t let me sleep unless I held her in bed.  By the time she was 1 week old, she was back to her birth weight.  We had an issue with the cord stump as it was a bit smelly and then fell off at 6 days due to the clamp being left on and hooking on something, but after about a week, everything was normal again.

I am so thankful for what God did through all this!  We had a prayer chain going, and I could feel it!  I am sore and part of me never wants to give birth again (I wanted so badly to ‘give up’ and sleep), but it was, in all, a good (although wacky) birth.  We are healthy, God answered prayer, and I actually had a natural labour and delivery… no laughing gas necessary!  I feel empowered by that thought… but not enough to want to do it again… at least not for a few years.  ;) 

Thank you, Lord, for all of my children.  And thank you for taking care of me.

 

My last belly pic.  Man, was I huge!

 

 Little baby B, chubby cheeks and all <3 bram="" in="" like="" looks="" much="" p="" picture="" she="" so="" this="">

 

 My oldest two, checking out their newest sister.  And A is sitting with me.  (love!)

 

My girls!

 

Baby B, 3 days old.

41 weeks and counting

Many thoughts have been running through my head in the last week.  I am 'overdue'.  Baby is still in my belly, 11 days after the due date has come and gone.  I knew it would likely be later due to when I tested and how things showed up on the test, but I was not expecting to still be pregnant so close to February. 


It isn't that I don't enjoy being pregnant.  This pregnancy has been fantastic!  I have been getting a little tired of all the questions if I'm walking enough, or taking the right things, or this and that.  As if I had control over any of it.  M comes home each day from school and says 'Awww, I thought you'd have the baby today'.  This morning she looked at me as I made breakfast and said 'you are still pregnant?', obviously repeating the phrase she has heard over and over.  My cousin, who was originally due the same day as me, was also pregnant still (as of yesterday... may have changed).  I have heard all manner of things.  Example is my mother in law.  In December she went on and on about how this could be a New Years baby (due date was Jan 16... so two weeks early).  Why?  Due to my size.  Now she is saying Valentine's baby.  Funny how she jumped 6.5 weeks like that.  I am not going 4 weeks over.  I know she says these things without thinking about them, but it can frustrate a girl... especially one who is trying to patiently wait on God's perfect timing in all this.


It is interesting, though, what He has been teaching me here.


I have been hearing stories, seeing the news, headlines, and so on about wars, rumors of wars, asteroids passing close by, things of that sort.  It reminds me of the things we are told will happen before the last days.  We can tell it is close, but we don't know when.  We cannot even guess!  It could be sooner than we think, or it could be a long time yet.  And we should all be like my daughter, thinking 'is it today?  It might be today!'.  Are we ready if it is?  The whole thing about the end days being like a woman in labor brings a whole new thought.  We know it is coming, but we don't know when.  We know it will not be comfortable but we don't know the level of discomfort, or how long exactly it will last for, or how it will build, or even if we will mentally be able to handle it (even though we were designed for it).  We DO know that God will be with us through it all.  We DO know that the end will be worth it all to the point of forgetting the pain we went through in order to behold that glorious coming.  And since having 3 babies and waiting not-so-patiently for our fourth, I see this so differently than I did before.  We wait, and we know it will be worth the wait.  We may even get excited about it in the beginning, knowing 'it's here', and able to work through the 'birth pains' as they start out, knowing that each one is bringing us closer and closer to that moment.


I think God really knew what He was talking about when he compared those days to labor.  I never understood before, and I think that I still wouldn't understand completely if it wasn't for his coaxing, but yes.  He knew.  He compared the two for a reason.  He gave us the signs.  He gave us the knowledge.  He also gave us the strength to be able to endure.


So, even though I'm 11 days over the 'due date', His timing is perfect.  This baby will come when it is time for them to come.  I am praying that I won't have to get induced (the increased risk of hemorrhage is frightening) and I'd much rather she come on her own.  I have no control.  Only God does.  And His timing is perfect.

Overdue

So, it has now been 4 days since my due date has come and gone, and I'm ok with that.  Baby will come when baby is ready (and it feels like it will be soon.  I've got the lovely pelvic pains, Braxtons, and baby was squirming so much last night I was convinced she'd break my water!).  However, I am finding myself in a place of exhaustion coupled with longing to organize everything, put up shelves and picture frames, and do all the things that I do not really need to do while ignoring those I should (like farm bookwork... year end, how I hate thee).  I'd rather bake mini cupcakes to bring to the hospital for the nurses when I inevitably go in.  Or calculate how much wood I need to build shelves/picture ledges for our bedroom.  Or go to Ikea and just buy said shelves since it is cheaper than using real wood (and that is what I work with, not that mdf stuff) and get my hubby to put them up so we can put our collections out and about in our room instead of having empty bland walls and collections in boxes in the closet.  And hang cute little baby clothes as well.  Sigh.  I love little baby girl clothes.


I'm still getting up at 6:30am each morning to make sure everything is ready for school (and only going to bed close to midnight it seems... can never get to bed early... might explain my need for naps).  Yesterday I decided to do a little extra something in my fridge to help my daughter with packing her school lunches.  On Sundays I prep and bag 5 each of a snack, protein, veggie, fruit, and bread product (well... not always 5 of those as I don't think sandwiches sitting in the fridge all week are much fun).  I took a clear shoe box I recently purchased in a pack of 10 on sale (yay sales!) and made card-stock dividers to place each of the food items into (last week I just had them all sitting in one corner of the fridge... not very contained, and M was having trouble determining what she should put in her lunch).  This is what I came up with.

She is thrilled.  Hasn't used it yet as she had already packed today's lunch, but I'm convinced this will make things much easier over the coming weeks.  And I must say, those little snack baggies are fantastic for prechopped apples and other fruits.  I like using containers, but who has 25 tiny little containers kicking around?  Not me!

Now if only fruit wasn't so expensive!  I would love to do something besides apples.  I do 1/2 an apple per day, and usually one other fruit besides for the other 2 or 3 days (like berries, grapes if they were on sale which they haven't been, cantaloupe if on sale, which it recently was, etc).  Veggies... basically just celery and carrots.  We haven't had peppers or cukes or anything in the house for  a long time, and she has been asking for broccoli now.

Speaking of organizing, I also recently organized and labelled my pantry containers (trashed a bunch of old stuff), and this morning I went through all my lids and got rid of a LOT of them.  The cabinet is so nice and clean in there now!  Got rid of some jars, too.  I should just put the jar lids on each of the jars and get rid of the rest of them.  I think I have twice as many lids as jars right now.  And last week I organized my recipes!  So happy!  The recipe box was overhauled and I made dividers for it.  Trashed at least 1/3 of what was in there.  As for the binder, I have no idea how much I got rid of, but it was a considerable pile.  Now to get rid of recipe books... except that I like them so much.  :(

I love organized kitchens!  

The time is near

So... my due date for this lil girl is Friday.  Friday.  Three days from today.

Yikes! 

The last number of months have just flown by!  We still don't have everything set up like I really want for the baby... but that is ok.  I have a place for her to sleep, we have clothes and diapers, and we have about 8 or 9 meals in the deep freeze.  I'm feeling ok with all of that.  M keeps asking when the baby is coming, and I keep telling her that we don't know exactly when.  It will be a surprise for all of us. 

Nesting is starting up a bit.  I am exhausted and want to sleep all the time, however I also want to sew, and organize, and clean things I usually don't clean.  For example, this week I cleaned out all the kitchen drawers and reorganized them, including the basket and phone caddy on the counter.  I also took apart the kitchen faucet and cleaned that so it runs properly now.  I went through my recipe box and binder and trashed a whole bunch of recipes I'll never use, and added dividers to the box (finally).  I really want some shelves on the wall in our bedroom so we can put some things on there for baby (and our collections.  It would be nice to display them again instead of storing them in boxes), picture frames, maybe even some hooks to hang the cute little dresses we have for her so that they are out and visible instead of hiding in the drawer.  The chest of drawers we are using is not the biggest in terms of drawer space... they are very shallow drawers.  Which is ok for baby clothes, really.  I just need two drawers for all the cloth diapers... and they are stuffed into one right now :) . 

Silly thing is... we still haven't pegged a name yet.  We have a middle name (in honor of my grandmother.  My due date is on what would have been her 90th birthday, but she passed away in October from cancer).  We also haven't completely packed a birth bag.  I've got most of what I figure I'll need in there (toiletries, an outfit for baby, socks/slippers for me) but no snacks (don't have a clue what to put in anyway, and they do not stock that sort of thing well in the hospital I'm going to), no pills (I really should put a couple of days worth into a container for then... I'll still be needing my prenatal and calcium pills), nothing for 'helping' with labor (I wouldn't know what to pack!  I have no idea, and I've done this 3 times already).  I'm thinking that since I know at least 3 other women due in the same week as me, I probably should pack my birthing ball that I have at home here so I don't have to worry about needing one and someone else is using it.  I don't know... overkill, maybe?  What sorts of things would you pack?

Just feeling a little... underprepared.  And yet, I don't really care right now, because all I want to do is sleep (and maybe have a soak in the tub).  I am constantly exhausted.

The Kids Rooms - DIY Done!

Christmas day, and part of what we did was put up a bunch of the kids wall stuffs, since it had now been a month and the walls were ready!  Stickies, letters, and some of the items we bought and gave to them as parts of their Christmas gifts... all went up in the next few days.  Here are their rooms now (and yes, there will likely be more shelves and such that will go up.  I have some old shelves from when I was little that are perfect for a girls room that I think we'll be finding space for on M's walls)

 

 We found in among all our bedding supplies a few things that we forgot we had.  There was a twin Star Wars sheet set that my husband had as a kid that my son now has for his room.  Also, this huge double sized blanket that lends itself nicely to things.  We bought those hanging plush organizers from Ikea for $5 each and they are wonderful (especially since these rooms already had the hooks on the ceiling from the old 70s style lamps they used to use).

 Got these three shelves and their brackets from Ikea also for $15 total.  Nice.  And they look great!  I had my old lava lamp as a kid packed away, just waiting for the right time to give to one of my kids, and Bram got it for Christmas this year.  He's thrilled!  It is such a fun little thing!  We put up his old clock as well (and now M is asking for a princess/fairy clock).

 Got some wall stickers on a great deal at LW before it shut down, and they look fantastic on the walls.  Want to get some cars ones eventually... but those things are pricey!

 M's room got new sheer curtains that have such a pretty texture of flowers and vines on them... so girly and gorgeous!  She loves them.  They were on sale at Ikea for $16. 

 I made her some butterflies with my die cutter and old pop cans.  Yes... pop cans.  I love the iced tea ones with the flowers... green tea or something.  Cannot remember the name.  I kept the flowers on the outside for those, and the rest I showed the silver portion of the can.  They are lovely, and she is so happy to have them!

And here  is her teddy organizer... in pink.  I was disappointed they didn't have red ones for Bram's room, but the green looks nice, too!  The kids are so happy with their new things!  Who knew that doing bedrooms for them would be such a fun Christmas gift?

And no worries... A got her own little bedroom makeover.  I made her name in foam and put it on her door (because otherwise she'll pull it off the wall and eat it if it's at the right level for her) and I reorganized all the stuff that was already in there (especially since she has a whole lot of new toys from Christmas). 

I am wanting to go on another Ikea shopping trip for our own room now... shelves, maybe those picture frame shelves to go all around the top of our room for our collections, books, and photos... some hooks for baby clothes as they would get lost in our closet... perhaps take some art from the nursery and move it into our room for awhile, maybe add a 'canopy' to our bed to make it more 'private' (although I don't think the baby will care.  M would just love it, though!). 

I love Ikea!  At least, I love their organizing things.  ;)