Labor

I don't have any pictures for this post.  This is merely a post for me not to forget how grateful I am to be healthy and to have had a healthy baby.  When I read this post, I want to remember how wonderful the miracle of life is and the joy that Ben has brought to our lives but not forgetting the difficulty the labor and delivery which finally brought him to us.  I will make sure I read this before we decide to have baby #2.  Ha!  This post might be the only form of birth control we need.  Lol.

Labor hours 0-6

Sunday night at 11pm after only being in bed for about 30 minutes, I woke Tyler back up asking him to start the timer again.  After about 45 minutes of timing them, the contractions were consistently 5 minutes apart.  It was GO TIME!  Yay!

Tyler started to pack his bags as I made sure to put the last things on my checklist into my bag.  I was so excited, I wasn't nervous at all.  Tyler wasn't nervous either!  We were finally at that point.  I remember thinking to myself, "I can do this."  It took us a couple of hours before we were on our way to the hospital.  

Once we got to the hospital we were taken into the Triage Room.  This is where they check you to make sure you are in labor.  Some women may feel contractions, but they are not in active labor.  That was me, or course.  After walking for 2 hours, I was still 4 cm (the dilation I was at when I got there).  We walked the halls from 3:00am - 5:00am.  So they sent us home.  That was so scary because the contractions hurt so bad.  The nurses wanted to make sure I was rested for what was to come.

Labor hours 6-11

When we got home at around 6am, I went straight to sleep. When I woke up, I could still feel the contractions.  That is when I decided to take a bath, thinking it would alleviate the pain.  Tyler got a little workout, Insanity, under his belt.  Of course, my handsome husband had to work on his fitness!  He's so cute.  After the bath and workout, we sat in our bed and watched a couple of food network shows.  Because we were exhausted from the hospital trip, it was so nice to have the TV to take our minds off of the contractions.  Around noon, I started to scoot off of the bed and suddenly felt a gush of water between my legs, the bed was wet!  MY WATER BROKE!  They say that only 11% of women actually have their water break naturally at home.  The rest of them, it has to be "broken" by the doctors.  I called my doc, she said to go to the hospital.  I decided to take my time to get to the hospital because I hated being there and being sent home.

Labor hours 11-25

We finally went to the hospital at 4pm Monday.  Once again, we were sent to the Triage Room but this time, we were admitted and not sent home because my water had actually ruptured.  It turns out that there was a part of the water sack that didn't completely break so a nurse came into to "pop the sack".

After the sack was popped, the contractions continued to hurt.  Tyler was there with me through every contraction.  When I started to breathe, he breathed with me.  There was no one in the world that I wanted with me more than my husband.  He always kept my water bottle full and gave me popsicles to take my mind off of being hungry.  To me, that was the sweetest thing ever.  He even fasted the whole time because I wasn't allowed to eat.  I felt so comforted by just having my guy there.

At 7pm (3 hours after we were admitted), they checked my cervix, still 4-5 cm dilated.  At this point, we have been contracting, in labor, for 20 hours.  They nurses recommended pitocin to speed up the labor.  Although I didn't want any meds during the labor process, at that point, I wanted anything to help our little baby come out sooner.  20 hours was enough to make you want to push the baby out already especially after having the nurses check your cervix 5 times without finding any change.  I was warned that once I started the pitocin, it would be more painful yet it would help the cervix dilate faster.  I thought, bring it on!

After five hours on pitocin, I was STILL ONLY 5 cm.  At this point, we are 25 hours into labor.  I was starting to get very discouraged and sad.  I really wanted to have the baby naturally, without any meds, especially without an epidural.  It is kind of a taboo thing in my culture to get an epidural.  Everyone in my family talks about the time they "did it naturally".  I wanted to do as all of the ladies in my family did, naturally.  BUT at this point, 25 hours later, I was tired.  Tyler and I decided that the best thing for me was to get the epidural so I could be more relaxed in order to help my cervix dilate.  I remember crying because I was crushed that my birth plan was falling apart.  In my mind, I've always considered myself a strong willed person and I take pride in persevering through tough situations.  I'm also one who sets goals and tries my best to reach them.  I REALLY wanted to have Ben naturally because that was what Tyler and I wanted very badly.  I didn't want to disappoint myself but mostly I didn't want my husband to think that I had given up.  Of course, that did not cross his mind EVER, but I was still very upset.  I also didn't want to harm the baby by putting any more meds into my body even though I know that women do it everyday and their babies are healthy.  It just wasn't OUR birth plan.

Labor hours 25-30

Once I received the epidural, I was able to fall asleep immediately.  Unfortunately, this is when Tyler stayed awake watching the monitors which displayed my vitals and baby's heartbeat.  He was very concerned for both me and baby.  He could see on the monitor when I was having a contraction, my blood pressure, and heart rate.  Tyler's biggest concern was baby's heart rate.  Once I got the epidural, baby's heart beat spiked up about 25 beats per minute more than it was all day.  Needless to point out, Tyler did not get any rest.  When it comes to me and the baby, Tyler is the #1 worry monster.

The nurse, Courtney was sure that the epidural would relax my body guaranteeing that I would dilate quickly.  However, when she checked my cervix, still no change.  At 5am she noticed that there were still membranes (the water sack) still left.  This was when she messaged the same nurse that "popped" it the day before to come check.  It turns out that the water sack was never popped when we were admitted the day before.  If the water sack is still there, the cervix does not start to dilate and progress through labor.  Both Tyler and I stayed calm.  I didn't have energy to be mad.  It wasn't until after everything was over that we even talked about what happened.  I guess it could've happened to anyone.

Labor hours 30 - 37

At 7am on Tuesday, we were introduced to a new nurse Tricia.  She came in and was all business.  Her plan was to attached a monitor on the baby while cranking up the pitocin to really get the party started!  She wanted to give me just enough pitocin to not hurt the baby, but to progress things along.  Every couple of hours, Tricia came to check on me.  I was finally dilating!!!