A birth story
**edited 4/10**
I never have yet taken the opportunity to write down Isaac's birth story. Since it all started one year ago today, and especially because I am waiting for somebody to bring me some baking soda and cooking oil to finish big guy's cake...
I woke up at around 5 or 5:30 on April 5th of last year thanks to a minor gush of water that I suspected was you-know-what. Isaac was due on April 7th and we had been doing some major mall-walking (and my OB had done some membrane separation on the 2nd -- ew!) to try to get him out. I had a healthy, relatively uneventful pregnancy bar an early-labor scare, but ladies who have been there know that as the time approaches it's like "get out already!" I called the hospital and told them what had happened, though I was a little surprised that my water breaking wouldn't actually involve so much fluid. They told me to come on in. Dad and I took our time, took some showers and even stopped at Starbucks, on the way in because I wasn't having regular contractions. We got to the hospital at around 7:30, and they did an ultrasound to determine if there was any fluid around Isaac (aka if my water really did break). This was where the fun began -- we had Isaac at the University of Washington Medical Center, which is a teaching hospital. Meaning that most of your care is performed by residents (AKA rather inexperienced doctors) and they are in charge of training medical students, who also get the opportunity to check you out. Meaning you get checked at least twice, almost every time. And then they discuss whether or not they agree right there in front of you. I found this all particularly amusing because there was this one dude who was a super-fledging trainee who kept getting everything wrong, and when he would check how far along I was, his poor little nervous hands were shaking. Come ON, dude, it's not like I'm not going to KNOW! What a dork. Anyway, after a minor disagreement, the resident (her name was Dr. Kurachi) said that she thought Isaac's fluid was gone (more on that later), and that I was also dilated to 4 cm and 1 cm effaced. This dilation part had actually not changed since my prenatal appointment on Friday, though. There was some initial discussion about whether or not to send me home (GOD NO!!!!), but in the end they resolved that having a potential water-break means it's time to start Claire on pitocin and help her have a baby. Rock on.
I progressed pretty well initially, and made it to 6 cm by lunch with very little pitocin and very little discomfort. I mostly walked around a lot, my enormousness leading my IV pole around the maternity ward. I was the only one walking around, though, which felt really weird...like I was getting ready to make a prison break or something. I was doing so well, in fact, that they asked me if I wanted anything to eat, and upon acknowledging that I was indeed starving, presented me with a French Dip sandwich. As in roast beef. Which I devoured (more on that later).
At around 1:00 I stopped progressing completely. They started turning up my pitocin really fast, and Isaac's heart rate suddenly dropped precipitously. Out of nowhere, my little L&D room, staffed only intermittently by a single nurse, filled up with 3 or 4 nurses and 5 or 6 doctors to check on Isaac and make sure he was doing okay. I freaked out and started bawling because obviously their reaction meant my baby was going to die. After several minutes of continuous monitoring, the medical personnel dispersed and my nurse told me that sometimes this kind of baby-heart reaction happens when the baby slips down into the "ready" position above the exit ramp. We assumed in the end this must have been what happened, because Isaac's vitals were the picture of health for the rest of the labor. Anyway, because I stopped progressing, the doctors decided I needed in intrauterine catheter inserted, which is basically a tube that they coil up and around the baby for the purpose of accurately measuring the pressure exerted by your contractions -- they were concerned my contractions weren't strong and manly enough to exude out my little man. So they did this, and it was weird, and I'm still not entirely sure it was necessary. And then they upped the pitocin because they were getting really weird readings.
After awhile, I started to get tired of dealing with the contractions and asked for a walking epidural, which was given to me at lightning speed. For the uninitiated, this means I get a catheter placed into the fluid around my spine to deliver medication. A normal epidural means anethesia + pain killers; a walking epidural lacks the anesthesia (hence you can still walk around). This was fine and killed most of the pain.
At around 9:00, with still no progression, and weird readings from the intrauterine catheter, they started to worry about me and I heard "C-section" being thrown around. A take-charge young black lady resident named Dr. Piggett, who had just taken over for Dr. Kurachi, stepped in and examined me. She started pushing around my cervix and muttering "Baby's heads don't feel that soft...". She reached for a bag-of-waters-rupturing hook, fished around in there for a little bit, and I felt a pop and an enormous flood of water rushing out. It tickled, so I laughed, and my tightened stomach muscles turned the flood into a squirt gun aimed at poor Dr. Piggett. Not too many women can say they shot at the OB with their amniotic fluid. So my water was actually *not* broken, and yes, it does feel like a gush of biblical proportions in case you were wondering.
It turns out that I didn't actually know what labor was until Dr. Piggett broke my water. I don't remember too much after that, because I went from 7 to 9 cm in one hour. I do remember trying to do the stupid breathing exercises and thinking that I wanted to mash my labor instructor lady's face in poo. ***I remember that almost immediately upon the onset of the violent contractions, I threw up a mashed up and completely undigested French Dip sandwich, thinking "THAT's why you're not supposed to eat anything while you're in labor!" When I threw up a second time not too long after that, the nurses were exceedingly happy. Evidently throwing up means your labor is progressing well. Whatever. ***I also remember thrashing from side-to-side in the bed because moving around rapidly at least gave me something to do so I didn't scream like a murder victim. The whole time, for some reason, I never screamed or moaned or even cussed, and I remember thinking that all that would be just lame because, really, what good would it do? I remember asking Mike to rub my back, then telling him he had better stop rubbing my back if he knew what was good for him, and then I remember that he got me some cold wet washcloths for my forehead and that helped, though I'm sure he felt terribly helpless. At some point I must have asked for the full-on epidural, no more of this 'walking' crap, because I got it and then I was in paralyzed HEAVEN. They let me continue dilating, and then laboring Isaac down under the epidural, but told me they needed it to wear off so I could feel the contractions for the pushing stage.
And then came time to push. My OB, who wasn't even supposed to be on duty, showed up to coach me through the pushing, along with a new nurse and Mike. Mike held my leg up and counted in my ear. The ladies told me I was a great pusher, and oh look I see his head! He has blond hair! They said this about 20 minutes into the pushing. Little did I realize that "I can see his head" does not mean that your baby is nigh. 2 hours after they first said this -- meaning I had basically been doing crunches for 2 and a half hours AFTER having gone through 18 hours of labor -- I told the labor nurse that I didn't think I could do it any more. She looked at me and laughed: "Honey, you're the only one who *can* do it." She gave me some oxygen, and they let me click up my epidural to try to deal. Three hours after I started pushing I felt his head crown (again, weird). I pushed out his head with one long push. Even Michael, who swore he didn't want to see THAT, couldn't resist a look. Turns out all our pushing made Isaac into a squid-head. No kidding; his melon was literally a melon. I pushed out the rest of his body with another push, the best feeling in my whole life because not only would I now get to see my little bitty guy for the first time, but I was DONE THANK THE LORD. Isaac emerged at 1:30 in the morning.
They held up Isaac and he seemed so long to me. He had his eyes closed and didn't cry. I don't remember a lot of what happened then, except that they took him over to a nearby station and gave him a shot and put some goo in his eyes -- he started screaming about that. Mike followed them over and told Isaac that Dad was there, and Isaac stopped crying as soon as he heard Michael's voice. They measured and weighed him and declared him to be 19.5" long and 7 lbs 15 oz. I must say that was extremely proud of my wee little hips that they could deliver an 8 lb baby. They then wrapped up the Isaac and brought him over to me. I had never actually held a baby even close to that young before, but they showed me how to rest him in my arms, and I looked at his face and he opened his precious little eyes and blinked at me, trying to focus and take me in. Just as he has been doing with everything else in the world ever since. Happy birthday, my special little guy.
I never have yet taken the opportunity to write down Isaac's birth story. Since it all started one year ago today, and especially because I am waiting for somebody to bring me some baking soda and cooking oil to finish big guy's cake...
I woke up at around 5 or 5:30 on April 5th of last year thanks to a minor gush of water that I suspected was you-know-what. Isaac was due on April 7th and we had been doing some major mall-walking (and my OB had done some membrane separation on the 2nd -- ew!) to try to get him out. I had a healthy, relatively uneventful pregnancy bar an early-labor scare, but ladies who have been there know that as the time approaches it's like "get out already!" I called the hospital and told them what had happened, though I was a little surprised that my water breaking wouldn't actually involve so much fluid. They told me to come on in. Dad and I took our time, took some showers and even stopped at Starbucks, on the way in because I wasn't having regular contractions. We got to the hospital at around 7:30, and they did an ultrasound to determine if there was any fluid around Isaac (aka if my water really did break). This was where the fun began -- we had Isaac at the University of Washington Medical Center, which is a teaching hospital. Meaning that most of your care is performed by residents (AKA rather inexperienced doctors) and they are in charge of training medical students, who also get the opportunity to check you out. Meaning you get checked at least twice, almost every time. And then they discuss whether or not they agree right there in front of you. I found this all particularly amusing because there was this one dude who was a super-fledging trainee who kept getting everything wrong, and when he would check how far along I was, his poor little nervous hands were shaking. Come ON, dude, it's not like I'm not going to KNOW! What a dork. Anyway, after a minor disagreement, the resident (her name was Dr. Kurachi) said that she thought Isaac's fluid was gone (more on that later), and that I was also dilated to 4 cm and 1 cm effaced. This dilation part had actually not changed since my prenatal appointment on Friday, though. There was some initial discussion about whether or not to send me home (GOD NO!!!!), but in the end they resolved that having a potential water-break means it's time to start Claire on pitocin and help her have a baby. Rock on.
I progressed pretty well initially, and made it to 6 cm by lunch with very little pitocin and very little discomfort. I mostly walked around a lot, my enormousness leading my IV pole around the maternity ward. I was the only one walking around, though, which felt really weird...like I was getting ready to make a prison break or something. I was doing so well, in fact, that they asked me if I wanted anything to eat, and upon acknowledging that I was indeed starving, presented me with a French Dip sandwich. As in roast beef. Which I devoured (more on that later).
At around 1:00 I stopped progressing completely. They started turning up my pitocin really fast, and Isaac's heart rate suddenly dropped precipitously. Out of nowhere, my little L&D room, staffed only intermittently by a single nurse, filled up with 3 or 4 nurses and 5 or 6 doctors to check on Isaac and make sure he was doing okay. I freaked out and started bawling because obviously their reaction meant my baby was going to die. After several minutes of continuous monitoring, the medical personnel dispersed and my nurse told me that sometimes this kind of baby-heart reaction happens when the baby slips down into the "ready" position above the exit ramp. We assumed in the end this must have been what happened, because Isaac's vitals were the picture of health for the rest of the labor. Anyway, because I stopped progressing, the doctors decided I needed in intrauterine catheter inserted, which is basically a tube that they coil up and around the baby for the purpose of accurately measuring the pressure exerted by your contractions -- they were concerned my contractions weren't strong and manly enough to exude out my little man. So they did this, and it was weird, and I'm still not entirely sure it was necessary. And then they upped the pitocin because they were getting really weird readings.
After awhile, I started to get tired of dealing with the contractions and asked for a walking epidural, which was given to me at lightning speed. For the uninitiated, this means I get a catheter placed into the fluid around my spine to deliver medication. A normal epidural means anethesia + pain killers; a walking epidural lacks the anesthesia (hence you can still walk around). This was fine and killed most of the pain.
At around 9:00, with still no progression, and weird readings from the intrauterine catheter, they started to worry about me and I heard "C-section" being thrown around. A take-charge young black lady resident named Dr. Piggett, who had just taken over for Dr. Kurachi, stepped in and examined me. She started pushing around my cervix and muttering "Baby's heads don't feel that soft...". She reached for a bag-of-waters-rupturing hook, fished around in there for a little bit, and I felt a pop and an enormous flood of water rushing out. It tickled, so I laughed, and my tightened stomach muscles turned the flood into a squirt gun aimed at poor Dr. Piggett. Not too many women can say they shot at the OB with their amniotic fluid. So my water was actually *not* broken, and yes, it does feel like a gush of biblical proportions in case you were wondering.
It turns out that I didn't actually know what labor was until Dr. Piggett broke my water. I don't remember too much after that, because I went from 7 to 9 cm in one hour. I do remember trying to do the stupid breathing exercises and thinking that I wanted to mash my labor instructor lady's face in poo. ***I remember that almost immediately upon the onset of the violent contractions, I threw up a mashed up and completely undigested French Dip sandwich, thinking "THAT's why you're not supposed to eat anything while you're in labor!" When I threw up a second time not too long after that, the nurses were exceedingly happy. Evidently throwing up means your labor is progressing well. Whatever. ***I also remember thrashing from side-to-side in the bed because moving around rapidly at least gave me something to do so I didn't scream like a murder victim. The whole time, for some reason, I never screamed or moaned or even cussed, and I remember thinking that all that would be just lame because, really, what good would it do? I remember asking Mike to rub my back, then telling him he had better stop rubbing my back if he knew what was good for him, and then I remember that he got me some cold wet washcloths for my forehead and that helped, though I'm sure he felt terribly helpless. At some point I must have asked for the full-on epidural, no more of this 'walking' crap, because I got it and then I was in paralyzed HEAVEN. They let me continue dilating, and then laboring Isaac down under the epidural, but told me they needed it to wear off so I could feel the contractions for the pushing stage.
And then came time to push. My OB, who wasn't even supposed to be on duty, showed up to coach me through the pushing, along with a new nurse and Mike. Mike held my leg up and counted in my ear. The ladies told me I was a great pusher, and oh look I see his head! He has blond hair! They said this about 20 minutes into the pushing. Little did I realize that "I can see his head" does not mean that your baby is nigh. 2 hours after they first said this -- meaning I had basically been doing crunches for 2 and a half hours AFTER having gone through 18 hours of labor -- I told the labor nurse that I didn't think I could do it any more. She looked at me and laughed: "Honey, you're the only one who *can* do it." She gave me some oxygen, and they let me click up my epidural to try to deal. Three hours after I started pushing I felt his head crown (again, weird). I pushed out his head with one long push. Even Michael, who swore he didn't want to see THAT, couldn't resist a look. Turns out all our pushing made Isaac into a squid-head. No kidding; his melon was literally a melon. I pushed out the rest of his body with another push, the best feeling in my whole life because not only would I now get to see my little bitty guy for the first time, but I was DONE THANK THE LORD. Isaac emerged at 1:30 in the morning.
They held up Isaac and he seemed so long to me. He had his eyes closed and didn't cry. I don't remember a lot of what happened then, except that they took him over to a nearby station and gave him a shot and put some goo in his eyes -- he started screaming about that. Mike followed them over and told Isaac that Dad was there, and Isaac stopped crying as soon as he heard Michael's voice. They measured and weighed him and declared him to be 19.5" long and 7 lbs 15 oz. I must say that was extremely proud of my wee little hips that they could deliver an 8 lb baby. They then wrapped up the Isaac and brought him over to me. I had never actually held a baby even close to that young before, but they showed me how to rest him in my arms, and I looked at his face and he opened his precious little eyes and blinked at me, trying to focus and take me in. Just as he has been doing with everything else in the world ever since. Happy birthday, my special little guy.
posted by Claire at 11:10 PM
3 Comments:
Happy birthday Isaac! :) Hope it was a good one!
Right on. Happy oh-one, Ike. Can I call him Ike?
Although I think everyone still needs to know: WHAT HAPPENED WITH THE FRENCH DIP!!!???
-Ev
ACK! Sorry Ev -- I fixed it now -- the fate of the French Dip is surrounded by stars.
Post a Comment
<< Home