Once upon a time... :)
First, a little back story...Drew's sisters: Olivia, Eileen and Liz came over to spend 2 nights at our place on Sunday August 7th. Drew and I went out to see Bridesmaids (hilarious, yet shocking at the same time!) on Sunday and we had planned to see another movie on Monday night (I mean, who could not take advantage of free babysitting!) But, I couldn't find our free movie ticket, so I told Drew to go ahead without me and meet his cousin Joey at the movies to see Captain America. I think now that I didn't find the ticket for a good reason! (I have since found the ticket too!) The girls, Meghan and I were hanging out at Drew's other sister, Michelle's apartment (she and her boyfriend Corey live in the same complex as us), just relaxing and playing board games.
Kait started texting me at about 8pm saying that she had woken up that morning at 330am, 4, and 430am with horrible back pain but had been able to fall back asleep. She had left the house to run some errands and ended up at Fred's (baby's father) house in the late afternoon. She and Fred's mother Margaret had been timing contractions, they were regular every 5 minutes or so, lasting less than a minute. I decided to meet Kait back at our Dad's house and see what was going on.
I told the girls I had to go and Eileen and I came back here to put Meg down to sleep for the night. Eileen offered to come and wait until she fell asleep, then I told her she could go back over to Shelly's house. I left Meghan's window open and with Shelly's window open...almost as good as a baby monitor1 ;) Not to mention, Meghan never wakes up during the night and if she does, she's usually back to sleep within a few minutes. I left the girls and told Liz I'd text with instructions for Meg in case this was the real deal and not a false alarm.
I met up with Kait about 9pm. She said the contractions had slowed down, but still had solid back pain. I had her walk the length of the house a few times to see if there was any change. She had a couple solid contractions and wanted to go to the hospital just to get a definitive answer. I told her to call the OB's office first and see what they say, as she claimed she wasn't having regular contractions and her office hadn't broken. She didn't want to and just wanted to get to the hospital so off we went.
She continued to say she only had solid back pain and no real contractions, so I thought we would be sent home for sure. We arrive at the ER where they promptly tell Kait that she should have called her OB before coming in. She's admitted as an outpatient anyways because we tell them her contractions are regular every 3-4 minutes. We're taken to the maternity ward which is half under construction and put into a room literally half the size of my apartment living room! She had to give a urine sample and the bathroom was a toilet and space for your feet. With two doors on each side. That's it. :D The maternity nurses again told her that she should have called the OB before coming in but hooked her up to the monitors to track her contractions and baby's heartbeat. She also had blood drawn. Then we started to walk the halls...
The nurses were hoping that Kait would progress if she walked for a little while so she could be admitted. Which she did, whew! She was a 3-4 (cm dilated) and was a 4-5 after walking for about half an hour. We then got moved from the dinky little room into the newly renovated birthing center room:
This is Kait and Fred (baby's father) right after we got into the birthing suite. We had one nurse that was determined to have Kait on her back the whole time. She hooked her right up to the monitors and had her get into the bed. Well I put up with those shenanigans for about 5 seconds and had Kait get out of bed and move around into different positions. This is when I started Kait had a lot of lower back labor so she would squeeze Fred's hand while I used by palms and fists to counter-pressure her back contractions.
At about 330am, Kait was checked and at a 7! She had made it all the way to 7cm without any pains meds! She was feeling intense pain, so she decided to get into the jet tub! It looked divine while she was in there, I was a bit jealous! I felt like I was constantly watching the clock, but now I can't recall what happened at what time. I believe a couple hours later, at about 5am, Kait was checked and still at 7cm so she agreed to have some Fentanyl for the pain. I was/am so proud of her for getting so far without any pain medication!
Things moved fairly quickly after that. Kait started complaining that she felt like she needed to relieve herself, so we would take trips from the bathroom to the bed and back. Each time, not producing a baby or anything else. She was checked again at her request and found to be about a 7-8. She had Fentanyl at 5, 6 and 7am. I believe they broke her water at about 730am. And that's where we ran into trouble.
I saw meconium in the waters (obviously so did the nurses) I knew they would not let Kait labor on her own schedule. They continued to hound her. She just would not progress. She got to the point where she was essentially holding her legs shut and refused to do any hip-rocking or swaying or other moves that would allow her pelvis to open up and Freddy to move down farther. One nurse found she had the tiniest bit of cervix left but was completely dilated and not allowing her body to do the work for her.
At this point she was feeling everything and in such distress. She was pleading for a different nurse and for them to do something. She pleaded for a c-section. The nurses refused to give her any more medication because she was so close to being done and I'm glad they did that. I think Kait started pushing around 9am but started hyperventilating and pulling away from the contractions and our hands that were holding her feet. They put her on oxygen and she calmed down a little bit, but was still pulling away. She would push with each contraction and the nurses wanted 3 pushes with every one contraction. And Kait was just too exhausted. She would collapse after every push while the rest of us were egging her on, trying to coax her to push. Soon, it was apparent to everyone that she wouldn't or couldn't do it on her own. This is when they called in the doctor.
The first thing he asked was if she had an epidural. haha. He was quite surprised when we said no! He used a vacuum to help Kait get Freddy out. He pulled a little while Kait pushed. Frederick Harry Ceratt IV was born at 928am on Tuesday August 9th! Weighing 7 pounds 14.4 ounces and was 21 inches long.
Kait was in labor for about 30 hours and we were at the hospital for about 11 hours. She did not have to have an episiotomy and only had a small 1st degree tear internally that was quickly stitched up. Since the birth, Kait has taken no pain meds and is breastfeeding with minimal complications. Freddy was circumcised on his 2nd day and so far has had no complications.
Wow! That's amazing. Was she planning to not have an epidural beforehand? Thanks for telling such a great story!
ReplyDeleteshe was steadfast against an epidural and our family was sure she would 'wimp out', break down and get it. she also only had my nephew's and meghan's births to go on. my older sister and i were both induced and so the contractions were just crazy intense and painful.
ReplyDeletei am now totally against induction for silly reasons like being 38 weeks, baby being 'too big', obviously for medical reasons sometimes induction is necessary. i am all for letting the baby come when she/he is ready. i recently read a study (can't remember where, probably the Unnecesarean blog) about how when the baby is done growing, the lungs release a hormone that starts labor! i thought that was really amazing, as we are told babies are 'done' at 37 weeks and just gaining weight after that. they're gaining weight for a reason! :)
(unintentional rant ;D )