Labor and Delivery

Alright, so I'm finally ready to sit down (now that I can sit for a period of time on a chair without a pillow) and write our story. I'm not quite sure how much detail to put. My mom says women love to hear other women's labor stories, and so if you're a woman, continue. If you're a guy (although I don't know of any that read our blog) then maybe you'll want to close this and wait for other posts. :)

Jason and I getting ready to go into the maternity ward of Thunderbird Hospital.
You probably already knew that Jason and I are against inductions unless for medical reasons. Well, to cut a long story short, Henry was measuring VERY large (like 95 + percentile; a few weeks beyond where he should be) for a while. We went through extra ultrasounds in the 3rd trimester and all showed that he was HUGE! We prayed about it, studied about it, and decided that at 41 weeks, if he wasn't here yet, that we'd help him along to make sure that he and I would have a safe delivery. Our OB could do it on Friday (which was actually 41 weeks from conception). We went to the hospital to start the process at 12:30a.m.

By the time we got to the room (which was like the delivery suite for the hospital) it was about 1:30a.m. Linda, our first nurse, told me that they'd start me on pitocin and I said "What! Dr. Kotian said that you'd start with the porstoglandin gel and that if needed, they'd put me on pitocin." (My body was all ready to go-leaving out details-except that I was only 2cm dilated). So, she called my OB and got permission to do that. Somehow it was left out of the paperwork. Blah. Linda brought in 4 syringes with the gel saying that every couple hours or so she'd put more on. Well, there was no need. After one dose I started having intense contractions 5 min. apart. Then 4 min...oh my. Jason would look at the computer screen and say 'that was a good one' and such, because they were going off the screen. I wanted to kill him. Oh, the contractions started about 2a.m. Jason and I walked around once.

I had all this stuff hooked to me, so I had to wait to use the restroom until someone could come unhook me. UCK! A couple hours later, I was dilated to a 4 or 5 or something. I was in so much pain it was hard to pay attention. I had an IV put in (I don't remember when it was though). Some time around then, it's fuzzy now, the nurse told me that they were going to put me on pitocin because they could control that, whereas after the gel is in, it's in, and you can't control it. She was worried about causing stress to the baby. Apparently I didn't need all 4 of the gels-1 sent me right into hell. Man those hurt! She warned me that it would, and I squeezed Jason's hand good during it. She gave me some medicine to help take the edge off. What it did was make me so tired I konked out between each contraction-where I would wake back up trying to breathe through them. I surprised myself by doing a good job with the whole breathing and moaning thing to help with the pain. I wasn't sure if I'd be able to really control myself and do that. One contraction was so excruciating, and I'd been breathing through them for over 4 hours at that point (every 4-5 min. or whatever it was then) that I just started sobbing. It was like sob, breathe, sob, breathe...Poor Jason looked like he went into shock at that point. I've never seen him look at me like that before. After 2 more hours (it was now around 8 a.m.) a new nurse came in and told me that if I wanted the epidural, now was the best time to do it, because the lady that did them (can't think of what they're called) had many scheduled afterwards and so it was either now, or wait 3-4 hours. Yah, hard decision after having horrid contractions for 6 hours...hmm...YES! Give me the drugs! Anyway, I didn't actually yell that out-I was already wicked tired by this point. I am SO grateful for epidurals by the way. I'm glad that I didn't get one right away though.
The nurse said that it would take about 10 min. to kick in. Yah, 3 mintues later she asked about the pain scale of 'that contraction.' I replied "what contraction?" YES! And you should've seen it on the computer. It was a doosey! The rest of the day, I slept, talked with Jason and my Mom, read, etc...We'd look at the monitor and say things like, whoa-that was a big contraction! Dr. Kotian continued to come in and check on me and see how much I was dilated. Everything was progressing as it should. Because of the epidural, my legs felt like huge cement blocks and it was hard to rotate from side to side. What a strange feeling.
At 6p.m. I was ready to start pushing. And I did for an hour and 15 min. It's hard to push with an epidural. I could feel pressure, and I knew that I was pushing, but I couldn't really feel the pushing. The one nurse who helped with delivery, and in the end I was thankful for her, but during the process I wanted to kick her-if only my legs weren't so heavy. She kept saying "push harder, push harder." Oh my GOSH! I was giving it my all the ENTIRE time. It was really annoying. And I told her-as nicely as I could put it at the time. The pushing took longer than it might've if I didn't have a sensitive stomach during pregnancy and delivery as well. I kept having to throw up (just stomach acid at that point-and a lot of it). Speak about humiliating and degrating. It would run down my face, neck and hair. GROSS! So glad that's over. But! Finally he was almost out! I have to add this because those of you who've gone through it will remember it I'm sure and probably laugh about it now. The whole time the nurse/doctor keep saying "push, push, push." Then, when you want to puch most of all, when you baby is just one push away, they say, 'stop pushing.' "WHAT!!!?" Yah, the nurse and doctor got the bin ready and stuff super quick and I just starting yelling "Get him out, get him out." No epidural can stop that pain. Once his head was out, he slipped right through! Thank goodness he didn't get stuck like some doctors had thought he would.

Dr. Kotian (I think) placed him in my arms and there are so many emotions that went through me it is impossible to really portray them in writing. Jason and I were both crying just looking at our son. It is so amazing. At that point I couldn't feel the pain. I was holding our son and being held by my husband. Life is beautiful.