An update at long last

Tristan William

born on 10/22/09 at 3:32am

We had our final OB appt on Oct 19th. Due to the lack of dilation and effacement plus the gestational diabetes my OB decided to induce on Oct 21st since she was on call that evening. We were to report to the hospital at 7am.. I won't lie I got there at 7:20am. lol. After check in and the initial check up.. I sat around for almost 2 hours in my hospital room. I was still barely dilated and around 70% effaced. The doctor began a pitocin drip around 10am. I don't care what anyone tells you pitocin isn't fun and it doesn't make delivery easier. I was still progressing slowly with the pitocin and at my 12pm check I was only dilated at 1cm. The OB decided to break my water though, hoping to get things moving along at a faster rate. I was having regular contractions at this point, but I had been having them for days so it didn't feel like anything had really changed.

The day progressed... me eating lots of jell-o.. since pitocin means no solid foods and breaking my water meant I was officially in active labor. Around 3 or 4 pm the contraction picked up some. I convinced the nurses to let me out of the bed since my butt was numb. Being on an IV I could only go so far in the room. They found a birthing ball for me and I sat on it for awhile. Bran and I actually played a few hands on uno off and on during the afternoon. Around 6pm they came to check on me again or to deliver more food.. I don't remember. I do remember feeling cold, shivering and feeling nauseaous. We told the nurse and everyone thought things were progressing. About an hour later I started vomiting... fun times... The contractions were getting worse at this point and I was feeling the pain. I was determined to have a natural delivery though. The nurse kept talking to me about an epidural though. I still was only dilated around 2cm at this point. This was after about 9 hours on the pitocin and 7 hours after having my water broke. I convinced my evening nurse to let me walk to halls a bit... at the next check still no progress. I was having more and more pain at this point and the doctor was notified of the situation. The baby had dropped a little further at this point but not enough. I took a shower at some point to help with the contractions and to try to relax. Showering with an IV is interesting to say the least. It was mentioned more than once that if something didn't change then we might have to look at our options. An internal monitor was placed to check the strength of my contractions. It was possible that they weren't strong enough at this point and maybe this is why I wasn't dilating.

Around 9pm the doctor came in and checked my progress. Again little to no progress. A review of the internal monitor revealed I was having pretty strong contractions... probably the same strength as someone dilated at 8 cm and I only still at 2cm. The doctor recommended I have an epidural to relax my body and then maybe I would dilate. I refused, it was advised that if things continued as they were then a c-section might occur. My mother, husband, and the nurse both began earnestly trying to convince me to have the epidural. At this point the contractions were coming every few minutes and I was in a good amount of pain. I was getting tired and was emotional. My biggest fear was having a c-section... and it looked like it was going to happen. After awhile (an hour or so) I gave into having the epidural and honestly I was convinced this was the first step to having the c-section and was slightly hysterical probably.

They came in to do my epidural around 11:30pm. Honestly the epidural pain is what I remember the most. Having severe contractions and trying to remain still as some one sticks a large needle into your spine is not fun. Bran left the room at this point because he is also afraid of needles. Apparently I am one of the few lucky people that has nerves close to where the epidural goes. Every time they tried to place it they would hit a nerve.. this is when I began screaming. Bran came back into the room since the door had been left slightly opened to help keep me still. They tried to thread the epidural in the usual spots a few times with no luck... each time causing me severe pain and I couldn't move. Then they decided to try further up on my spine.. this meant getting stuck again. It was the same all over again. They placed the epidural eventually (after 30 minutes or so) but they weren't sure how well it would work since it wasn't every far done my spine. How well did it work... not well at all. It numbed only the right side of my pelvis/hip area. I could still feel every contraction on the left side. They tried a different medication again no luck. They had to consult someone and ended up giving me a medication that is giving during a c-section to stop the pain. The pain never completely went away but my body relaxed enough after getting the medication that the baby dropped a little bit more. Once he dropped (maybe 10-15 minutes after getting the epidural) the real fun began.

At this point my body did start dilating quickly but not quickly enough. My body naturally tried to push with each contraction. If you are not fully dilated and push then you can do damage to your body. I had to physically fight my own body not to push, I remember physically shaking with each contraction while trying not to push. The pain and pressure were severe. They attempted another medication for the pressure. Some where around 1:30/2am my epidural wore off. My nurse kept checking me at this point, she felt that if she left the room for any length of time then I would have the baby while she was gone. She wasn't too far off the mark. I became fully dilated around 2:30am. I only had to push for an hour before the baby was born. Honestly pushing does hurt. But it is a different type of pain... you know it will end after a little while. It also brings a relief to all the pressure. My OB was shocked at how quickly I dilated after the epidural. I was told later by the nurse that if I hadn't gotten the epidural it would have probably only been an hour or so before I would have had to have a c-section. She also told me that she had never seen some one's epidural not take like mine or someone have to fight their own body so much. Apparently the other nurses on the wing were watching the monitors at the nurses station and kept asking if I was pushing and were amazed that I wasn't. I also found out that my blood pressure was creeping up during all of this as well as my blood sugar levels. Tristan himself was born healthy with no glucose level concerns. He did have a pretty large bruise on his forehead from resting on my pelvis though. He did not have to go to the NICU once. When they moved us from our delivery room we actually saw our nurse from the previous morning. She was amazed when we told her what had happened. We found out later that my doctor was quite busy that day... there were 11 or 13 babies delivered on the wing in a 36 hour period. It was definetky an adventure, I wouldn't change one minute though since I now have a precious baby boy to show for it.