February 19, 2004
At the risk of repeating myself... you'll never guess what happened to me this week.
At my last doctor's appointment on Friday, we discussed our options. My OB was actually relatively supportive of my desire to wait it out as long as possible to try to go into labor naturally, instead of inducing or sectioning early, which was nice. I was 2 centimeters dilated, so things were happening, but I wasn't very effaced, and he told me that if nothing had changed by the next week's appointment, when I'd be 40 weeks, we'd need to talk about doing a repeat section, or possibly an induction, if my cervix looked favorable. He sounded pretty reluctant to do an induction, though, because of my prior Cesarean, which is understandable.
I briefly considered trying home induction methods, like breast stimulation and evening primrose oil and that kind of thing, but ultimately decided against it. I tried that with Zeke, and my water broke early, and he wound up arriving at 38 weeks with signs of prematurity. I decided I'd rather have a C-section with a full-term baby than do an induction to have the baby earlier than it should have arrived. So, we waited.
Saturday, my mom and sister took me out shopping, with the idea that maybe a lot of walking around would help the baby get into position. It was tiring, and I was pretty wiped out at the end of the day, but there were no signs of any serious contractions. Then I woke up at 6 AM on Sunday morning -- extremely unusual for me, as it would normally take an earthquake to roll me out of bed before 8 on a weekend -- feeling weird and uncomfortable, and realized I was having regular contractions. I was cautiously optimistic, but decided not to get too excited, as they were only 12-20 minutes apart, and not extremely regular.
I was hopeful that Sunday would be the day. We made sure the hospital bag was ready to go, and I took it easy for most of the day, in between finishing up Keith's birthday lime mousse (requested in lieu of birthday cake) and reading stories to Zeke. But the contractions never got any closer together, so I went to bed and tried to get some sleep.
After a fitful and very uncomfortable night, I woke up at 6 AM again, and this time the contractions were 6-8 minutes apart and getting stronger. Maybe this is it, I thought. By mid-morning I was having to do relaxation exercises to breathe through some of the contractions, so we decided to head for Columbus and my sister's apartment. We live 90 minutes from the hospital and she lives 20 minutes away, so our plan was to spend early labor at her place, in case things started to progress quickly.
The trip to Columbus was less miserable than I'd thought it might be. The vibration of the car actually seemed to help ease the contractions, which surprised me. We got there a little ahead of my sister, so we walked around the apartment complex for a few minutes, which also helped with the contractions. Keith and I also practiced the "slow-dancing" labor support position, where I leaned against him and he supported me through contractions. It really seemed to help a lot.
We spent most of the day watching "I Love the 80s" on VH1 and occasionally getting up and moving around to labor in different positions. We also tried a hot shower at one point, which was relaxing while it lasted. I'd told my sister at 1:30 PM before she left for work that we'd probably be gone before her husband got home at 5, because I felt the contractions were getting a lot more painful and close together. Except, 5 PM came and they were still 6-7 minutes apart. I continued to labor. Around 7, Keith suggested a walk, and we walked around the complex a little more, with the hopes that it would make things progress a little further. A run to Wendy's was made by my sister and brother-in-law, although I didn't eat anything, having by now completely lost my appetite.
At about 8, I told Keith that even though the contractions didn't seem to be getting closer together and I'd originally wanted to wait until they were 3 minutes apart or closer before going to the hospital, I wanted to go to the hospital anyway. I didn't want to go through another sleepless night suffering through contractions, and I just felt like it was time. I guess I must have intuitively felt that something was changing, though, because in the car on the way to the hospital, the contractions started coming about 3 minutes apart, which I think signalled the beginning of true active labor.
At the hospital, they checked me and discovered that I was already 5 cm dilated and completely effaced. This was almost as far as I ever made it with Zeke, and I'd done it all on my own before even arriving at the hospital. I felt very optimistic about this. The resident on staff recommended getting an epidural, because I was VBAC (vaginal birth after Cesarean) and they like to have an epidural in place in case they need to do an emergency C-section if, for example, the uterus wall starts to rupture. I could have turned them down, but by this time, I hadn't had any good sleep for a couple of days, I was exhausted after two days of laboring, and I just wanted some relief, so I told them to go ahead and run one.
First we got moved to the labor and delivery room, though. Somewhat disappointingly, the labor and delivery nurse told us we couldn't use the shower because they wanted to keep me on the fetal monitor. During the hospital tour they'd told us that there were wireless monitors in case we wanted to walk around or shower during labor, so I think the L&D nurse was feeding us a bunch of BS in order to make her job easier, but since I'd already requested an epidural, I let it drop. I did, however, refuse to lie back in bed like she kept asking me to. Sitting on the edge of the bed felt a lot better to me, so that's what I did. She was really an incredibly bad L&D nurse and seemed a lot more interested in following her procedures and filling out paperwork than in actually assisting with my labor. But, Keith was there and did a fantastic job of supporting me, so it was not that big a deal.
Once the epidural was in, I obviously felt a lot better and was able to relax, although I didn't go to sleep. Through the previous couple of days I'd noticed that when I napped or slept, the contractions got further apart, almost like my body was trying to give me a break, and I didn't want that to happen this time, so I stayed awake. I was very worried that the epidural would slow my labor, but fortunately it had no effect on the frequency or strength of contractions. Also, I could still feel the contractions as hard pressure. They were a little uncomfortable, but the sharp edge had been taken off. It was a perfect epidural in that respect.
After a few hours, I'd progressed to 6 cm, where I stalled out (so to speak) for the next few hours. The resident suggested breaking my water manually, as it still hadn't broken on my own, and I said I thought that was a great idea. So she broke my water, and told me we'd wait another couple of hours and if I still hadn't made progress, they'd consider a very light dose of Pitocin. But she said she was optimistic that I'd progress, as my cervix was very "thin and floppy" (nice mental image, hey?) and I'd been progressing well to that point. Sure enough, the next time they checked me an hour and a half later, I was at 7 cm and the contractions were getting even stronger.
It was now that I expected on some level for labor to stall and stop progressing, because that's what happened with Zeke. With him, I dilated to 6 cm, but he never descended into the birth canal. So when the resident announced that the baby had made it to -1 station and was starting to engage in the pelvis, I honestly couldn't believe it. It was at this point that I started to really think that maybe I would actually be delivering this baby vaginally.
Another few hours of labor, and lo and behold, I'd made it to 10 cm and was fully dilated. After a brief pause of maybe 15 minutes or so, it was time to start pushing. I had no idea what to do. I felt the urge to push even through the epidural, but until the L&D staff told me how I should be pushing, I was pushing in a really unproductive way. So I'm glad they were there to help out, or this part of labor would have taken a lot longer. I pushed, which wasn't excruciatingly painful thanks to the epidural, but was very uncomfortable and disconcerting, almost scary, until the baby's head was crowning. At this point I was saying things like, "I can't do this!" and the staff was reassuring me that yes, I could, and Keith told me that the baby was almost out, that he could see the head, and it had lots of hair. After he told me that, I felt recharged and a lot more focused, and started the final few pushes. It was right at exactly this point that the L&D staff told me to wait, because my OB hadn't arrived yet. I was like, "What, you mean he hasn't arrived on this floor?" They said, no, he hadn't arrived at the hospital. I told them there was no way I was waiting, and there was a flurry of movement as people started donning scrub suits. About 30 seconds later, I was pushing Anastazia out into the world. It was honestly the most bizarre and yet gratifying sensation I have ever felt, ever, bar none. Afterward I couldn't believe it was over. They held my squirmy bloody little baby up to me, and I touched her head, and then Keith went over with her while she had what I think was her first blood sugar check. (Babies of diabetic moms are at risk for having low blood sugar after they're born.)
Her blood sugar was just fine, and stayed that way, although they did continue to check it regularly for the next day or so, and she turned out to weigh 8 pounds, 9 ounces. So much for my prediction that she was going to be much smaller than Zeke, who weighed 8 lb even. She was the same length as he was, as well -- 21 inches. So I have no idea why I measured so far ahead during my pregnancy with him but not with her. Maybe they put the weight on differently. I don't know.
After the delivery, they did take her to the nursery for observation for a couple of hours, but as it turned out, that was just as well. When I got out of bed to get into the wheelchair for transport to the postpartum recovery room, I suddenly felt nauseated and like I was going to black out. I started to lose my hearing and vision, and stumbled back into bed (against the directive of the incredibly bad L&D nurse, who wanted me to wait until she'd changed the mattress pad). I promptly threw up all the ice chips I'd eaten over the course of the previous 12 hours, and then slept for the next couple of hours. When I woke up, there had been a shift change, thank God, and the new L&D nurse tried to help me back into the wheelchair, where I nearly threw up again. Back into the bed, and this time they brought a gurney so that I could be transported in a lying-down position.
In the postpartum room, they brought Stazi to me and we nursed for the first time. She is so much better at it than Zeke was. I had so many problems with his latch, and wound up using a nipple shield to help for the first few weeks, and it was just a huge nightmare. With her, it's easy as can be. Part of it is probably that I have some experience this time around, but I think part of it is that she's just naturally better at it, because she's full-term and also possibly because even though I had an epidural, she still got less drugs than Zeke did with my C-section anesthesia. So that was a very pleasant surprise.
I was thrilled to discover how easy recovery was after a normal delivery. After the first 12 hours or so, I was up and about and going to the bathroom by myself and laughing and coughing and doing all those things you just can't do normally after a C-section. I could turn over in bed without worrying about re-opening my incision. I could walk with no pain. It was fantastic.
I do have a lot of soreness from where I tore during the delivery. Stazi came out with her hand beside her head, which caused a pretty significant tear, so I do have some stitches, but even so, this recovery has been a million times better. I mean, we were able to come home from the hospital less than 48 hours after delivery. They did want to keep Stazi there for the full 48, to continue to monitor her blood sugars, but my feeling was that they'd been checking her blood sugar every 4 hours since delivery, she hadn't had a single low one, breastfeeding was going fine so she was obviously getting nutrition, and I was sick of being in the hospital. I swear, someone was coming in our room every 20 minutes to check my vital signs or have us sign some paperwork or ask us health history questions, and all I wanted to do was sleep. I was also very sick of the nurses wanting to take Stazi out of the room every four hours for a blood sugar check. So we came home, after a brief argument with the on-call pediatrician.
Stazi has been an absolute joy so far. She barely ever cries, and she has these wide bright eyes that are so adorable to look at. We think she looks a lot like my grandma who passed away a few years ago, which was surprising and yet welcome. She looks a little like Zeke, but she isn't nearly as close to him in looks as we were expecting. She has long fingernails, and extremely wrinkly skin. The insides of her hands are red and shiny and almost scaly-looking, but very soft to the touch. She likes being bundled up tight a lot more than Zeke ever did, and she doesn't mind having bare feet. She's kicked her socks off at least three times now, which is a lot of times, for a baby that only came into the world two days ago.
Zeke is entranced with the new baby. He keeps wanting to come over and stroke her head and pat her face. Last night he was doing this, and looked up at us and said, "Baby! ...Mine!" I think he thinks he's her third parent.
He's still in daycare, so luckily I only have a newborn to watch during the day, and not a newborn and a toddler. I'm feeling pretty good, but still, I'm not going to be running any marathons anytime soon. Also, Keith's approval for substitute teaching apparently came through this week, as he received three separate calls to come in to school districts this morning. He took the first call, so he's off at his very first day of substituting right now. I am excited to find out how it went.
More to report later, I am sure. In the meantime, I have a newborn to feed!