At 3:30pm, my water hadn't broke on it's own yet, so...the doctor decided to break it.
We did not want to have to do that, but we agreed that it was the best decision at this point. Graysen, who is already stubborn with a mind of his own...(wonder where he gets that)...did not want to come as quickly as he seemed to in the beginning. The doctor was certain that after he broke me water, things would move very quickly and we would not need the aide of Petocin, a very nasty drug that starts extremely strong contractions, but blocks all endorphins so that you have no way for your body to cope with the pain.
This was great news as we really wanted to try to have a natural childbirth with no drugs.
From that point on, we did everything we could to get this labor going. Juanita, our Doula, was amazing. She is a God Sent! The three of us walked the halls, used the ball and tried different positions on the bed, which to start contractions. I'm not sure if I mentioned before, but I was Group B positive so every 4 hours, I had to have antibiotics, so I was hooked up to an IV as soon as we were admitted into the hospital, which made doing different positions difficult sometimes. When the IV wasn't dripping, it was locked and plugged so that I didn't have to drag what would later be my best friend around with me as we walked the halls.
The doctor came in around 5pm to check me again and I was now dilated to 7 and 80% effaced. He said, "Well, you are at a 7 but I can stretch you to whatever I want! You have a very stretchy cervix!" Thanks I think! :/
Contractions on the monitor showed that they were coming more regularly and stronger, but my cervix did not want to dilate past 7 or 8! What went so fast in the beginning, was now starting to stall!
We decided to try to use the shower to stimulate contractions. I sat on the birthing ball in the shower and let the water run over me. This really helped! Contractions started coming one right after the other. Nausea started to set in around 6:30pm. Juanita gave me a SeaBand to wear on my wrist. It helped a little, but the contractions were coming stronger than ever. I dropped to my knees in the shower to try to cope with the contractions as they came. I got out of the shower around 7:30pm...I think! Time was obsolete.
From 7:30-8:30pm, I started throwing up and convulsing. The monitor was picking up many strong, close contractions. YAY! The doctor was sure that pushing was close or here. He checked me and sure enough...I was 100% effaced! BUT....still only dilated to 8cm. Yes, he could stretch me to past 10cm, but that wasn't good enough.
The doctor looked at me and said, "I know you don't want to have an epidural, but we need to start Petocin to push your cervix to the max and it could be hours. (It was 9:00pm at this point.) I was so torn and distressed over the fact. I absolutely did not want to use Petocin, which has been called "The Devil" by even some of the staff. Tim and the doctor convinced me that an epidural was probably the best thing to do since I needed to keep my strength up for pushing and hours more of labor would be very exhausting. If I was close to pushing, or ready to push, I would have refused and dealt with it. I relentlessly agreed...I was tired and ready for it to be over. So at 9:10pm, they called the anesthesiologist.
She arrived at 9:30pm. She was a gruff, Russian lady who was all business! My contractions were making me convulse and throw up still as she made me sit perfectly still on the side of the bed. Tim sat in front of me on a chair, holding me as I gripped the pillow to keep from convulsing too bad as she inserted the catheter into my back. It seemed like an eternity as I sat there, trying not to vomit all over my husband. She said I would feel a "funny bone" feeling shoot threw my legs. She was right. She adjusted the catheter and taped it into place. I laid down, which was not an effective way to deal with the pain of the contractions, which were still coming very strong, until the epidural kicked in. She handed me a clicker that I was able to use every 9 minutes to administer more pain medication. They inserted the Petocin into my IV and we were ready to rock and roll! Unfortunately, the Petocin kicked in before the epidural.
Finally, the epidural kicked in and I no longer felt the contractions. I did however, still feel pain in my upper abdomen and was still very nauseas. (For the last couple months, I had had a very sharp pain in my upper left side of my uterus/stomach, which the doctor attributed to the baby's foot being lodged up by my ribs. We'll later discover that that was not the case...) I think I dozed off. I obviously did because before I knew it, it was midnight and the doctor was in to check me again. FINALLY! I was at 9cm with only a little cervix left! At 1:00am I was ready to push!
Pushing went well...until...the monitor started showing his heart rate dropping to 80 every time I pushed. (His should be almost twice that high.) They were sure he was under distress. The doctor came in and they told me I had to delay pushing and just breathe through the contractions, which were hard to feel coming on, so that they could check the baby. After an hour or so of delaying pushing, they realized that every time I pushed, the monitor was slipping and picking up my heart rate!!! UGH!!! What could have been an hour or less of pushing ended up being two hours! I used a mirror that my wonderful nurse Jenny held while I was pushing to see what was going on since I didn't have a lot of feeling. I could feel the pressure, but not necessarily the pushing. I could however still feel that pain in my upper abdomen every time I pushed. I remember telling Tim, "My stomach hurts so bad!!! Something feels wrong!"
I could see his dark hair crowning and knew I had to give it all I had. His head was out and the doctor told me to once again hold off on pushing so that he could clean out his mouth etc. Then I got the best news...PUSH! It felt so good to push him out! It was like a slimy relief!
He instantly started crying and was wrapped up to be put skin to skin with me!
Everything was supposed to be rainbows and sunshine right?? I had my brand new baby boy on my chest and delivery was over! WRONG!
That's when the pain really started! The pain in my abdomen and pelvis was worse than any of the labor and delivery and I had an epidural that was supposed to block that pain. What was going on?? I was supposed to be delivering my placenta and be done! I looked down and the doctor was still "working" between my legs. He was up to his shoulder inside of me and his other hand was pushing very vigorously on my abdomen. Something was definitely not right.
Tim remembers hearing the doctor say, "Uh oh...!" and that's when the blood shot everywhere! This may seem over dramatic to say that it shot every where, but he clipped something and yes...it SHOT EVERYWHERE! Tim said he was standing in pools of my blood!
The doctor said, "We need to get her to the O.R. now! This is very serious! Your placenta has abnormally attached to your uterus and I had to manually remove it. As I was doing that, your uterus started coming out with it, pulling inside out." It was at this point that I started to black out and I could hear the beeping of the monitor start going crazy. I was instantly thrown upside down in my bed and the baby was whisked away!
I then remember the doctor slapping me across the face and telling me, "Stay with me! I'm not going to lose you! If I have to take your uterus I will! You are losing a lot of blood and I'm not sure if there is a perforation. You may be bleeding internally." I looked at him, well, the black outline that was him, and said, "Take it...take it all! It hurts so bad!!" In an instant, I was racing down the hall. I started throwing up and had to turn my head and throw up off to the side, which was all over my hair and the nurse next to me. I did not care at this moment. I was in so much pain and was so scared!
I was suddenly in a very bright room with many many people. The doctor had called in the other doctor on call in to assist him. They threw me onto the O.R. table and when I looked back at my bed, thought, "It looks like someone just gutted a deer on my bed!"
Part 3 coming soon...
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