Labor and Delivery

I always enjoy hearing people's birth stories. They're always so different, and never cease to amaze me. Here's Aiden's story.

I was scheduled to be induced on May 24. The hospital wanted us there at 5:30am. Of course, I didn't sleep a wink the night before. Nerves, excitement, anticipation... kept me up all night. Mike came down with the same stomach bug I had, and was sick the entire day before. So, the night before the induction wasn't ideal.

My mother in law arrived at our house at 5am, as she was taking care of Addison the day of Aiden's birth. We left promptly, careful not to be late- we were excited and wanted to get this show on the road! When we got to the hospital, we waited for an hour and a half just to get to our room. SO annoying. Once we got up to our room, we waited ANOTHER hour to be seen by our nurse. I was not feeling great about how the day was going.

Good thing I was wrong. Once we did meet out nurse, Betsy, I LOVED her. She was awesome. She started the pitocin immediately. This was about 8:30, I believe. She took good care of Mike, too... made sure he had warm blankets, was comfortable she knew we needed our rest while we could get it! Mike was feeling better this day, thank goodness. A little queasy still, but not "sick" like the day before.

I had made it clear from the very beginning that I wanted an epidural. So, at 9:30, the anesthesiologist came in and gave it to me. I was about 4 cm at this point, and the contractions were still very manageable. They were definitely getting stronger, bot to be honest, receiving the epidural was the most painful part of labor. Wah, wah, I know.

My doctor came in to break my water at about 9:30. She said she predicted that I would be delivering around 1pm. I was about 4.5 cm dilated and 80% effaced at this point.

We had a couple of episodes where Aiden's heart rate dropped pretty low with contractions, so the nurse kept coming in and switching me from side to side. This was, for me, a mortifying experience. When you have an epidural, and have no feeling in your lower half, you are of no assistance to the nurses trying to move you. I felt like a WHALE. Dead weight. Huge. Gross. Fat. You get the picture. I had to have an oxygen mask at times, too, so I really felt glamorous.

My nurse was on lunch, and a fill-in nurse, Tina, was taking care of me, and didn't want to check my progress, she said she'd leave that to Betsy. Looking back that's pretty annoying, but at the time I wasn't annoyed at all... I understood. (side note: Tina was my nurse the Friday before, when I was in the hospital with the stomach bug!)

Well, when Betsy came back from lunch, she had a delivery in another room, so my nurse was forced to check me at this point. And to everyone's surprise, I was crowning. Ready to deliver!

She stopped my pitocin, called my doctor, and we found out that my doctor was in surgery across the street. "Can she wait 30 minutes?" My nurse laughed and said "no!". "15 minutes?" I said I wasn't feeling a HUGE urge to push, so agreed. The ER OB came into the room, just in case, and we got totally prepped to deliver. Stopping the pitocin stalled things, and Aiden took 2 steps back, so to speak... he wasn't crowning anymore.

My doctor made it over, I pushed 3 times within one contraction, once in between contractions, and then one more time with the next contraction and there he was! At 1:34pm, I delivered my beautiful baby boy. Mike of course was there, and I looked over at him and he had tears in his eyes. Not thinking, I asked him "what's wrong?" I was worried that something was wrong! He just shook his head and said, "it's amazing".

So, for such a breeze of a labor and delivery, here's where the story gets sticky. Turns out Aiden's cord was wrapped around his neck, (which I don't think Mike even noticed). So they laid him on my tummy for maybe 10 seconds before grabbing him back and taking him to his warming table to "shock" him into breathing on his own.

At this point, one doctor came in after another to help with Aiden. No one was talking. They all had quite serious looks on their faces, and you could tell they each served a purpose, had a job, and were there to do it. I was delivering my placenta, and getting my stitches, and crying... asking "what's going on? Is he ok? What's happening???" I would get affirmation that things were ok, but never more than that. At one point I looked over and they had a long skinny tube down his throat. We still hadn't heard him cry. My doctor explained to me that he swallowed some amniotic fluid... this was normal, especially in babies who had their cord wrapped around their neck. I swear, this all lasted for at least 10 minutes. At least. And there were at least 8 people around him. And then we FINALLY heard the sweetest sound in the world- our baby's first cry.

One at a time, the doctors who were working on Aiden left the room, and finally it was just me, Mike, our doctor and our nurse again. They gave Aiden to me, and of course, this was one of the best moments of my life. My tears of concern and worry turned into tears of joy. No one can describe this moment if they haven't experienced it themselves. Amazing.

Pictures of family holding Aiden for the first time coming soon. I need a nap. Aiden and Addison are both asleep right now, so I'm taking advantage.