These past 10 days have flown by! We have been adjusting to our new life with the little one. Fortunate for us, she is the sweetest, most perfect baby I could ever ask for. She lets me sleep through the night, only waking me once or twice to eat, and she spends most the day sleeping or calmly looking around at her surroundings. Everyday for the first week we had tons of visitors. Johnny and I both come from very large families and then some of our closest friends stopped by too. This week we have decided to ask people to not come by so the three of us can bond as a family. On Monday of next week Johnny goes back to work. I am confident that I can take care of the baby on my own, but I do not look forward to Johnny going back to work. I have become so used to having him around and Myla and I will miss him a lot!
Like we all do, my little girl, Myla, has a birth story of her own. You can be told all the different things about having a baby but no birth story will be the same. And your birth story might be nothing like what you have been told or imagined. Everyone's body handles things differently. I did a lot of asking and researching on the internet to find out what a contraction felt like. I wanted to be ready when I had my first one. Friday July 20th, just as I crawled into bed around 11:30pm I felt a burning sensation in my thighs that lasted about a minute. Then about 15 minutes later it happened again. I thought, is this what a contraction is? I decided to just monitor it to see if it happened again, and sure enough if did. By the fourth time it happened, I woke my husband and told him that I thought I was having mild contractions and that hopefully we would have the baby the next day (I was already 10 days late with a planned induction date, and I really did not want to get induced.) A lot of people, including the doctors at the hospital find it strange that I felt my contractions in my thighs. As they intensified through out the night I did feel some in my back that radiated into my stomach. I wasn't able to sleep. With each new contraction I was awakened, and always felt the urge to pee and so I did. I started to record the contractions. At 2:00am I figured I should take a shower so I would be clean when the time came to go to the hospital. Then I packed any last minute items in the hospital bag, and did the dishes. By 4:30am the contractions were about 6 minutes apart. I woke Johnny up and told him that if he wanted to take a shower he had to do it now because we would have to leave for the hospital very soon.
While Johnny showered, I took Hershey outside to go to the bathroom and play catch. All night she seemed so sad, like she knew something was happening but wasn't sure what. She was worreid. Everytime I got up to go to the bathroom she followed me.
When Hershey and I were done playing catch, I called my Mom and told her that she should head over because I was about to call the Midwives, that my contractions were almost five minutes apart, lasting one minute each for about an hour (5-1-1). When I called the midwife it was 5:00am. She asked if I could still talk through my contractions and I said yes. I didn't find them painful at all, so I was hoping that by the time we got to the hospital that they didn't tell me that it was a false alarm. I was hoping that my water would break so that I had a clear indicator that I was truly in labor. By the time we got to the hospital it was 5:30am. I checked in and got sent to the evaluation room. This is when my contractions intensified.
Of course, I had to text everyone to let them know that I was at the hospital.
They hooked me up to the fetal heart monitor to monitor the babies heart rate and the contractions. My contractions were already 2 to 3 minutes apart. The nurse checked me to see how dilated I was. She said, "You're definitly having a baby! The head is really low and you're already 8cm and completely thinned! Let me go get a doctor." This led me to believe that she thought I was going to deliver the baby in the evaluation room. I started to panic. I knew I wanted an epidural so that I wouldn't feel as much pain when I was pushing but I was told that sometimes it is too late to get an epidural. I said to the nurse, "I can't have this baby now! I need an epidural first." and she just responded, "Hunny, you might not have enough time to get one." Panicking me is never a good idea. Because I was panicked and feeling stressed, I felt a lot more pain with each contraction and I began to pass out. This in turn made the nurses nervous because you can't really deliver a baby smoothly if you're passed out. They did a quick ultrasound and then transferred me to a wheelchair and brought me to a room where I could deliver my baby. Along the way I remember getting on and off of an elevator and people asking me questions but I wasn't responding to them, nor do I remember what they were asking me.
They transferred me from the wheelchair into the bed and within minutes the anesthesiologist (whose name happened to be Doctor Payne - how ironic) came in and gave me the epidural. I immediately felt better! I would recommend an epidural to anyone! I didn't even feel it.
The next few hours were kind of boring. Apparently the reason I progressed to 8cm so quickly was because I was dehydrated. When you get an epidural they hook you up to an IV. The IV rehydrated me and slowed the contractions down. We patiently waited for 6 hours until I could begin pushing. Johnny and my Mom watched T.V. and listened to their Ipods while I tried to rest. At one point they went out and got themselves breakfast sandwiches and coffee! How cruel, do you know how good that smelled, and how hungry I was, and all I could eat/drink was ice chips!
At about 11:30am was when I began to push. I pushed for 3 full hours before my little girl was born. I'm not lying when I say this, I felt no pain the entire time. About half way through I was even able to place a sushi order so that my Dad could bring it when he came to visit after the baby was born. Yes - that's what I said - SUSHI! I had been deprived from my favorite food for 9 months and that's all I wanted to eat. I was able to monitor my contractions because I felt a sensation (not pain) in my left buttcheek. Very strange, I know. Even the anesthesiologist found this commical. Since I felt no pain they claimed that I was the best candidate for an epidural . Although the contractions and pushing was not accompanied by pain, it was very tiresome pushing for such an extended period of time. The last two pushes was when I finally felt the pain, but it didn't last very long because seconds later at 2:26pm, I had this gorgeous little girl in my arms. I can't explain the feeling but it was one of the most amazing feelings in the world. I won't show you the picture of her when they first gave her to me. She was purple, and as you can imagine, I looked very unattractive. They let me hold her for a few minutes and then they took her to weigh her and clean her up.
I couldn't believe how alert Myla already was, she was staring at me as if she knew I was her mother. And I couldn't get over the look on Johnny's face as he held her in his arms for the first time.
He had really only held a baby once or twice before and it was never a newborn. He was instantly a natural and has become one of the Greatest Dad's. I appreciate all his help and the help of my mother during delivery.
