The Birth Story :
I should probably back up and say that throughout this pregnancy my stomach had been measuring a few weeks behind schedule. They had been doing regular ultrasounds to monitor the baby's growth and based on those measurements, the baby looked completely healthy but small. Three weeks pre-delivery, he was in the 45th percentile, then at two weeks out, he dropped to the 25th percentile, but they gave us no reason to worry or be concerned. On Wednesday, October 14th, I went in for my regular 37 week check up. Thankfully, Kyle was with me. They did another ultrasound and Baylor still looked good. I saw a different Doctor in the practice, and she examined me, told me I was probably 1cm dilated, then I thought she was going to send us home and tell us to come back in a week for another check up. Instead, she said that the baby had dropped down to the 10th percentile and based on the fact that he was no longer growing within the womb I was going probably have the baby that day or the next day. What? She said it just like that too, "so, you're probably going to have the baby today," like that was completely normal. Well, I started to hyperventilate because when you are only 37 weeks pregnant and they tell you that they need to get the baby out, without much explanation as to why, it can be a little disheartening. Kyle and I were both in shock when the Doctor told us to head down to labor and delivery so they could hook me and the baby up to the monitors and induce contractions to see if the baby could handle the stress of delivery. Huh? It was truly one of those moments when I felt completely out of control. When we got down to labor and delivery, the nurses must have sensed my stress and seemed to all at once ask me what was wrong and then proceed to tell me that it was going to be ok. I don't know about anyone else, but when I am on the verge of tears, the last thing I need is someone asking me what is wrong, it definitely released the flood gates. They took us back to a room where I was told to contract every 5 minutes, so they could monitor Baylor's heart rate. Now, I'm not going to go into how you make yourself have a contraction, but let me just say that it's not pleasant. While lying in the hospital bed, I had to call and cancel supper club that was supposed to be at my house that night and call families to let them know what was going on. It's not very easy to let people know what is going on and to calm nerves when you don't know what is going on either. Then I started thinking about all of the things that I hadn't done. Hill was at school, so we had to coordinate picking her up, I didn't have a car seat in the car, no bags packed for me or the baby, and countless other things that still stress me out to think about. After the contractions, the nurse came in and said that the baby had done great and my Dr. would be down to talk to me about the next steps. I don't know why, but I thought that since Baylor had done so well, we would be able to go home and they would just continue to monitor me closely until 40 weeks. When Dr. Goolsby got to the room, we finally got some answers. She basically explained that sometimes the baby stops growing/thriving within the womb. This can be because of several different reasons such as low amniotic fluid, blood pressure of the mother, uterine constrictions, etc. I didn't have any of those problems, but either way he wasn't growing and hadn't been for at least the past three weeks. She said that it would be best to get him out because whether or not he had to go to the NICU, he would have a better chance of growing outside of the womb. She also said that based on his stress test, she had no hesitation about him being able to handle a vaginal delivery, that was good news. She told us to officially check into L and D and they would begin induction that night. I began to cry again thinking about the things I needed to get done or had wanted to get done before checking into the hospital and she told me I could go home for a couple of hours to get my bags packed, but I needed to be back at the hospital by 8:00 that night. Such a relief to know that Kyle wasn't going to have to pack my bags for me ;-) As stressed out as I was about the situation, I was not ever worried about Baylor's health, because they gave me no reason to worry. I was just starting to pull it together when we got on the elevator and Kyle lost it! Apparently, he was extremely worried about Baylor's health and thought the Doctors weren't telling us something. He was letting himself think the absolute worst and all of his fears that had been pent up the whole pregnancy came pouring out. I think it probably helped calm me down to know that I needed to be the strong one for Kyle. I guess as out of control I felt in the situation, it must have been a million times harder for him not having a connection to the baby yet. My mom picked Hill up from school then headed over to our house to help get some things done. We had to clean the house, install the car seat, pack bags, go buy some preemie clothes, take showers, etc. The hardest thing was not being able to see Hill before we headed up to the hospital. I felt so guilty about not being able to explain the situation to her, not that she would have understood. When we got to the hospital that night, they hooked the monitors up to me and the baby, stuck me four times to get the IV in then inserted the Cervadil to help speed up the process. The plan was for the Dr. to come by about 8 am to break my water then give me some pitocin to make contractions speed up. Well, Baylor had his own little plan, and about 3 am I began having pretty intense contractions. I tried to re-situate in the bed at 5 am and "pop", my water broke. It was loud, I actually heard it. When the nurse came in to check me, I was 5 cm. Luckily she told me I was next in line to get an epidural. About 45 minutes and a lot of pain later, the anesthesiologist showed up. I felt instant relief in my left leg, my left side of my stomach and parts of my right leg, but as time went on and contractions got stronger, I realized that the epidural wasn't working right where it counts. The nurse checked me again and I was 8 cm. I was in a lot of pain and she wasn't sure if I got another epidural that it would have time to work. She gave me two epidural "boosts" instead and it didn't work, but boy was my left leg numb. I have complete respect for those who choose to go through labor naturally, but I also believe that is something that you have to prepare for, mentally and physically, and I had not. I was in so much pain and it was so centralized to a particular area that I thought I was going to die. I kept holding my breath and the nurse yelled at me and I about broke kyle's hand. The anesthesiologist came in to try inserting a different kind of medicine into the epidural. I didn't feel instant relief, so I was preparing myself to push through the pain. The nurse checked me again and I was 10cm. She called the Dr. down and told me to do a couple practice pushes before she got there. I had one more contraction before I began to push and the pain was gone!!! I couldn't believe it, I shouted "it's a miracle" like a cheese ball, but I was sooooo relieved. My thoughts and fears quickly switched over to the health of baby Baylor and a few pushes later, he was here. The Dr. laid him on my chest and I was real quick to tell the nurses to take him from me so they could check him and make sure everything was ok. I thought the room was going to be a lot more chaotic with them testing the baby, but everything was so calm. They weighed him in at 4 lb 15 oz and I kept waiting for them to rush him away to the NICU, but it never happened. He was perfect! When my placenta came out the Dr. told me that she knew why he hadn't been growing and asked me if I wanted to see. I told her no, but she showed me anyway. My placenta was half the size it should have been, so the baby wasn't getting adequate nutrition. She told me that they would send it off for testing, but they would most likely come back and say that they didn't have an explanation as to why my placenta was not growing. Very reassuring. The rest of our stay in the hospital was very uneventful. We are just so thankful to have a happy healthy baby that seems to be growing like a weed. I mean, he was already 5.1 lbs one week post delivery, he's huge ;-) Thank you so much to everyone for your kind words, prayers and help over these past few weeks!
More pictures to come...
