So here's how the events unfolded to bring us our sweet "little" girl.
We were scheduled to go to the hospital on Thrusday evening to start the induction process. Josh and I grabbed some food, and took our last drive as a family of 2. We needed to kill some time because we couldn't just sit at home and wait.
We got to the hospital a little early, and sat downstairs...waiting some more. Finally, we went upstairs to get checked in. They asked me a bazillion questions, Josh went and got all of our stuff, and then came the IV. I warned the nurse that I don't do so well with needles, so it was best to leave me lying down. She had to dig a little to try to get to the vein. After what felt to be about 5 - 10 minutes of trying she said she was going to bring the anesthesiologist in to do it because she was good, and was still having a hard time. So the anesthesiologist came in and numbed my arm and then put the IV in. I think that was probably the worst part of the whole thing! Well, minus the contractions...more on that later. By the time the whole IV thing was over, I was a little woozy, so they had to get a cold compress so bring my color back. I tried telling them I didn't do well with that stuff :)
After the IV they gave me Cervidil, which was supposed to be the precursor to the Pitocin. I was supposed to get the Pitocin 12 hours after the Cervidil. Anyway, the nurse who gave it to me said that it most likely would not send me in to labor, but may give me some contractions. It definitely gave me contractions! I got the Cervidil at about 7:30 or 8:00pm. I started feeling the contractions within the hour. That nurse also told me to order something to eat because this was going to be a long process and I wouldn't be allowed to have anything to eat, except clear stuff after I went into labor.
The nurses switched shifts, so I got a new nurse. She told me that if I wanted she could give me some Nubane and Ambien which wouldn't completely stop the pain, but may make it manageable so that I could rest. I told her I would try to hold out. I didn't want to be loopy or make the baby sleepy, which I had read that stuff would do. At about 11:30pm, after talking to Josh and him letting me know that if I was feeling this bad all night, it was going to be a long night, so we called the nurse in to give me the medicine. She said I could have the Nubane every 2 hours. When she gave it to me, she had to check to see how far along I was. I was only at 1-2cm. So she gave it to me and I was able to rest for a little while, maybe an hour, because the 2nd hour I was breathing through the contractions. By the time the 2nd hour was up I asked her to bring me some more. She came back in and said she needed to check me again before giving it to me. At that time she said I was about 3cm and she could feel the bag of waters. I told her I needed to pee before I took more medicine. I went in to pee, got up to wash my hands and felt like I had to pee again, so I went back to the toilet. Before I made it to the toilet I thought I had peed and though I missed the toilet. I looked down and yelled out to the nurse that I thought my water broke. I sat on the toilet and then started to feel really bad. The contractions changed suddenly and I yelled to her that I thought I was going to be sick. And I was. So all the food I ordered before came back :) This all happened at about 2:30am. Also, there was a full moon at 2:39am. Josh called both of our mom's to let them know. Cindi came on up. Mom stayed back because we thought there was still some time. At about 3:30am Josh called my mom and told her she had better come up. So she got in the shower and started coming up around 4:30am.
At that point she asked if I wanted an epidural, and I said yes. She said I had to get a bag of IV fluid 1st because epidurals make your blood pressure drop. It took about 45minutes to an hour for the fluid to drain. During that time the contractions just kept getting worse. I was doing my best to breathe through them. She had already called the anesthesiologist, and wanted to check me again before he came in. I asked her what her guess was on how far I was. She said she though 6cm. I told her I was hoping that but figured I'd only be 5cm. She checked and I was 8cm!! At that point, she went to check to see where the anesthesiologist was. By the time he got there, my contractions were HORRIBLE! The nurse asked me what my pain level was...I told her a 7. In between contractions, I told her I didn't know what I was saying then, it is definitely a 10! I had never felt anything like that before. They told me to sit on the side of the bed. The nurse was in front of me trying to keep me calm and breathing. At one point, I told her I wasn't feeling well. I think I then burped and Josh said she kinda jumped because she thought I was going to get sick again. Before the anesthsiologist stuck me I told the nurse I felt like I needed to push. She asked if I felt that every time, I told her every other. She asked the anesthsiologist if he wanted her to check me...he must have said no because he just kept going. I know you're not supposed to scream because that is not productive, but I was pretty much yelling, like crying without the tears. They wanted me to sit still, but it hurt so bad that I was jumping out of the bed. Josh was having a hard time because he could see how much pain I was in. He just wanted them to hurry up and get the epidural going. The anesthsiologist was finally able to get the epidural in, and I was so greatful. I told him how wonderful he was!
After that it was kind of a breeze! :) The nurse told me she didn't want me to push yet because she wanted the contractions to do more of the work for me, otherwise I'd be pushing for 2-3 hours. So we waited a little longer. I think around 5:45am she told me I could start pushing. She told me I had to do a good job at pushing because the doctor doesn't like to get there until I am 15 minutes from delivering. So I was doing my best. I could tell when I was doing a good job by the facial expression on the nurse.
Now, during the whole pregnancy Josh said he wasn't looking below the belly. He didn't want to see any of that. I had no problems with that, I didn't really want to see either. Well, when I started pushing the nurse said she could see the head and there was a lot of hair. She asked Josh if he wanted to see all the hair, and he told her no. She said, "Really?". So at that point, Josh decided to take a look. She asked if I wanted to look, and I said I was good. After that, all plans changed. Josh was busy holding one of my legs while I pushed. Those legs are heavy! :)
During the pushing they had me do 3 counts of 10. At some point it went to 4 counts. Josh was getting a little frustrated again because when they were counting to 10 they started to slow the counting down. Josh was concerned cause I wasn't breathing during that time, I of course, had to hold my breath. There was only one time that I stopped pushing in the middle of their count of 10. It was burning, so I stopped, they urged me to keep pushing and push through it. Blah!
By 6:36am we had our little girl! When she came out I was waiting for someone to tell me if the baby was a boy or girl. I was looking at the doctor, the nurse, Josh...no one was saying anything! I don't think Josh could see. I looked down and the umbilical cord was in between her legs and I couldn't see. The doctor finally put her on my belly and I could see that she was a little girl! I yelled it to Josh and told her we had our Aurora!
I got to hold her a little before they took her to check her out. When they took her I told Josh to go talk to her because she was calm on me but when they took her, she was upset. So I wanted Josh to go talk to her so that she would have a familiar voice. He went over there and just stared. I had to tell him a few times to talk to her. He later told me that he didn't know what to do...he was kind of scared of her. He finally snapped out of it and started talking to her.
That's the long story of how our Aurora Cecele made her appearance!
