Lucky for us, the hospital is only one block away. We arrived at about 10:00 pm. At this point, although I was feeling contractions, I was still feeling pretty good. Instead of having Jeff drop me off, I told him to park and we could go in together. I didn’t want to be sitting there by myself, plus walking felt good. So we park and head on in. Since it was late there was a security guard outside the elevator with a sign that read “Check In” as it pointed to him. As we started to walk toward him he just said, “WOW, Keep Going!” We laughed and headed right up the elevator. Randomly one of my friends Dustin was standing outside the elevator, we said hi but obviously made our way up to labor and delivery.
By the time we got all checked in and to our room it was about 10:30. A nurse came in and got me all situated. Since my water never truly broke, they needed to test the fluid to make sure. First they did a little pH swab. Although the nurse was pretty sure it was amniotic fluid, it wasn’t 100% positive so they did another test where they let it dry and check it under a magnified glass. Apparently it has a very unique drying pattern. So they got some more and took it to the lab. Sure enough it was indeed, my water was leaking. I was there to stay!
At this point they strapped all the monitors to me, one to measure my contractions and the other to measure the baby’s heartbeat. It was pretty awesome to be able to hear his little heart the whole time. Watching the contractions was pretty neat as well. At this point my contractions were 3 minutes apart. I felt most of the pain in my back. We later confirmed that the little dude was face up or sunny side up as they call it which is why I was having back labor. Needless to say not fun. Sadly, I was still only dilated to a two which surprised me since the contractions were so close together. We knew we were in for a long night.
Jeff and I were pretty much just hanging out. We eventually flipped on the TV but of course in the middle of the night there is nothing good on. There was only one thing we forgot to bring to the hospital that I really wanted and that was a deck of cards. It really would have helped the time pass, but o-well. As midnight approached my exhaustion grew, and although I really was not in unbearable pain yet, I decided to get the Epidural. I knew that I was in for a long night, especially since I was only to a 2, and really wanted to be rested so I could have the energy to push the little guy out. So at about Midnight the anesthesiologist came in and gave me the shot. I was amazed at how quickly it began to work. At one point the nurse said, “You just had 2 big contractions, how were they?” I was shocked; I didn’t even feel a thing! I knew the Epidural would help but I didn’t know it would help that much. Modern medicine truly is a wonderful thing!
When an Epidural is given, you often lose feeling of your entire lower half. I was lucky enough to have had a great shot where I could still feel and control my legs which was nice. But since most of you is asleep, they give you a catheter for your urine. Once again, because of the epidural, I didn’t feel a thing and I hear catheters are usually really painful. One down side to the epidural is that you can only lie on your sides. This wasn’t too big of a deal for me, because I was the most comfy on my side anyway, but switching from one side to the other was pretty hard. I had to do this about every hour otherwise only one side of my body would be numb, but that wasn’t a big deal because I usually wanted to flip around that time anyway. The only side effect I had was immediately after the epidural, I was shaking like crazy. My whole body was practically convulsing. It was basically the shivers, but super intense and long lasting. It was so weird to be shivering, but not cold and there was really nothing I could do about it. They eventually wore down, but it was so weird. The nurse said it was very common and would mostly likely happen again after delivery.
Since my water never truly broke, they decided to come in and manually break it. I guess they usually wait longer, but because it was still intact it wasn’t allowing the baby to drop as low as they wanted. At one point, the nurse did an Ultrasound to make sure he was head down because she couldn’t tell. He was so content way up in my belly, so they decided to help him come down a bit. Soon the doctor came in and broke it and it did just what they were hoping, dropped in down. Hopefully now I would progress more.
By this point we had obviously told our families we were in the hospital. My parents decided to go straight to bed and to make the drive leaving at 4:00 am. Jeff told his brothers and best friend who all decided to join the party. We thought they weren’t going to come until the morning and were quite shocked when they walked in at about 2:00 am. Rick, Jason, (Jeff’s Borthers) Tyler and Rory (who came down from SLC) all came to hang out. Everyone I tell is surprised that we let them stay, but they are such good friends and they were so excited. I wasn’t about to kick them out. Plus it gave company to Jeff, which was good for him. They obviously left every time the nurse would come in to examine me but it would only take a couple of minutes. It was fun to have them there, but I must admit, it did prevent me from getting much rest. However, I really don’t think I would have been able to sleep anyway, I was too excited. It was so neat to see how excited they were for us as well. In fact, both Tyler and Rory took the next day off work, just so they could stay to meet the little guy. They are great friends!
My progression was pretty slow. I stayed at a 2 for the first couple of hours. It then jumped to a 4 and then to an 8. I was so excited and the nurse guessed that he would be in my arms by 9 at this rate. Unfortunately when I got to the 8, my body decided to stay there. It stayed there for a couple of hours in fact. Since I wasn’t progressing, the doctor decided to give me pitocine to help move things along. They said that my contractions were so frequent and so intense that it wasn’t giving my body enough time to rest between contractions which is when it dilates. By giving me the pitocine, it would regulate and basically slow down the contractions which should help me progress. So they hooked up another IV and on it came.
At some point between all these checks a few other things happened, unfortunately I don’t remember the timing. There were a couple of times when I was switching sides that it put stress on the baby. His heartbeat dropped almost in half a couple of times. It was sad and had me quite worried. The nurse gave me an oxygen mask to help me get more oxygen so he could get more oxygen. This seemed to help. They also decided to monitor him from the inside. The monitors on the tummy just weren’t cutting it, so they put a tub up me to get a better reading. They later did the same thing for my contractions. For some reason, the outside monitors were not picking it up accurately so they did it from the inside. None of this bothered me; I was just amazed at how many tubes there were coming out of me from so many different locations. I had my regular IV, the Epidural, the Catheter, the baby’s monitor, my contractions monitor, the pitocine, and the oxygen mask. Sounds like I would be uncomfortable, but it really didn’t bother me one bit.
Also, at one point the Epidural stopped working on one half of the body. It was pretty intense, especially because my contractions were so often (this was before they put me on the pitocine). I was just going to rough it out, but then I really just didn’t see the point. We called the anesthesiologist back in to fix the problem. I don’t know what he gave me this time, but it was much more intense and caused my legs to completely fall asleep. It was such a crazy thing! I honestly could not feel anything. At one point the nurse came in to check me and I was looking over at Jeff talking and when I looked back I found that she had lifted my leg and I had no idea! Such a weird thing! Another time I could tell something felt funny. I asked the guys what my legs were doing down there. They laughed and said one of my legs was falling off the bed. I asked them to help me put it back on. Although I was trying with all my might to lift it, it wasn’t even budging. Tyler kept lifting it up and it just kept falling right back off. It made us all laugh pretty hard. Again, such a weird feeling! Needless to say, it made me much more grateful for the amazing healthy body Heavenly Father has blessed me with. I cannot imagine feeling that way every day. I am so blessed!
Finally, after a couple of hours the pitocine did what they were hoping. They came in to check me and I was at a 9. WOO HOO!! Almost there! At this point it was 9:00 am, so the original nurse was wrong in her estimate that I would be holding him by this time, but I was still excited I finally made it past an 8. Before I knew it the doctor came in to check and said it was time to push! I could hardly believe it! We kicked the boys out and started prepping for the delivery!
By the time we got all checked in and to our room it was about 10:30. A nurse came in and got me all situated. Since my water never truly broke, they needed to test the fluid to make sure. First they did a little pH swab. Although the nurse was pretty sure it was amniotic fluid, it wasn’t 100% positive so they did another test where they let it dry and check it under a magnified glass. Apparently it has a very unique drying pattern. So they got some more and took it to the lab. Sure enough it was indeed, my water was leaking. I was there to stay!
At this point they strapped all the monitors to me, one to measure my contractions and the other to measure the baby’s heartbeat. It was pretty awesome to be able to hear his little heart the whole time. Watching the contractions was pretty neat as well. At this point my contractions were 3 minutes apart. I felt most of the pain in my back. We later confirmed that the little dude was face up or sunny side up as they call it which is why I was having back labor. Needless to say not fun. Sadly, I was still only dilated to a two which surprised me since the contractions were so close together. We knew we were in for a long night.
Jeff and I were pretty much just hanging out. We eventually flipped on the TV but of course in the middle of the night there is nothing good on. There was only one thing we forgot to bring to the hospital that I really wanted and that was a deck of cards. It really would have helped the time pass, but o-well. As midnight approached my exhaustion grew, and although I really was not in unbearable pain yet, I decided to get the Epidural. I knew that I was in for a long night, especially since I was only to a 2, and really wanted to be rested so I could have the energy to push the little guy out. So at about Midnight the anesthesiologist came in and gave me the shot. I was amazed at how quickly it began to work. At one point the nurse said, “You just had 2 big contractions, how were they?” I was shocked; I didn’t even feel a thing! I knew the Epidural would help but I didn’t know it would help that much. Modern medicine truly is a wonderful thing!
When an Epidural is given, you often lose feeling of your entire lower half. I was lucky enough to have had a great shot where I could still feel and control my legs which was nice. But since most of you is asleep, they give you a catheter for your urine. Once again, because of the epidural, I didn’t feel a thing and I hear catheters are usually really painful. One down side to the epidural is that you can only lie on your sides. This wasn’t too big of a deal for me, because I was the most comfy on my side anyway, but switching from one side to the other was pretty hard. I had to do this about every hour otherwise only one side of my body would be numb, but that wasn’t a big deal because I usually wanted to flip around that time anyway. The only side effect I had was immediately after the epidural, I was shaking like crazy. My whole body was practically convulsing. It was basically the shivers, but super intense and long lasting. It was so weird to be shivering, but not cold and there was really nothing I could do about it. They eventually wore down, but it was so weird. The nurse said it was very common and would mostly likely happen again after delivery.
Since my water never truly broke, they decided to come in and manually break it. I guess they usually wait longer, but because it was still intact it wasn’t allowing the baby to drop as low as they wanted. At one point, the nurse did an Ultrasound to make sure he was head down because she couldn’t tell. He was so content way up in my belly, so they decided to help him come down a bit. Soon the doctor came in and broke it and it did just what they were hoping, dropped in down. Hopefully now I would progress more.
By this point we had obviously told our families we were in the hospital. My parents decided to go straight to bed and to make the drive leaving at 4:00 am. Jeff told his brothers and best friend who all decided to join the party. We thought they weren’t going to come until the morning and were quite shocked when they walked in at about 2:00 am. Rick, Jason, (Jeff’s Borthers) Tyler and Rory (who came down from SLC) all came to hang out. Everyone I tell is surprised that we let them stay, but they are such good friends and they were so excited. I wasn’t about to kick them out. Plus it gave company to Jeff, which was good for him. They obviously left every time the nurse would come in to examine me but it would only take a couple of minutes. It was fun to have them there, but I must admit, it did prevent me from getting much rest. However, I really don’t think I would have been able to sleep anyway, I was too excited. It was so neat to see how excited they were for us as well. In fact, both Tyler and Rory took the next day off work, just so they could stay to meet the little guy. They are great friends!
My progression was pretty slow. I stayed at a 2 for the first couple of hours. It then jumped to a 4 and then to an 8. I was so excited and the nurse guessed that he would be in my arms by 9 at this rate. Unfortunately when I got to the 8, my body decided to stay there. It stayed there for a couple of hours in fact. Since I wasn’t progressing, the doctor decided to give me pitocine to help move things along. They said that my contractions were so frequent and so intense that it wasn’t giving my body enough time to rest between contractions which is when it dilates. By giving me the pitocine, it would regulate and basically slow down the contractions which should help me progress. So they hooked up another IV and on it came.
At some point between all these checks a few other things happened, unfortunately I don’t remember the timing. There were a couple of times when I was switching sides that it put stress on the baby. His heartbeat dropped almost in half a couple of times. It was sad and had me quite worried. The nurse gave me an oxygen mask to help me get more oxygen so he could get more oxygen. This seemed to help. They also decided to monitor him from the inside. The monitors on the tummy just weren’t cutting it, so they put a tub up me to get a better reading. They later did the same thing for my contractions. For some reason, the outside monitors were not picking it up accurately so they did it from the inside. None of this bothered me; I was just amazed at how many tubes there were coming out of me from so many different locations. I had my regular IV, the Epidural, the Catheter, the baby’s monitor, my contractions monitor, the pitocine, and the oxygen mask. Sounds like I would be uncomfortable, but it really didn’t bother me one bit.
Also, at one point the Epidural stopped working on one half of the body. It was pretty intense, especially because my contractions were so often (this was before they put me on the pitocine). I was just going to rough it out, but then I really just didn’t see the point. We called the anesthesiologist back in to fix the problem. I don’t know what he gave me this time, but it was much more intense and caused my legs to completely fall asleep. It was such a crazy thing! I honestly could not feel anything. At one point the nurse came in to check me and I was looking over at Jeff talking and when I looked back I found that she had lifted my leg and I had no idea! Such a weird thing! Another time I could tell something felt funny. I asked the guys what my legs were doing down there. They laughed and said one of my legs was falling off the bed. I asked them to help me put it back on. Although I was trying with all my might to lift it, it wasn’t even budging. Tyler kept lifting it up and it just kept falling right back off. It made us all laugh pretty hard. Again, such a weird feeling! Needless to say, it made me much more grateful for the amazing healthy body Heavenly Father has blessed me with. I cannot imagine feeling that way every day. I am so blessed!
Finally, after a couple of hours the pitocine did what they were hoping. They came in to check me and I was at a 9. WOO HOO!! Almost there! At this point it was 9:00 am, so the original nurse was wrong in her estimate that I would be holding him by this time, but I was still excited I finally made it past an 8. Before I knew it the doctor came in to check and said it was time to push! I could hardly believe it! We kicked the boys out and started prepping for the delivery!
Comments
I am so grateful for all the information ... the idea about to bring games etc. and about the epideral (I had no idea you'd have to lay on your side afterwords) and that it really does get rid of the pain! I am so grateful to know that :)
Did you guys tour the hospital before hand? I really want to and I know my first question is going to be "How soon after delivery can I take a shower?" This is something that is very important to me! :)
You are one amazing lady and congrats on your adorable son! Can't wait to meet him!