Thursday, October 29, 2009

Brody's Birth Story:

It Begins...
So it started on June 3rd 2009 (well technically, it started a week before when the first amnio sent me into pre-term labor, which they were able to stop, after a 2 night stay in l&d) I woke up, went to work, and generally did not feel right all day. I was nauseous while working with patients and decided to call it a day. I chalked it up to being nervous about my amniocentesis I had scheduled for later on in the afternoon. So I got home, Corey and I ate lunch, hung out outside, and I started to feel better. I got in the shower and got dressed. I was about to leave for my 3pm appt and noticed that my underwear was wetter than usual, and I was worried that I was leaking amniotic fluid, so I went to go check, and it was nothing out of the ordinary for what is normal for a woman in their third tri (or so I thought!). I kissed Corey good-bye, wishing he could come with me (he had to work at 4pm - he worked 4-1am that week) and headed out. I got to my appt and they did the preliminary ultrasound to find a good place to preform the amnio and noticed that my fluid level was way down. The week before it had been at a 10.1 and now was at a 4.8. The doctor got concerned and said he had to do an internal to determine if I was leaking fluid. I was freaking out by this point. He came in did the test and immediately said, yep, + for amniotic fluid. Your not going anywhere tonight, your having a baby.
So I called my husband and told him not to go to work after all and to get to the hospital, my bag of waters had ruptured and I had a slow leak. He was so excited to finally meet our little man, he let out a whooooop! of excitement that the nurse taking notes could hear him through the phone. This all happened between 3 and 3:30pm.
I got admitted to labor and delivery and they started the pitocin drip, an insulin drip, D5 for sugar replacement(since I could no longer eat), antibiotics, and saline drip.
I am going to skip all the details, because there is just too much going on between now and 24 hours later, but I was contracting every 2 minutes, some more painful than others, but consistently getting longer and getting stronger as they increased the pitocin. I labored all through the night, no sleep, because I could not sleep through the contractions (or my hubbys and moms snores from the pull out bed and recliner a few feet away). I was not getting the epi, because I had not made much progress, and I wanted to walk to progress things. But when I did walk the monitors would move and they could not monitor Brody, so I got confined to bed anyways. I really wanted to go natural. But with the induction and pitocin I knew that it may not go as I planned. The problem was that when they increased the pitocin enough to get some progress going, Brody would d-sat for a moment, so they would turn the pit back down... it was a roller coaster.
Flash forward 24 hours later, I was standing up bedside with my nurse when I felt a "pop" and water came GUSHING out like I could have never imagined. Buckets and buckets of fluid. Apparently I had a forebag(?) that had ruptured earlier, but my main bag had not, which was slowing progress. After that happened the contractions became UNBEARABLE, breathing through them was like running a marathon each time. OUCH! They came 25 hours into labor to give me the epi. Ahhhh - Heaven. They numbed my back first with an injection and that hurt worse than the epi itself, I barely felt that part! It was weird though, I immediatley got shaky and my whole body itched really bad for about 15 minutes. Apparently my anestelogist uses a "special" kind of epi. that works immediatley but makes you itchy for a while. Oh well, It made me feel great and I got to sleep for the first time since Tuesday! (It was 6pm on Thursday by this time) So I slept, my mom came back to the hospital and her and Corey went out at about 945 to get some dinner after I told them to go, they were hungry and I needed some more sleep. Well the contractions were getting stronger and longer (not that I could feel them) but Brody just could not tolerate them. So at 1030 my doctor came in and said. "We are going to have to do a c-section tonight. Brody will be here before midnight. I am going to go get the OR ready for you now, you should call your husband ASAP." I called Corey and my mom back and they got there in record time. Corey got dressed in his scrubs, I got preped for surgery and off we went.

C-Section
The c-section was so easy to go through. Once they got me all numbed up I looked at Corey and the anesthesiologist and said "I think I am going to take a nap." It had been 29 hours of exhausting labor, I just couldn't keep my eyes open. Until I heard them tell Corey it was time to start the video camera! I felt pulling and tugging, some pressure, but absolutely no pain, and at 11:28 pm on June 4th (at 36 weeks exactly) Brody James Griesmer was born.
Weighing in at 7lbs 3oz and 18.5 inches long!
Corey got to hold him next to me and I just cried and cried. We were instantly in love with him!
I gave my little boy a kiss before they took me away to recovery.
In recovery they cleaned me up (weird, but the nurse gives you a sponge bath and you cant feel a thing!) and gave me pain meds and after hearing that Brody was doing well, I fell asleep from all of the meds. I was told they were keeping him in the NICU for the night for monitoring and I could see him in the morning. They did wheel me into the NICU in my hospital bed, but I dont really remember that.
Brody was coming down sunny side up, which is why after 29 hours of painful, pitocin labor I had only dialated to 3cm. He was born with a bruised face and a shiner on his little eye, from being pushed into my pelvic bones with every contraction. But he was truly a beautiful baby boy!
I got up in the morning expecting Brody to be in the room with me, and when he was not I panicked. and called the nurse and told her I needed to get to the NICU- It had only been 6 hours since my surgery, so the nurse had to help me to get out of bed and into the chair! OUCH!!! Everything hurt from the neck down!!! My left arm was so swollen from being on the pit and IV fluids for 29 hours, my legs were HUGE and so heavy. But I managed to find my legs and with the help of the nurse got to the bathroom, got my teeth brushed, and got in the wheel chair to go see my little boy.

The NICU
Brody was in the NICU for 8 days. It was incredible hard, probably the hardest thing Corey and I ever went through. There were times when Corey didnt even want to go in, because our little guy was hooked up to so many monitors/tubes/IV's that it made him cry, but we both were there for eachother, he was strong for me when I needed it, and I was strong for Corey when he needed me. The NICU nurses there were amazing and took great care of Brody, and we are forever grateful.
No one can prepare you for leaving the hospital without your baby, looking in the backseat, and not seeing him in the carseat, or going home and not using everything you have set-up for him to use. But at the same time, no one can prepare you for the overwhelming joy, the total euphoria you get when you finally do get to take your baby home!







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