I took this picture last night and had intended to have a blog post titled "Induction Attempt #2" today since eggplant parmigiana is a time honored southern tradition for starting labor. We went to
Topo Gigio on Wells after a basketball game and had our *last* dinner as a couple. I had been feeling a little weird all day but as Allan had been saying to me "you feel weird all the time", so I did not think much about it. I did feel the need to clean up before going to bed and throw stuff away, try to tie up some loose ends via email, etc.
As normal, I did not sleep well. Lights out at 11:30, up to pee at 1:30. I was lying in bed, listening to Allan snore and felt something *funny* and then felt lots of liquid. I jumped out of bed and ran to the bathroom where it felt like I was peeing out a gallon of water. Totally clear, did not smell, I just kept peeing. Even after I was done, I kept leaking. Yes, my water had broken. Allan and I called the Dr., packed up, made a few (dog related) phone calls, walked the dog, and were at Prentice an hour later. I was definitely having contractions, but nothing terrible or that painful. I NEVER would have gone in to L&D or even called a Dr for these contractions, even though they were about 5 minutes a part.
We were checked into triage, they established my water had broken, and we were put in a room, waiting for a room on the L&D floor. The good/amazing news is that MY Dr. was the Dr. on call for the practice and he was going to be the one to deliver me!:) Happy Days! Unfortunately, the storm that came into town had also brought many other women into labor and our short wait for a room, turned into a three hour wait. This would have been fine except my nausea came back with a vengeance after my water broke. I finally ended up taking one of my own zofran (the nurses wanted me to wait to get upstairs), but it was to late. Before I was sent up stairs, they established that my cervix was dilated to 2cm - up from the 1 it has been for the last 10 days.:(
We made it to the L&D floor at about 5:00am. The Dr. came in and started me on Pitocin. I was a little against this but understood his reasoning, we needed to get the contractions going more consistently to get the baby out of me since my water had broken. I had been told,....if they do anything to speed up your labor, get the epidural first. (good advice, take it if you are ever in this situation). I actually asked about an epidural at that point but was not in much pain so the Dr said to wait. Things progressed and by 7, I wanted the epidural. It was weird, it was not that I could not tolerate the pain, it was that I did not want to. Part of it was that there was no end in sight. The other thing was that my blood pressure had been VERY high since I was in triage and there were concerns regarding pre-eclampsia. The whole point of waiting for an epidural was that I would be able to move around, they were worried about pre-e so I was not allowed to get out of bed.
Unfortunately, by the time I asked, someone else was in line ahead of me and by the time they were in the room and setting up, it was 8:00am, I was VERY uncomfortable, and spent most of the process throwing up. Not pretty. Allan was kicked out and I told him to go get some breakfast and take a walk. He later told me that he was scared by the sounds I as making when he left. The good news is that I thought the epidural was GRAND, and felt soooo much better and in a nicer mood. Then nurse upped the pitocin and I was very bummed to hear that I was still only at 2cm at 9:00am when they checked me.
I spent the morning in a daze, watching tv, looking out the window, talking on the phone a little. At 9:00am I realized (or processed) what they were telling me. While my water had broken, my body was not ready to go into labor and that was why they were really pushing the pitocin. Essentially, they were forcing my body into labor. I was also made to realize that this would be a LONG process. At that point, my goal became to have the baby before 5:00pm when my Dr. went off call and a new Dr. would deliver me. It was determined that the baby was "happier" if I as on my left side, so I pretty much hung out there and felt my legs getting numb.
I sent Allan out to get some food before noon and walk around. A new nurse came on shift at noon and we talked a little about the process. Again, I settled in for a long term, first pregnancy labor. Allan got back at about 12:20 and we hung out. The medical student came in, and at about 12:30 a resident came in to introduce herself and check my progress, which I thought was great. I had been told they don't check you that much because there is some risk of infection - which made sense, I just wanted to know if I had made any progress since 9:00am. The nurse had told me at noon that they would wait for me to tell them when things felt different....which I thought was crazy, because I had an epidural! I had a hard time shifting around in bed so she could check. Things had been feeling a little different for the prior 30 minutes, but I figured it was just the contractions getting stronger. I could feel the baby getting lower and the nurse had to keep moving the monitors down.
The poor resident started to check me and pretty much went white. She asked how I felt and when I said ok, she said that I was 10cm dilated and she could see the baby's hair. It pretty much started a crazy fire drill where they told me not to push (it now felt like I needed to) while they found the nurse, Dr and got things set up. By 12:45 they had me ready to go, less than 4 sets of three pushes later, Henry was born at 12:58pm! 7lbs, 15oz, 20.5 inches. Lots of black hair!
