So I know it's been way too long since we posted. Let me tell you, I'm sure you all understand how much work it is taking care of a new baby! I'll try to tell the stories from the last few months, starting with this one: The story of Alex's birth which I wrote in an email to our awesome Bradley class.
My blood pressure started to elevate at the beginning of May, so the doctor was watching it closely. I was going in for weekly readings even before my weekly visits, and we had a big push at work and I was nearing finals week for my MBA class too. It wasn't stressful, but I was starting to really lose mobility and I was tired too! I was ready to be done, but was glad he was still in there growing. I'd been wondering all semester if I'd make it to finals week before having Alex, and as it turns out, I did. I took my final and completed the course, but the next day I had such a high blood pressure reading that they had me seen by the OB on call that day. I was a little nervous because it was the only four days that my doctor had told us she would be out of town in the entire nine months of the pregnancy. I was seen and put on bedrest until the delivery, which was a relief to me, because I was pretty much sick of working anyhow and had a funny arrangement of my desk to keep my feet up as it was... I had to use my own belly as a mousepad with my keyboard on my legs! The doctor on call had me monitored and apart from the blood pressure, everything was fine. She decided to strip my membranes, which I had no issue with since it was a minimally invasive process and only took a second. She said he would arrive any day now, and she was betting on early - I was so relieved not to be induced that I went home and relaxed happily.
Sure enough, two nights later at 4 am, I woke up feeling what I knew was nothing like the Braxton-Hicks contractions I'd been having for months... these were clearly more useful and stronger. Josh got the laptop for me and I tracked them for a bit on contractionmaster.com while he slept to keep up his energy. They were 10 minutes apart, so after a few I went to sleep too. We woke up later - luckily my mom had arrived the afternoon before; she was the assistant coach. They were still coming on strong, about 5-7 minutes apart. It was actually very comfortable, and I enjoyed the early stage of labor. We ate lightly, I had water, Josh helped me take a shower and everything. We just hung around with the laptop all day, I sat there reading a novel, excited and nervous to experience the other stages.
After lunchtime, they were coming about 3-4 minutes apart. I got a little impatient and Josh helped me walk around the block. That took a long time, with both of us laughing as I paused frequently - it was pretty difficult for me to walk at that point, as I was supposed to stay off my feet! When we got back to the house, I called my dad because it was his birthday, to wish him a happy day and tell him that he was going to get what he wished for back on October - he wanted Alex to be born on his birthday! I could tell now that it was really going to happen today.
We stowed the bag and carseat in the truck and Mom, Josh and I went to the hospital. Mom manned the camera while I went inside. It's a very small hospital, but I knew things were coming along since I could only get so far before pausing. The nurse brought me to the exam room, and checked my progress - she said I was 4-5cm and that they would keep me there. Suddenly, the contractions stayed a few minutes apart but started to hurt like mad... Suddenly I was panicky and started going all out of my head. Frantic, I worried it would be like this for hours still, because the contractions were not that close together and I was only partially dilated. That was when I started my freakout and was begging Josh for drugs, telling him I couldn't do it, etc. I was aware enough to be embarassed at the time, because I thought I was pretty weak giving up in the middle stage of labor. But, of course, Josh knew what I wanted and got me to avoid any drugs at all. They quickly brought me from the exam room into the labor-delivery-postpartum room assigned to me, and I had been in the hospital about 20 minutes. I laid on my side, hoping that would feel better. Josh came into the room and sat down to hold my hand when suddenly I grunted. The nurse who brought me in said in alarm, "Are you pushing?" I said, "No... *grrrrrrrunt*... YES!!!!" Josh just looked at her. She told me not to push, that I needed to be examined. We just let that roll as we wanted to know how far along I was. Someone came in (the details start to blur for me at this point, Josh can fill us in), and they said I was at 10 and ready to deliver! I went from 4-10 in a matter of minutes. Now we knew that I went right from first stage to 2nd stage, spending only a few moments in transition. I felt a little better about my pleading then. Actually, my pleas continued because it was very intense and painful. I tried a couple of positions to push, and managed not to completely break Josh's hand. I was a pretty noisy pusher! :) But, after a while, even with very helpful nurses and my wonderful coaches, the doctor started to worry. It seemed he couldn't fit past my pelvis, no matter what they tried. They even brought out the vacuum without us realizing it until they were using it (much more painful than labor, nobody ever told me that) but it wouldn't stick! I got mad that they sneaked the vacuum in and told them to stop. Then, all hell broke loose quickly as the baby's heart rate plummeted with each push. They told me if I didn't get him out in the next few pushes, we would have to do a C-section. I tried harder to push and visualize his long-awaited exit, but to no avail - they pretty much whisked me off to surgery. Josh hurried into scrubs to try and make it in time to be with me. Disappointed and a little scared - I was somewhat unprepared for surgery - I waited as nurses ran around the surgery room trying to find implements and count things and prepare me. Something seemed strange, and we learned later that as I sat on the table having painful, useless contractions, there was a communication error at the desk and the on-call C-section doctor was not contacted quickly enough. They were also understaffed due to it being a weekend and there being a simultaneous fatal crash just as I was admitted! Josh came in and watched me flop around helplessly for a bit, but then the anesthesiologist put in a spinal block and I experienced sweet relief. But, then, I started to shake around from the adrenalin of labor (or so they told me) and it was like having a conscious seizure! No longer distracted by the pain, I worried about the effects of the emergency surgery and anesthetic on my poor son.
When the doctors arrived, they had him out pretty quick. A tear slid down my face because I didn't hear anything and couldn't see anything, but Josh the hero lost his squeamishness... even saw them rearranging my organs to get at him (yuck) and was able to be with them when they did his Apgar and cleaned him up. I was glad for that, even as I flopped around some more on the table, uncontrollably shaking. Wish someone had told me about that sometime! His 1-minute Apgar came in at only 4, but just a moment later he started screaming his lungs out and ended up with a 5-minute score of 8. He was a little cold since his heart had gone through the wringer of that superfast labor, so they gave him to Josh for skin-to-skin kangaroo care while they sent me to recovery for a bit. I was so glad Josh was prepared to be with him and take care of him while I was out of commission.
Shortly, they wheeled me into the room and showed me my healthy, alert son (by some miracle). He was too shocked to have a suck reflex at first, and wouldn't eat, causing us some concern - but in an hour or two, he latched on like a champ and has been a very successful breastfed little guy. I'm most pleased about that!
So all in all, the pregnancy and labor was easy and even enjoyable... right up until the last minute major surgery! I had a lot more trouble than he did, with the high blood pressure lasting until weeks after the surgery and a pain-in-the-butt recovery that stressed Josh out a lot. The only advantage was that I got 8 weeks off instead of 6 and am still on leave. Alex is still checking in as a big healthy boy chasing down lots of physical and social milestones, and even giving us a break with sleep now and then. He's a really easy baby and we're very lucky. I can see now why a VBAC would seem scary, because I wouldn't want to suddenly have a C-section like that again after that crazy intense ending to my labor story. But in a few years, I'm sure we'll be considering it again, even though it's scary. We were both so glad that Bradley prepared us for anything... even the ultimate intervention.
