We had the induction scheduled for almost a week, I had to call in the morning at 5am to see if they had a bed for me. Unfortunately I had a wait, and had to call in a couple more times before I was finally told to come in. I was happy for the extra time, took a shower, Cameron painted my toe nails, had some extra quality time with baby Grey.
I was pretty emotional about leaving him at home, I had so many mixed emotions about adding a second child so soon after him. I was worried I wasn't giving him enough "only child" time, and that I would have to divide my love and attention too much when the new baby got here. I was told it wouldn't be so bad once she came, so I was looking forward to dropping the guilt.
Cameron and I were finally off! I was so nervous I thought I was going to throw up! With Grey's birth it was a little easier because it happened spontaneously and almost 3 weeks early, I hadn't had time to sit and dwell on what it would be like. This time around I was worried about her flipping back to breech or back again (at this point I still didn't know if she was head up or down).
When we arrived at the hospital all the normal stuff went down, checking in, getting set up in our room, very familiar.
Here is my last pregnancy shot, I was GIANT!!!
Once I was all settled they check and I was still 3cm dilated. So not a lot going on in there.
By 1:15pm I was still waiting for the doctor to come give me an ultrasound to find out if baby was still head down, or if she had flipped again. That would determine the induction route vs. c-section.
She got there at 1:50pm - head down!!! Let's get this party started! She broke my water to try to induce more naturally (I was still thinking I might be able to get a med free birth)
3pm check - no progress, so bummed, they ordered pitocin (started the drip at 4ml)
6:30pm - not even feeling much yet, uped the dose to 12ml
7:30pm - still nothing, uped to 16ml
8:30pm - nada, 18ml
11pm - getting a bit dicy, sat on the birthing ball, walking around the floor like crazy trying to get things moving. Obviously gave up on the 11th of February as her birthday!
12am - out of nowhere BOOM, serious pain! I asked them to check me, 4cm - WTF I was so upset. I couldn't believe with that kind of crazy pain that there was only 1cm of progress!!
I asked for an epidural - with that kind of pain at 4cm I thought there was no way in hell I would make it through with no pain meds, so might as well get it over with.
Shit started to get real, really quick.
During my birth experience with Greyson, everything was so new, even the things I would dread now didn't seem as crazy because I didn't have any anticipation of what it would be like, not having anything to compare it to.
The epidural is one of the most disturbing feelings, just so completely unatural and yuck.
Because of those feelings I seriously freaked the fuck out, I was kind of irrationally upset about getting it. I was shaking, crying. The anesthesiologist was super nice and I was a FREAK. Embarrassing. Whatever. On top of that I was in super duper serious contractions. I couldn't sit still, it was just all kinds of fucked up. Eventually it was over, and I felt, albeit slightly, more composed.
Then catheter time, another seriously dreaded thing. WTF is wrong with me!? I had a fucking panic attack when she goes to put it in, started puking. Thought I was going to pass out. She called in the doctor again because she thought there might have been something actually wrong with me. Of course there wasn't, and I felt like an asshole and I think the doctor was pissed because she didn't check me out for more than a minute before she called him in. So annoying.
After all was calm (it was only a few minutes it just felt like a million years of stupid).... I felt different, even through the epidural I felt something change, kind of hard to describe now, 2 months later.
Because of this change, she checked me and I was at 7cm. Soooooo obviously the crazy contractions I was having before the epidural were not, in fact, nothing, they got me 3cm more dilated in just a few minutes!!!
From then I used the peanut ball on my side. After a while I felt another indescribable shift (I'm guessing it was hard to describe because I was numb from the waist down LOL) so because of that feeling the nurse checked me and I was 9cm (2:45am).
Getting close!
3:45 - 10cm. Of course I start freaking out again. By now the full impact of what is about to happen has sunk in at an alarmingly fast pace. So many emotions were running through me. All I knew is that I DID NOT want her to come yet!! I somewhat irrationally explained my hesitation to the nice nurse, who looked at me like I was insane. She then tried to rationally explain to me that this was going to happen whether I liked it or not.
I asked her if I could "labor down" for an hour (really just so I could try to quickly come to terms with what was about to go down).
4:00am - not exactly and hour, but she came back and let me know it was time to practice push.
It was looking like I didn't have a choice in the matter, so I agreed.
Brief moment to refresh on the last labor - super shitty, 32 ish hours, pushed for 4 hours, placenta broke off in me, doctor reached hand up to dig it out, extremely traumatizing. (this might explain my hesitation about allowing her out)
I agreed to push. I waited for a contraction and pushed 3 times. Cameron was watching (who btw was a total champ the whole time, even though I was having breakdowns the majority of it!!)
Nurse says, oh look there is her head! I look at her like WTF do you mean her head (at this point with Greyson is was still WAY the eff up inside of me, and that way for several hours)
Nurse tells me she is going to call the doctor and we can push a few more times.
Stop.
WTF.
I've only pushed THREE times, I was kind of yelling, like I thought she was playing a cruel trick on me.
I then of course say, hahaha sure, call the doctor, then again, rationally explain to her that with my son it took 4 hours and there was NO WAY that she was coming out after like 10 minutes.
The nurse - who probably fucking hates me by now - was like, umm hun, she'll be out in a few minutes.
I then completely lose my shit and burst into tears, once again, freaking the fuck out. It was all TOO fast, I wasn't ready.
So at 4:15am she called my doctor.
I hung out (freaking out) until the doctor arrived, less freaking out probably more just watching the room mysteriously transform in that amazing way into a magical baby birthing room. Crazy lights from the ceiling coming down and turning into awkward vagina spotlights, baby bed rolling out and flipping the heat lamp on (that means there will be a baby in it soon). A tray table rolls in with all kinds of evil silver tools, gowns come on, help arrives, everyone knows its "Go" time, I'm still in shock.
4:35am - doctor arrives (she looks tired obviously)
4:45am - doctor all dressed staring at me from between my legs up in stirrups. I'm, yet again, hysterically crying. She is asking me why and I'm trying to explain I don't know but I'm scared as shit and told her I would try to stop being a little bitch and let's get this show on the road, yada yada.
4:52am, February 12, 2016 - 4 contractions and 12 pushes later, little miss Lorelei was born. I couldn't believe the nurse was right, she was right there, out of me, no sweat. 21 inches, 8lbs 13 oz. She was placed on me. I was hysterical again, though happy tears and relieved tears instead of panic tears.
She was having trouble breathing, she had inhaled a lot of fluid, so it was a little frantic for about 20 minutes while they had the NICU doc checking her out and trying to flush out her lungs, but all was fine shortly after.
After all was said and done, the only person who made this birth experience shitty was myself. Everything went so well. Because of my traumatic first birth experience I was so caught up thinking danger was lurking around every corner that I didn't stop to realize that it was a fairly ideal birth. Lesson learned if there is another one, just take it in stride next time. Maybe ask for some calming meds
heheheh....
...Awkward...
And here we are:
And here was my pregnancy in a nutshell:
