Baby Story - Part 3: Delivery (Graphic Level: Eww)

I started to write the labor and delivery story of Baby L and I, and it started to get really long. Instead of a single novella post, I've broken it into 4 parts, each with varying levels of graphic description.

All photos on this blog entry are courtesy of Lacey Sexson Photography!

Part 1: Pre-Labor (Graphic Level:  TMI)
Part 2: Labor (Graphic Level: Low)
Part 3: Delivery (Graphic Level: Eww)
Part 4: Recovery (Graphic Level: TMI)

Part 3

In Part 2, I talked about my last few contractions where my doctor was calmly sitting on the stool near me coaching me through helping Baby L's head drop into the proper position.  At the same time, I could hear a woman screaming in the hallway.  Apparently, this woman hadn't registered with the hospital in advance, she had just shown up in labor!  If I hadn't been in so much pain and discomfort, I would have laughed at her screams.  They sounded something like "oh my GOD IIIIIII-EEEEEEEEEE!!!!"  She didn't even make it into a labor suite, I'm told she delivered in the assessment room about 30 minutes after she arrived at the hospital.  I will admit, I was jealous!

Anyway, back to my story.  My doc did one final assessment and determined that I was ready and then there was a flurry of activity. My bed was prepared for delivery, and suddenly there was blue paper everywhere. My legs were raised up and while I tried to hold G's hand, the midwife asked me to hold onto the back of my legs instead.  She also whispered in my ear, "Now Kim...it's after 5am. You have been up here for a very long time.  No pressure, but let's try to have this baby before 5:30."

I wanted to hold G's hand while pushing, but the midwife Shirley, standing next to G, said delivery would be faster if I held my leg instead.

I breathed, I pushed, I yelled.  My doc coached me and encouraged me.  My midwife told me to stop wasting my energy yelling and to put it into pushing.  It's hard to describe the feeling of pushing because most of the sensation and the pain is actually already gone from my memory - the human body is pretty magical like that.  I remember trying to push once after the contraction was over, and my doctor telling me not to wear myself out.  I also remember yelling to get this baby out of me!  I don't remember how many contractions it took - I think less than ten, so not too many.  Baby L was born at 5:38am!

I remember thinking whatever passed through me was longer than expected - that I only expected to feel her head, but that I felt her whole body leaving me.  I don't remember the pain of actual childbirth at all.  I heard her crying immediately, and I was so relieved - she has an excellent set of lungs.  I also had a moment of vindication and irritation that her "lack of movement" on the monitors didn't mean anything, she was perfectly fine.  I started opening and pulling apart the top of my gown so they would put her directly on my chest.

Those first few moments with Baby L were magical.  I couldn't believe how perfect she was.  Love at first sight!

G cut her cord, and she was whisked away.  I was sad that she couldn't stay with me longer, and I knew that it was important for her to get fully checked out by neonatologist.  G left me to make sure she was ok, and my doc injected a local anesthetic to start stitching me up while we waited for my placenta.  She explained to me that she was about to make a cut, but decided to allow me to tear instead -- and there were only a few small tears to correct. This pain I remember.  I remember the pain of every stitch - I kept asking for more epidural drugs or more anesthetic, and my doc kept asking me "Kim, you feel this? You shouldn't feel this".  I felt all of it.

Baby L's first checkup!

After her checkup, Baby L is dressed, swaddled, and handed to G

At some point, when the neonatologist finished with Baby L, G got to hold on to her for awhile.  I saw him rocking her back and forth. I weakly asked if I could see her, and Lacey, bless her, heard me. She told G that he should maybe bring Baby L over to distract me.

This is my favorite photo from our birth story.

G brought her back to me and I think I asked if I could hold her. I'm not sure how she got back on my chest, but Shirley helped her to find my breast and she immediately latched onto me.  It was the perfect distraction, and in that moment, I felt all the pain everything was worth this moment.  I was so ecstatically happy.

Baby L is a breastfeeding champion!

G and I watch her, and we are totally amazed by her.

While Baby L was feeding, the nurses and midwives were massaging my stomach trying to get my uterus to contract and expel my placenta.  Lacey took a few final shots of G, Baby L, and I together, and then congratulated me and headed home for some much-needed sleep.

We were about to move Baby L to my other breast when I started to feel something coming out of me, and another flurry of activity.  There were a lot of hands on me and around me, and I asked G to take the baby because I was confused about what was going on.  He took her and then my world shifted slightly.  

I heard my doc talking a lot but I couldn't understand what she was saying.  I heard alarms going off in the room, I suspect it was the machine monitoring my blood pressure.  My vision dimmed and I experienced tunnel vision and I said as loudly and strongly as I could that I was dizzy and I thought I was going to pass out.  I was dropped into a laying position, and I struggled to stay conscious.  Suddenly, I felt what I think was my doctor putting her hand through my vagina back into my uterus and I screamed.  The pain was excruciating, worse than anything I'd experienced so far that day.  I started to black out again, and I started praying "Lord please let me live so I could love my husband and my baby."  

I felt the excruciating pain a few more times, and each time I screamed and cried and I think somewhere I heard my doctor say my name, but I don't know what she said to me.  The pain subsided, and then I felt more stitching and medicines being injected into my still-raised legs. I was still dizzy, but no longer on the verge of blacking out. My doctor brought another doctor in for a second opinion, and they were looking at an ultrasound of my uterus.  At this point, I'm still flat on my back so I can't see anything going on down below.  

The doctors explained to me that when the placenta was removed, I started hemorrhaging and that the doctors were looking at the ultrasound to ensure that they had stop all the bleeding, and that I would be ok.  I can't remember exactly how they described what they did, but I think it was essentially a D&C to remove any potential clots or remaining tissues left in my uterus and that the injections in my legs would help my uterus contract to stop any further bleeding.  I was to stay here in the birthing suite for a few hours to recover, then go back to my hospital room.  I needed to take a nap, eat some food, and then rest while Baby L received her full physical assessment.

All I'd had to eat for the last 20 hours was apple juice and water, and even then, I vomited all of the apple juice that was in my stomach.  When that is the only thing you've eaten, it really doesn't taste much different coming up than going down other than maybe a little more acidic.  I asked for and received Zofran so I could eat.  I also asked if it was ok for me to sleep - I was going to wake up if I closed my eyes, right?  This is the part where knowing statistics about maternal mortality rates was not to my benefit.  The midwife reassured me that I was fine, and to rest.  So I did.  I woke up about an hour later, and G and I decided he would follow the baby to the nursery, while the staff took me to our room, and then he would stop by the room to check on me before heading back to the apartment to shower, change, and grab some clothes.   The nurses helped me into a wheelchair to go downstairs, and off we went.

At this point, I will say that I am now 100% reassured in my decision to have the baby in UAE instead of travelling home to deliver.  It's not that I don't love my OB-GYN in Houston, but recent studies have shown the maternal mortality rate in the US to be three times higher than other developed countries, and even higher in Texas.  After discussions with my doctor in the following days, I don't think I was ever in danger of actually dying, but the care I've received post-delivery have strengthened my belief that in the US we don't pay enough attention to recovering mothers.

So on to Part 4: Recovery (Graphic Level: TMI)!