We arrived at the hospital at 7pm on Tuesday July 13. About an hour later they put in a prostaglandin suppository to help soften my cervix. I was also hooked up to contraction and heart rate monitors as well as a blood pressure cuff. I had to flat lay on my back for the next 2 hours to let the meds work. I had been contracting since 11pm the night before but they were inconsistent between 4 and 15 min apart and I wasn't dilated at all. I WAS about 50% effaced at my Dr apt though so i felt like my body was at least starting to get ready on it's own. Jon had to go to work that night from 9pm-6am so I was on my own all night. After my 2 hours on my back was up I was allowed to change positions and get up to use the restroom, but I still had to call a nurse to unhook the monitors if I needed to get up.
My contractions were crampy and uncomfortable and the hospital bed was small and hard. I started wishing I had just stayed home and labored in my own, comfy, king sized bed at home where I could heat up my rice bag and get up to pee whenever I wanted. (Apparently the nurses weren't allowed to heat my rice bag up for me...?) I did get a sleeping pill though, so that helped. I slept off and on between the blood pressure monitor randomly turning on, and the nurses coming in the check on me.
My water broke at 2am. I totally thought I peed my pants because I totally needed to pee, but didn't want to call the nurse to come help me. I DID end up calling her though and I let her know I either just lost control of my bladder, or else my water broke! Turns out it was the latter and I was mortified when it continued to leak all the way to the bathroom (all 5 steps from my bed). Once my water broke, I got yet another tube attached to me when the put in the IV.
We started pitocin at 7am the next morning. Jon went home after work to get a couple hours of sleep since nothing was really happening yet. They also started a drug called stadol which doesn't actually numb the pain, but it makes you loopy enough not to care anymore. Once that got into my system I was on cloud 9 and my uncomfortable hospital bed seemed like a luxury 5 star hotel mattress. It felt like i slept for hours, but I'm not sure if I actually slept at all. My contractions were definitely picking up but I was also able to relax through them and almost fall asleep. I couldn't keep my eyes open.
By 10am i was 2 cm dilated and my contractions were becoming too intense even for the stadol to help and I was ready for Jon to be there and for my epidural. The epidural got there before Jon, and by that point my contractions were super intense and I kept getting heat flashes and waves of nausea and throwing up. I was in so much pain and so out of it that I couldn't even function and had to rely completely on the nurses to help me get in position for the epi. I couldn't even focus enough to look at the anesthesiologist who was about to become my hero. I don't remember the epidural hurting as it was put in because I was in the middle of a contraction and nausea attack that were so much worse. I do, however, remember the nurse telling me this was the last contraction I was going to feel! And it was! I felt better almost immediately and was able to thank the anesthesiologist and apologize about a million times to the nurses for being so out of it. (I hate it when I feel helpless.) Jon arrived just as I became totally numb to all the pain. I'm kinda annoyed he wasn't there to see the painful contractions and me barfing my guts out all morning.
The day was pretty uneventful. I dozed off and on between more nurse checks and the blood pressure cuff turning on, until about 4:30pm when the effects of the stadol finally wore off and I could keep my eyes open and not just fall back asleep immediately. I continued to dilate, but at some point they turned off the pitocin for a while because Aria's heart rate was dropping too much during contractions. I had the shakes for quite a while and the heat flashes/vomiting attacks came back too.
My Dr arrived around 7pm. I was dilated to 6cm but because my water had been broken since 2am and I hadn't dilated much in the last few hours, Dr. Rita said we may have to talk about a c-section if I didn't dilate to an 8 in the next hour. They started increasing the pitocin again every 20 min and I watched Aria's heartrate on the monitors every time I contracted, willing it not to drop, so we could continue increasing the pitocin. Finally we got through the hour (more like hour and a half since we WERE dealing with a hospital here.) and I was at a NINE! Dr still wasn't convinced we weren't going to have a c-section because I have a ridge on my pelvis that babies "tend to get stuck on". She said we'd talk again about the cesarian if I didn't make it to a 10 in the next hour. I totally made it to a ten though. Jon asked how long it would be till she was actually born and was told anywhere from 30 min to 3 hours. Since this was my first baby and we had to deal with the issue of my pelvic ridge, we were expecting at least a couple of hours.
The nurse started having me push a bit. It was hard to push since I couldn't feel anything down there. But apparently I'm a good pusher and when the nurse started pointing out Aria's dark hair to Jon, I asked for a mirror so I could see too. It made pushing a little easier when I could see my progress. After about 30 min of pushing during contractions the nurse told me to stop and ran to get my Dr! 10 min later Aria was born. Jon even cut the cord which I totally didn't expect him to do. My Dr was super surprised that I was able to give birth vaginally. All I could tell her was that when I put my mind to something, I do it. And if someone tells me I can't do something, I'm DEFINITELY going to do it! I wasn't about to go through 20 hours of labor and then just be cut open anyway.
Aria Bente Hiort was born Wednesday, July 14, 2010 at 10:38pm weighing 6lbs, 13oz and was 20 inches long.
7 years ago