Birth Story Part Two

Hey everyone!  End of day two and I decided to take a turn on the blog.  I've been debating on whether to add more to Jack's Birth Story or not, but today I started thinking I should write out my end of his arrival while the details were still so fresh in my head.

So you already ready the summary of how his arrival went for Daddy.  Here's how things were from inside the OR.

It all started like Randy mentioned in the earlier post.  We had really only been on Pitocin for a few hours and I was sitting on a birthing ball watching Netflix with Randy.  Contractions were coming, but they were still really sporadic and I could talk through them and everything.  As far as my mind was concerned I was still hours away from meeting my baby.  Little did I know, things were about to change very quickly.  I had just looked over to watch a contraction on the monitor and noticed the numbers from Jack's heart monitor were lower than his usual 140's range.  Since I'm no medical professional, I just figured it was because of the contraction or the monitor not picking things up just right.  That's when our nurse and scrub nurse came in and asked me to change positions and go ahead and get back into bed.  She said she had noticed some drops in the baby's heart rate and wanted to do a quick cervical check to see how things were going.  When she went to check me, I could tell that something wasn't quite right.  You could tell she was trying to really feel around and make sense of what she was feeling.  That's when she told the scrub nurse to let them know at the desk that she was holding cord.  Since I'm somewhat of a pregnancy junkie, I knew that this was no good at all, but my mind just couldn't process all of the "what now?!" kind of stuff that was happening so quickly.  Once the nurses at the desk caught wind of the situation, the whole room was instantly filled with chaos.  People began pulling my robe and rings and anything extra like that right off of me.  They wrapped up Tracey's (my nurse) hair and started draping her, too.  That's when Tracey told me that I was going to need an emergency c-section and that she would have to go with me because she was literally holding my baby's prolapsed cord.  The pressure from his head was cutting off his lifeline so she was holding it basically protecting it with her own hand.  We were rushed to the OR in one of the most painful rides of my life.  Just picture bumpy hospital bed bouncing down the halls while someone has their hand inside you.  TMI, I know.  But it was just so crazy and terrifying, yet so amazing at the same time.  Tracey literally held my baby's life in her hand from the moment she noticed the cord, throughout my c-section, until they took him safely out of her hand.  When we got in the OR it was pure madness.  People were running around me and I was totally awake while they moved me onto the table and began prepping me for surgery.  There was lots of yelling and barking orders since they were not planning to do this surgery on me so fast.  The anesthesiologist was rushing to get his end of the deal ready while my Doctor was holding the scalpel in her hand waiting on the clear to begin cutting.  I was absolutely terrified.  First I was worried sick that my baby was dying and second I was completely aware that it was taking entirely too long to put me under and my Doctor was about to begin cutting the baby out whether I was awake or not.  I was so emotionally torn because I wanted them to do whatever it took to save Jack, but at the same time I was literally begging them not to start cutting until they put me under.  I started to totally panic!  The last thing I remember is hearing my Doctor say something to the anestheciologist about him running out of time and putting me out now because she was going to start.  Then I saw the mask coming my way and I gladly took the biggest breath I could.  That's the last thing I remember thank God because it was apparently a pretty close call and I fought back some when they got started.  I am so thankful that I don't remember any of that at all.  I just remember the mask as the last thing in the OR.  I remember feeling like I was having a really tense dream and then coming in and out to hearing Randy's voice.  I couldn't get myself to wake up enough to say much, but I was trying to ask if the baby was okay and I remember Randy putting him up to my face and just feeling his warm little face against my cheek.  Then I drifted in and out some more and woke up in recovery feeling like I had been hit by a semi truck.  Thankfully I had a great nurse who worked quickly to get my pain under control through my IV and once he had the pain level controlled and I was awake more, they took me to my room.  It was so hard to stay awake and I was super emotional, but once they wheeled me into the elevator to go up, my hubby came around the corner with Jack and all was well again.  They handed him over to me and I got to finally hold him.  That's the instant that makes it all so worth it.  But wow.  What a crazy experience.  I wanted to share his story with all of you because I think it's such an amazing reminder of how much God was there taking care of us.  So many details worked out just the way they needed to.  If the timing had been just even a little more off I probably would have been awake when they did my c-section.   Or if my nurse had been busy with another patient and unable to check my monitors it could have delayed everything.  There are so many details like that.  Not to mention the fact that I was in a very small hospital that didn't have a Doctor around for emergencies like this.  My OB office is literally across the parking lot from the hospital so it allowed my OB to get their very quickly.  It was something like 15 minutes from the time the prolapsed cord was discovered until the he was safely delivered.  That's so amazing.  Definitely a miracle that he is here and perfectly healthy.  We are so blessed and so very very thankful.


As for now, Jack and I are doing so well.  I have still been having a lot of pain, but today I was able to get up and move around some.  Jack is looking great and had his circumcision today which he handled really well.  We are all just so thankful that things did not end up any worse.

Moving forward, you can pray that I stay infection free.  Because things were so rushed, they weren't done as efficiently and sterile as usual.  So now I'm at a really high risk for infection.  They have taken precautions and given me preventative antibiotics, but they will still be watching things very closely.  So hopefully that won't be an issue, but if you want a specific way to pray for me...there ya go!  Also, this is random and totally unrelated, but pray for Randy tomorrow.  Our van has been acting up and we thought it just needed new spark plugs...well turns out it was the transmission.  We are just trying to decide if it's worth putting the money into our van to replace it.  We were planning to replace the van soon because it has been close to death for awhile, but we really didn't plan on doing it the week our baby was born!  It's just going to be a stressful day for my hubby tomorrow trying to car shop and make some decisions about the van instead of being with me and Jack at the hospital.  But we know it will all work out.  The timing is terrible.  Our Accord just got finished being fixed and we were supposed to pick it up this week from the mechanic.  So we are not thrilled with the timing.  But at the same time, we refuse to let this trouble with the van distract us from all the good God has been doing in our life.  It will all work out and get taken care of!  But just be thinking of Randy and praying things go smoothly for him tomorrow so we can get this taken care of.  I will be going home either tomorrow late afternoon or Friday.  I'm a little anxious to get home to my other babies, but I'm also trying to be sure and follow all the instructions they give me because I'm so ready to not be in pain.  I don't want to make any of this harder on myself so I am trying really hard to make sure I don't over due.  Yesterday I was really discouraged about the amount of pain I had and feeling so helpless, but today was really encouraging.  I'm already feeling tons better so I'm hoping each day continues to improve.