Labor....Are you sure?

I'm sure there are plenty of mommies out there who have had that moment where they are sure their water has broken. Later they find out that, no, their water has not broken, but labor is probably imminent! Well, I certainly had that moment with my little girl. It was a Monday morning and I was being lazy since I was about to have a baby. I mean, why not be lazy while you have the chance!? Once I decided to get up and brush my teeth, I suddenly felt a little trickle down my leg. I thought it was probably nothing so I finished picking out an outfit for the day, then I felt it again. This time I figured I ought to call someone, so I called my mom of course. After that conversation, then a conversation with my hubby, I called the doctor and was told to go into the office. After they did their little test to see if I was leaking amniotic fluid, the NP told me I wasn't leaking anything but I ought to go to the hospital just in case I might be starting labor anyway! I met Steve back at home and we headed up to the hospital.

Once we arrived, I was set up in a room and hooked to some monitors to see what might be going on in my belly. I was contracting quite a bit, but they were very irregular. So I walked around for a while to see if anything might speed up but it was to no avail. After 5 hours or so, the nurses gave me the option of staying and waiting for my labor to jump start or go home and wait for my labor to officially start. Well I was totally gonna go home! If I stayed in the hospital, I would have had to continue just eating ice chips. No way I was down for that. So I went home and spent my night as usual.

Well, 5 am the next morning, I woke up and didn't quite feel good. So I figured I'd use the restroom and be fine. Not quite. I started getting awful pains in my back. After about 20 minutes of those pains, Steve decided it was time to call the doctor because he couldn't stand to see me like this anymore and it must be labor. Once again, we headed to the hospital. The nurses set me up on monitors and we were off again, but for real this time. The first, oh, 6 hours of labor were a blur. At first, the back labor was so horrible I was just curled up in pain and didn't notice anything around me. Then the wonderful nurses gave me Stadol. After that, I was so sleepy and loopy that I didn't notice the pain, much less anything else. They wanted to give me the Stadol because the anesthesiologist was tied up in a surgery. Having been at 4cm for the past week and a half, I thought I would get my epidural immediatley. Finally, the anesthesiologist was able to give me the epidural around noon. After that, I was able to pay attention to everything around me and start enjoying my labor! At that point, the nurses also gave me pitocin to speed things up. I was so tense from the back labor that my contractions weren't progressing my labor like they should have. Now that all my drugs were in place, we finally started going somewhere.

I dialated fully in a couple of hours and the nurses started working with me on pushing. I am undoubtedly a terrible pusher. Of course, it didn't help that my baby was wedged face up, making it more difficult to get anywhere while pushing. Unfortunatley, my little lady was bent on staying face up and the nurses decided it was time to try and turn her so she would be able to come out. After about an hour and a half of pushing and not getting very far, we decided to let me rest and try some other things to get her to turn. Laying on my side helped somewhat, but it wasn't quite enough. After another hour, we tried pushing again. I'm very glad my doctor gave me the chance to push more instead of opting for a C-section. After another hour and a half of pushing, I was very close to delivering but had really stalled out. Arabella was turned at an odd angle and I wasn't pushing well enough to get her out. So it was decision time. The nurses talked with my doc and came to the conclusion that we would either need to decide to try using the vacuum to help her out or go do the C-section. After looking at my progress, my doctor said that he'd be willing to try the vacuum but if we weren't successful after 2 or 3 pushes, we'd go to the OR. Well, that's all the motivation Belle and I needed! My amazing doctor put the vacuum in place and 10 minutes later Arabella was born!

October 20, 2009 at 6:23 pm my life changed forever! I couldn't have asked for a greater experience. My nurses gave me amazing support and helped me every step of the way and my doctor, although he was there for a short time, was nothing short of a miracle worker with that vacuum! I'm so excited to have Arabella in my life now!