August 25, 2009 ... Quinn's Birth Story

(I never put this on here, and since this is our family journal, I figured it needed to be added.)


THIS IS TAKEN FROM MY MOM'S BOARD ... WRITTEN ON AUGUST 25, 2009

so it has been busy with a newborn ... I forgot how often they eat.  ALL THE TIME.  (I'm lucky to be getting this break I guess)

so birth story.

I went to the dr. last Tuesday, it was the day before I turned 38 weeks, and everything looked good ... so she stripped my membranes.  ( I was only 2 cm dilated and 25% effaced at that time) I decided to take full advantage of that and the fact that my mom had my girls at her house with all their stuff, just in case.  So I went and walked.  I walked ALL day.  I went to the store, and to the mall and then when my dh got off work at 2:30 we went to the park and to the beach. 

By 5 (appt. was at 11) I was having pretty regular contractions, so we went home, ate something, got my stuff together and got to the hospital by 6:30.  They hooked me up to be monitored and I was having pretty regular contractions but they were still only like every 5 or 7 minutes.  When I was checked I was still only 2 cm dilated and about 50% effaced.  (that was annoying after all that walking)

So they had me walk for another hour at the hospital.  When I came back from that walk I hadn't dilated more, but the nurse said she didn't feel comfortable sending me home because of all the contractions, so they admitted me.  (I was SO excited and happy at that point)  I think they felt concerned about this being my 5th and having it go too quickly.

So I sat around for a while, I walked around some more, I took a nice warm bath, I rocked in the chair for a while ... all through this the contractions were pretty regular, but still only like 5 minutes apart.  At some point the dr. came and broke my water ... I wanna say it was 9 or 10 but it's all kind of a blur on the timing.  When she broke my water she said the head was still pretty high and I was only dilated to a 3.

So then at some point they decided to give me pitocin to try to speed things up, and I said if I had to have pitocin I wanted an epidural, so they called the anesthesiologist (sp?) and got that set up.  I got the epidural and it didn't work.  Half my body felt tingley and a little numb and the other half felt normal (that's happened to me before) so they tried to adjust it and it still wasn't doing anything.  By that time though, the pitocin had started and I was in more pain than I wanted to be.

So I asked them to have the anesthesiologist come back and give me a new one ... they checked me at that point and I was dilated to a 4 (this was like 2 in the morning) ... the nurse was getting frustrated by the lack of dilation ... so the anesthesiologist came back and was setting up to do a new epidural and all of a sudden I felt like I had to push.  I tell this to the nurse, and she says, "we just checked you ten minutes ago and you were only at a 4 ... it's probably just a little pressure from the head moving down" ... I told her to check, and so she checks and says, "oh ... the head is right here and you're at a 10" ... then she asks me to push a little to see what happens and so I do and she says "stop, stop, someone get the dr. fast, the baby is coming now"

at this point it's kind of all a blur ... people are running around, the dr. is called back in (luckily she was just in the sleep room across the hall) and I have one more contraction, push twice and the baby is out. (the dr. said I went from a 4 to completely done, delivered placenta and everything in 35 minutes)

The cord was wrapped around his head and his body and his hand was up by his face while he came out (which the dr. said was amazing that he was so easy to push out even with that) ... it hurt SO bad and I really thought my body was just going to break open and shred to pieces or something, I don't know ... it's amazing I didn't even tear at all ... it felt like I did.

anyway ... I got to have the baby on my chest for a while after that, until I decided he needed to be cleaned up because he was super sticky.  His apgars were 9 and 9 ... but then he started to look ashy, so they had to call the NICU and do an eval for a while ... he just wasn't crying enough I think ... he really only cried for like 30 seconds right after he came out and that's it.  He didn't even cry for the heel poking and all of that. 

Really, he doesn't cry at all now either (which I consider to be a blessing)

So that's the story ... sorry it's so long.  I am just glad he's here, and healthy, and everything's good.

He weighed 7 pounds 12 ounces, was 19 inches long.  Super cute!!