Happy Birth Day! Part 2

After hours and hours of Pitocin and painful contractions, my OB came to check my progress again. I was at a 3! Seriously!?! And apparently, further up my birth canal I was even less dilated. I guess there was some sort of membrane that was making is hard for my body to dilate. So what does the doctor do? He breaks that membrane by stretching the crap out of it. I could barely breath for the pain. This was supposed to help me dilate more.

And while the monitors I was on showed me having contractions every minute or so, my OB was concerned they weren't hard enough to be making any change, so he decided to insert an internal contraction monitor and heart monitor for John. Having these inserted into my uterus while only being dilated to a 3 (about the size of a bottle cap) was the worst pain I have ever felt in my entire life. I thought I was going to pass out from the pain. It also really broke my water, I was gushing fluids and blood everywhere. The doctor had explained to me earlier that once your water breaks, you have a limited amount of time to deliver the baby or risk infection for both mom and baby. So they had said from the beginning that if I wasn't ready to push after so many hours, that they may have to do a c-section. And now that my water had really broken, the clock was really ticking.

The monitors they had inserted showed the my contractions were good and strong, but after more excruciating hours, I had only dilated to a 4. It was now 10 in the morning and I had been in labor for 18 hours. I hadn't eaten anything since lunch the day before and I hadn't slept in 28 hours. I was at my breaking point. In fact, I remember one really hard contraction where I looked up at Robby and all of a sudden felt so small and weak and helpless. I just burst into tears. So now that I had reached the do or die point and I was only at a 4, my OB said our only option was a c-section. And although I really hadn't wanted it to come to this, after this ordeal, it was actually a relief to know that I didn't have to do anything more. Because even if I had dilated enough, I don't think I could've found the strength to push. But now, I was about to have some relief.

The OB nurses prepped me for surgery, the anesthetist gave me the epidural, and miraculously the pain stopped. Everything from the bottom of my rib cage and down went totally numb. It kind of made me feel claustrophobic to not be about to move my body at all, but I was so exhausted and relieved to not be in pain anymore that I think I may have fallen asleep on the surgery table.

Unfortunately, the epidural gave me the shakes -- I felt like I was in a freezer and I couldn't stop shivering violently  -- and I also got nauseous and started vomiting up green bile. I puked twice during the c-section. But all of a sudden, I heard crying. I was a mom. My baby boy was born. And now I was crying; this time for joy.

In recovery, I puked again but they gave me some medicine that stopped the nausea and the shakes and I started to feel much better. After about 20 minutes in recovery, Robby brought in my baby boy and I got to hold him. And despite all the pain, it was totally worth it and I would go through it all again in a heartbeat to have my baby boy. My John.