At 37 weeks and 3 days, I was ready to meet my sweet daughter. Did I know it would be soon? Absolutely not.
It was the early AM hours of April 5th 2018. I had woken up with the need to use the washroom, just like I would any other night. While sitting on the toilet I noticed that my pajama bottoms were oddly on the wet side. I thought perhaps I wet myself, as many pregnant woman sometimes do. I leaned in to smell it and it was odorless. Still convinced it was urine, I took my pajama bottoms off, grabbed a new pair and went back to sleep. An hour or so later I wake up to use the washroom again only to find that my new pajama pants were soaked as well. Still thinking it was pee I ignored it, grabbed yet another pair and went to sleep. This same process went on one more time, It than became 7AM when I woke up for the morning, saw I was wet, put panty liner on and underwear, then proceeded on with my morning.
I began to feel a little worried that the wetness was me leaking amniotic fluid, but was unsure because I didn’t feel the “gush” that mother’s tell you you feel when your water breaks. I called the maternity ward at my local hospital, explained what was happening and they suggested I come down and get it checked out because I was early term* and to bring my hospital bag just in case. (A small fun fact, I had just packed my hospital bag the day before and got her carseat ready) I then got off the phone with them and headed down.
While waiting during my Fetal Heartbeat Monitoring in the maternity ward, I had called Dean while he was at work and let him know where I was and to stay by his phone just in case. They swabbed my panty liner and got an inconclusive result to amniotic fluid. The doctor who was on-call came in, examined me, did an internal swab, and came back with a faint positive to a more sensitive test. At 12PM I was admitted into the hospital. Called Dean and said one word, “Come”. He jumped in the car within a few minutes and started driving.
Because I didn’t feel a gush sensation, they applied a gel inside my cervix to help speed up the process. Baby was being monitored and contractions were irregular. Mine and baby's blood pressures were also a little on the high side. When about 6hr of being admitted (6PM) I had finally felt this gush and had to jump out of the bed because I could feel liquid running out of me. My water had finally broken. The leaking would not stop! Contractions started but weren’t very strong.
Dean had finally arrived at the hospital around 8:30PM. He was coming from working on site 8hrs out of town. He had stopped at home, showered, grabbed us dinner and then came. I told him to not rush because baby was making slow progress.
During the time of waiting for Dean’s arrival, I was checked for my dilation and it was making slow progression. They gave me oxytocin** to help induce my labour because by 9PM, I had been leaking fluid for about 21hrs, and they didn’t want me to have a dry birth so wanted to speed things up. My dilation was checked again around 11PM and I was still 1CM. I was starting to experience very bad contractions and told them I wanted to receive the epidural.
I never thought that it would be that painful to receive it. I had screamed out and was full on crying in pain leaning on my nurse as a surgical doctor was doing the procedure. Within a half hour it kicked in and I had no more pains. Would I recommend an epidural? Yes I most definitely would. But brace yourself for a painful experience.
My dilation was checked again at 12AM by my nurse. She made an interesting face, looked at me, and said “I might be wrong, but I feel her labia (outter lips of the vagina), I’m going to get an ultrasound done, she may be breached” I looked at Dean with a bit of worry in my eyes. She comes back in, looks around my whole belly for about 10mins. Tells me she’s going to get another opinion. Her and another nurse come back, they look at the screen. Look at one another, than tell me “I'm sorry that we didn’t find this out sooner, but she’s breached”. My heart dropped.
The on-call doctor comes back in and apologizes for not catching it sooner. Explains that “sometimes the baby’s bum can feel like a head”. He then proceeds to tell me that “because she is breached, and you’ve been leaking fluid for almost 24hrs, you are going to have to have a cesarean.” I explained that I understood why they had to do the cesarean because we were both at risk of getting an infection. Once the doctors left the room I broke down crying. Dean was holding my hand telling me it was going to be okay. At 1:30AM, I called my mother and told her what was going to happen. Sobbing on the phone. Told her I loved her. Than I called my father, waking him up but he didn’t care, sobbing again.
At 7AM, the day of April 6th, they prepared me for the surgery. Dean got dressed in a surgical gown to be beside me while the operation happens. We become separated because they needed to prepare me without him there and then were going to bring him in. A couple minutes pass by, they up my epidural dose to make me numb so I don’t feel the surgery. They poke at my belly and I can feel it. They wait longer, poke harder and it feels worse. They give me oxygen, than a few minutes later tell me I’m being put to sleep in 15 seconds. I had no time to think. I was crying as I went going under. Apparently a nurse ran out to where Dean was and told him “You’re not allowed in, there was an emergency, Xena is going under”.
Aurora was born at 8:04AM
Three hours later I wake up from what felt like just a normal sleep. They bring me to a recovery room where we ended up staying for 3 days, which is normal for a mother who’s just gone through a cesarean. They wheel me in, still out of it, and than I hear a little cry out. A nurse says, “she knows you’re here”. I start to cry. Call out for Dean, he comes around the corner and we both get teary eyed. They pass me my daughter for the first time. So precious. Soft. Perfection. She was a healthy 7lbs 1oz.
On the last day of our stay they ran a test to find out if she was jaundice***. Just a normal routine they do on baby’s who were born c-section at my hospital, as well as after a few weeks for mothers who give birth naturally. The results came in and she was right on the borderline of having it. They then proceed to treat here under UV lights which is also completely normal for them to do.
We are happily home and recovery amazingly. I was blessed to have such amazing nurses and am grateful that the doctors made the choices they made for me and my baby to both be alive, healthy, and happy.
Hi, it's Imani here, and I am so happy to hear that everything is great with Xena and that she now has beautiful baby Aurora. I know what it's like to go through a difficult delivery but I made it through like a trooper and you sure did that Xena. Good job and best wishes mama with baby Aurora. ����
ReplyDelete