At 34 weeks, 4 days, Allen and I attended a baptism in our ward. He was the ward mission leader so we made it a point to be present at every baptism that took place. We enjoyed the evening, chatted with the sister missionaries, the new member, and the family. We cleaned up the chairs, drained the font, and went out the doors.
As I made my way down the stairs, I counted wrong. And I fell.
I actually took a big, old dive. I ended up flying beyond the last step, over the sidewalk, and into the parking lot. I landed face down, right on my tummy.
I yelled out, "My underwear!" I was in a dress, after all. And it had come up.
Allen yelled, "Who cares about your underwear! Are you ok?"
I was really embarrassed, but felt fine.
When we got home, I decided to take it easy and climbed into bed.
Then, I felt a little bitty pop. And a little bitty gush.
I called the nurse; she asked me if I had, perhaps, just peed my pants. Um, yeah. Pretty sure I would know if I'd just pissed myself, thankyouverymuch. So, she told me to go in "just to be safe." I grabbed my purse, and we went to the hospital.
When we got there, they did an ultrasound. The amniotic fluid was low. And, they confirmed, my water had broken.
I asked, "So, um, do I make an appointment to see my doctor?"
They replied, "Honey, you aren't leaving here until you have a baby."
Did I mention all I had was my purse?
They talked to the neonatalogist about the best course of action. The team decided my best bet was to wait 2-3 days to see if I went into labor. They put my in a room, and told me to get comfy.
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| Home away from home. |
I hung out there for a couple of days. Allen kept going to work. He would come visit for a bit after work and then go home to try and prepare a place for the baby. Some days, he would call me first, go home (45 minutes from work), get me more things I'd realized I would need, come back to the hospital and then drive home again around 11 p.m.
Then, late one evening, the doctor came in. He explained that because I hadn't gone into labor, the safest thing would be to induce me and get the baby out. At almost 35 weeks, she was big enough to be healthy. The risk of infection was increasing, and getting her out was almost an emergency. They would start pitocin first thing in the morning.
On Monday morning 6 a.m., they moved me into a delivery room and started the drug. Twelve hours later, at shift change, they checked me (no progress) and took me off of the drug. They gave me chicken broth for dinner and wished me a good night.
On Tuesday morning at 6 a.m., they started the pitocin again. Twelve hours later, they checked me again (still no progress), gave me my broth, and promised to come back the next day.
On Wednesday, they told me that "today would be the day". They got my pitocin going and even had the anesthesiologist come in early that morning to put in an epidural.
At 6 p.m. Wednesday, they checked me again. I was at a 1. I started to cry. The doctor looked at me with disdain and said, "Why are you crying?"
I'd been in the hospital for almost a week. I was scared. I'd been on pitocin for 36 hours and only made 1 cm of progress. Every few hours, a NICU representative would come in and explain what would happen when our baby was born. How she should be fine (they even chose not to give me steroids to help the baby's lungs because at 35 weeks, she should be good-to-go), but they would have the whole team there to help "just in case". Allen had been with me this whole time, and had no days off from work left. When the baby did come, I would be pretty much alone. I felt like it was time for a few tears to drop.
Rather than take me off of the drug at shift change that night, they kept me on it. And, they broke my water.
Wait? What? Wasn't I there because my water had broken almost a week earlier? Wasn't the baby in grave danger?
As it turns out, I'd probably had a very small leak at the very top and my water had, in fact, filled right back up. No infection. No risk to the baby. You heard me right. Yet here we were, 3 days into induction.
As time marched on that evening, I started to make progress. Despite the epidural I'd been given, I was in a lot of pain. Around 11 p.m., I'd had it. I was so tired. The pain was awful; I had complete back labor. I could feel the baby kicking the catheter as she moved around. I could feel every contraction. I was rigid and tense because of the pain, and that wasn't helping my progress.
The nurse came in, moved some tubes around, poked my leg, and said, "What did you expect, you're in labor?" And, she left.
The doctor came in at midnight and checked me again. I was a 9, almsot a 10. She told me if I wanted to try and push, I could.
So, I did. For over an hour. I pushed, and pushed, and pushed.
And at 2:30 a.m., she got a call to do an emergency c-section. She said they would take me off the pitocin, let me rest, and then try it again.
I completely broke down. I didn't have anything left. I was weary, and my resolve was broken. I'd been on pitocin for 42 hours. I been pushing for hours. How was I going to do this any longer?
In walks a woman I'd never seen before (and I'd seen everyone who worked there having been in the hospital for so long). They called her, "the interceptor". She took my hand and, for the first time since I'd been admitted, asked me, "What do YOU want to do?"
I just wanted to get that baby out.
An hour later, at 3:23 a.m., Thursday morning, I had a c-section.
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| Allen took this picture of me the morning after surgery. |
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