Emmy's Birth Story and My Not-Death Story

This is Emmy's story of the night she was born, but it's also my story of the night I didn't die. I struggle with that phrasing - too dramatic? - but it is accurate to how I feel. And, technically, accurate to what happened too. I am still processing that night and learning how to incorporate it into my life story. Just sitting down to actually write the words feels monumental. I hope anyone who reads this will be kind and understand that this is a step in my process and it is for me. As such, it's super long. 

[Also, I should probably put a warning here that I didn't hold back on gory details and birth terms. Also, if you have experienced something similar, this might be triggering for you.]

This was the one time when I met Emmy for a moment after she was born and before the crazy started.

Emmy was born on Thursday December 13th, 2018, at 9:00 pm, one week past her due date. At my doctor's appointment that morning, I asked to have my membranes stripped (for the 2nd time), but I was also informed that my blood pressure had gone up again. I wasn't terribly concerned because that's happened with each of my pregnancies (and I was always fine) but my midwife sent me over to the hospital to be monitored and checked for pre-eclampsia. Everything was fine but since I was dilated to about a 4 with some good strong contractions, they gave me the option of being admitted. The contractions weren't very consistent so I decided I wanted to go home and labor there (if this was really labor). (Spoiler: It was.)

We drove to McDonald's to meet up with the kids and my wonderful mother-in-law (who had picked up the kids from school on very short notice, bless her) for dinner. While we were there, my contractions got closer together and after about 20 minutes, I was uncomfortable enough to ask Tim to take me home. As soon as we got home, my contractions went from every 5 ish minutes to every 2 minutes or less. I went straight into active labor and it was intense! I could feel the baby moving down and I actually felt a distinct pop which I realized later was my cervix dilating/losing my mucus plug. At first I tried to tell Tim that we should wait a little while and that it might not be the real thing (denial, much?), but we were back in the car headed to the hospital less than 30 minutes after getting home.

I had hoped to have a natural birth again but that jump into active labor caught me off guard and I couldn't find my calm to ride out the waves. Soon after getting to the hospital, I decided to get an epidural. As it turned out (another spoiler), it was the best decision I've ever made. It took a while to get it in because of how close together my contractions were, but once it took effect, I was able to breathe and calm down and get my bearings. My doula and dearest friend Natalie arrived, my mom arrived, Tim submitted his final project for the semester, we called the girls to say goodnight. We were still trying to wrap our heads around the fact that our baby was really about to be born!

The next time my midwife checked me, I was at an 8, so she broke my water to help things move along. There was meconium in it, which was a little scary, but the baby's heart rate was holding steady. Around 8:45 pm the midwife checked me and I was at a 10! It was time! On the next contraction, I pushed three or four times, waited a sec, and pushed her out the next contraction! It was maybe 12 minutes of pushing total - I was so surprised! The cord was wrapped tightly around Emmy's neck so my midwife had me stop pushing as soon as her head was free and it took a sec to get it off. I got to hold my beautiful, slimy baby for just a minute before they whisked her over to the respiratory therapist there in the room to suction her out. It took a few minutes but she started crying and was totally fine. She had lots of dark hair that had a lovely greenish meconium tint to it, but she was completely healthy. I laughed/cried in amazement as I tried to let it sink in that she was really there and I was really done!

Or so I thought. 

Once the baby was taken care of, we turned our attention to the delivery of the placenta. The problem was, it did not want to come out. My midwife worked with it and worked with it but it would not deliver for probably close to an hour. During that time, I had two great gushes of blood (one of which directly caught my poor midwife). Finally, FINALLY, the placenta came out and the midwife was able to stitch and clean me up (small 1st degree tear in the same place I tore with my other deliveries). The placenta looked intact so we thought that was the end of it. (Spoiler: It was not.)

Shortly after that, I had a rush of lightheadedness. I let everyone know that I might pass out and they thought it was because my legs were finally down on the bed instead of up in the stirrups. They gave me an oxygen mask and I tried to breathe and stay calm. Then the pain started. On the left side, where the epidural had been the slowest to reach, I had a ton of pain. I gave it an 8 on the pain scale, and I'm generally pretty conservative about my pain scale scores. I thought maybe it was postpartum contractions, but it didn't go away and only got worse. They gave me pain meds and it only barely took the edge off. This was our first clue something was wrong. 

In the meantime, I started to feel worse in general. I had waves of lightheadedness, I was really cold, and I needed the oxygen mask. I felt terrible enough that I decided not to try to hold Emmy, and once she started to get hungry, I knew I wasn't up for trying to breastfeed. But she is the champion baby who took a bottle and drank all 30 mL of the substitute milk Tim got to feed her. (I want it noted that I am incredibly grateful for that milk and the nurses who took care of her that first night. I knew she was fine, and that helped me through the rest.)

I was also still bleeding, a lot. I couldn't see or feel it, thanks to the epidural that was still working, so I never realized how much until after everything happened. Apparently, my bleeding slowed down to a normal amount after the placenta delivered, but then started up again in waves. I was losing tons of blood. At one point, the nurses tried to draw blood from my arm and could literally squeeze only drops out. I needed a transfusion, but my midwife had left to go to another delivery (earlier when I seemed stable, not when things got dicey) so without someone in charge, things didn't happen very quickly. 

The nurses called in the backup doctor, but that took time, and even once I started receiving a transfusion (before he got there), I still felt horrible. Tim asked the nurses how long it would take for the transfusion to help and they said, "Well, she's losing blood about as fast as we can get it in her, so, not yet." 

The timeline of events is very fuzzy in my memory, because while in my head I was conscious and awake, in reality I became less and less cognizant of what was happening as I lost more and more blood. I was very focused on breathing through the pain, keeping calm, and using my voice to let people know what I was feeling and what I needed. I never really believed my life was in danger but I recognized that things were not going well. At one point, I told Tim that I didn't want to die, not because I thought it was a real possibility, but more as a "just so we're clear..." statement. Tim assured me I wouldn't die, but when he looked up and none of the nurses would make eye contact with him, he realized that it might have been a lie and that my life was in very real danger. 

I was fading in and out and trying to sleep (it was around 2 am, after all) when the backup doctor arrived along with what seemed to me to be a ton of people. Everything got loud and crazy all at once. The doctor started asking me questions to assess my coherence. The on-call anesthesiologist placed another IV (I believe I was up to four at that point, two in each arm) to get another bag of blood going but he couldn't take the time to be gentle and I ended up yelling, "What are you doing???" at him. I had taken off my glasses at some point so I couldn't really see anyone and couldn't really open my eyes anyway, so it was all just noise and chaos to me.

With the doctor there, we finally had a guess what was wrong - I had an inverted uterus, which means that my uterus had turned inside out. (Didn't know that could happen, right??) As he told Tim, he couldn't tell for sure from the initial physical assessment if that was the problem, and I would need to go to the hospital's OR to find out for sure. If he could, he'd try to correct the inversion but if they couldn't fix it quickly, I'd need an emergency hysterectomy. "Our focus right now is on saving her life," he said. 

When Tim came over to tell me what was happening, I realized he was crying. "Are you okay?" I asked, because I still didn't fully understand that I was the one not okay. He told me they were taking me to the OR. I asked if he could come with me, and he said no. I asked if Natalie (who was still there, bless her forever) could come with me, and he said no. "So I have to go alone?" I asked. He couldn't answer. 

The nurses and anesthesiologist rushed me through the hospital to the OR. (Side note: I was awake enough to think it felt like a movie to be wheeled through the hospital like that, so when we got the the OR doors and they slowed down to maneuver the bed in, I quipped, "Well this is very dramatic." No one appreciated that I still had a sense of humor but they should have!) They got me moved to the OR table and started prepping. My arms had to be out to the sides and my feet were up in candy cane stirrups. My throat was completely dry after hours of oxygen masks and I begged for some water but was told no. I was also in so much pain that I begged to be put under completely and was told no. (My epidural had gotten a boost but I could still feel the one spot that had worn off.) I was lying so flat that I couldn't breathe very well, but the oxygen mask they put on me made it even harder to breathe and I started to panic. (Thankfully they switched to a different type of mask.) 

It was 3:00 am, six hours after Emmy was born. I found out later from my medical records that they guessed I had already lost more than three liters (3,000 mL) of blood at that point (blood loss for a normal vaginal delivery is around 500 mL, blood loss for a c-section is around 1,000 mL). 

The doctor had pulled another on-call doctor from going into a c-section to come to the OR, and it turned out to be a very, very good thing. This second doctor had smaller hands (apparently) so he was able to manually reach in and push my uterus back into place. 

This was the worst moment for me. The pain was excruciating. Having your uterus pushed back into place with one hand on the inside and one hand on the outside is even more painful than it sounds. My one comfort was the nurse who held my hand and kept patting my arm, and I will be forever grateful to her for doing that. I couldn't find the deep breathing calm that had helped me for hours, and my attempts at low labor sounds turned into panicked "This hurts this hurts this hurts" cries. I couldn't thrash, I couldn't move, and I couldn't manage the pain. 

I finally turned inward and cried out to my Heavenly Father in my mind, "I CANNOT do this. You HAVE to help me." And then I "cast my mind" toward Jesus and felt, for just a moment, a kinship. I don't know how else to describe it. It was just this wordless feeling that we were the only two people in the world to know exactly what this pain felt like. And though I didn't put it into words like this until later, it was the knowledge that he had suffered that pain alone so that I didn't have to. 

Immediately after that, though it was gradual, my panic was replaced with peace. It was not the assurance that I would be okay, but it was the reassurance that I was not alone. And I saw, in my mind's eye, that the room was full of people in white, and I knew that people who loved me on the other side of the veil were with me too. The pain did not go away but my panic did, so much that I was able to breathe deeply and focus myself to get through it.  

All of that happened within just a few minutes, although it felt much much longer. The doctor was able to get my uterus back into place, remove all the placenta pieces left in there, and re-stitch up my tear. I knew the minute my uterus was restored because the excruciating pain stopped immediately.

I was stable, but there was quite a bit of care left. I received shots in both arms and they did a blood draw from my earlobe (not my finger because it wouldn't have been accurate). With each new thing, someone warned me that it might hurt and each time I just took a deep breath and said, "Okay, I'm ready." And compared to the pain I had been in, it was no problem. I started asking for information and felt (unsurprisingly) more awake than I had been for hours. My very first thought once it was over was to send someone to tell Tim I was okay. They told me they would but not yet, so about five-ish minutes later I asked again. I wanted to make sure he knew I was alright.

They moved me to a post-op recovery room for an hour. (I asked again if Tim could be there with me, and again they said no. Jeesh.) I was finally coherent enough to ask questions and chat with the nurses, even though I was completely exhausted. (Funny side note: At one point I asked what time it was and when they told me 4:30 am, I said, "Well no wonder I'm so tired!" Still didn't connect that I was tired because I'd just lost a ton of blood.) I ended up receiving a total of 4 units of blood and 1 or 2 units of plasma, plus bags and bags of pitocin (like 7 altogether). The doctors said no food or liquids until the morning, but my throat was completely parched. I needed a drink so badly, so one of the nurses got permission to give me water on a little sponge. I drank a whole cup of water that way, with that sweet nurse sponging it to me one tiny bit at a time. I'm still humbled to remember her service to me - it meant more than she will probably ever know.

Finally, FINALLY, they wheeled me back to my room, which the housecleaning staff should have won an award for cleaning what appeared to be a murder scene back to a pristine hospital room. I was so glad to see Tim, though not as glad as he was to see me since he had a much better grasp on the situation than I did. Natalie stayed with him and kept him from falling apart while I was gone, something we can never thank her enough for. She sponged me another cup of water while the nurses got me set up (one of my IVs came out!), and I finally got to sleep for a little bit before the shift change in the morning. 

There is one last piece of the story: I still hadn't held Emmy and was extremely anxious to do so. After I got to eat breakfast (almost 5 hours post OR), I tried to sleep again but I couldn't relax and settle enough to do it. So around 8:30 or so, I asked my nurse to bring in Emmy so I could finally meet her. 

When the nurse brought her in, she was so quiet I thought she was asleep, but in fact, she'd just had gunk (including more meconium) pumped out of her stomach and was wide awake but totally chill. The nurse handed her to me, I got her undressed for skin-to-skin, held her up to my chest, and just wept. I had waited 12 hours to hold my precious baby and I will never, ever forget that moment when I finally did. The nurse got us settled and then gave us some privacy. I snuggled Emmy and marveled at her, and she quickly fell asleep against me. Before long, I was struggling to stay awake myself and called the nurse to take her again. After that, I was finally able to sleep.

The process of recovering from that experience emotionally is ongoing, for both me and Tim, but I am fully recovered physically. I can even have more babies if I want, though we're not ready to face that yet. If you are still reading, bless you. This was very much more for me than for anyone else. I am still grappling with understanding what happened and have researched and learned a ton about uterine inversion, if anyone wants to know more. 

I am also still tremendously and eternally grateful to be alive, grateful for blood and plasma donors, grateful for competent doctors and nurses, and grateful for all the people who helped us out during my extended recovery. Grateful for my Savior, who walked through that experience with me. Grateful for eternal families on both sides of the veil. 

And grateful for my body. I never felt like my life was in danger because my body carried me through that experience. It sounds odd but I really felt like we were a team, my body and I. Even when I was not totally conscious, my body stepped up and was strong for me. She was amazing, IS amazing, and I am so grateful.

One month already

Our darling Rosie is a month old already and we love her more and more. She's already giving us the most mischievous smiles and sideways glances that tell me she's got so much personality to share. She eats like a champ and is consequently growing like a weed (she's already up to 9 lbs!), and best of all, she sometimes sleeps! She even slept for a full 5 1/2 hour stretch last night, which Georgie didn't do until she was 3 months old. Her naps are a little sporadic but she'll generally take two or three long naps during the day. That being said, she also likes to be awake, sometimes for ridiculously long stretches. I'm talking two or occasionally even three hours at a time. She is mostly a content baby, especially if she's being held, but definitely and loudly lets us know when something is amiss - this one's already got opinions for sure.

This month has been hard, but not more than we expected and I feel like it's ending on a good note. Figuring out the emotional and physical logistics of how to feed, change, put to sleep, and positively interact with two littles and take care of myself and hopefully have something left to give Tim is the daily, and sometimes insurmountable, challenge with the second child. I've battled lots of mama guilt over losing my patience with Georgie and lots of worry that I'm not holding/cuddling/interacting with Rosie enough. Some days it's been too much, especially after particularly rough nights, and my emotions have been very raw as a consequence. But every time this month got too hard, I reminded myself that things would be different in a day, a week, two weeks. We are moving forward and all I have to do is take it one day and one night at a time. 

And here we are and now I can look back at the last four weeks and say it wasn't so bad. Overall, my recovery was easy and nursing has been pretty straightforward, plus the girls' naps generally overlap for a little while in the afternoons so I can get a little extra rest. I remember that with Georgie, that first month was a constant struggle (see my post about it here) emotionally and physically, and while I've done my fair share of crying (thank you, postpartum hormones) and feeling physically spent, at the end of month one I am feeling almost...capable. Normal. Way less anxious than last time. We still have a long way to go and things will be different in a month - not better, just different - so I am just going to enjoy this feeling while it lasts.

Methinks these two are sisters. What do you think?

How she got here - Rosie's birth story

I've rewritten this post over and over as I've oscillated between wanting to honestly share my experience of Rosie's birth and worrying about over sharing. But one of the things I have learned about myself recently is that I am not very good at being open with my emotions, especially in the last few months while I've had some hard emotions to handle. But that's another subject; the point is, this is going to be relatively long and detailed, so if you prefer to skip to the photos, I don't blame you. 

For Rosie's birth, I wanted to have the natural birth experience I didn't get to have with Georgie, and to do that, I really needed to go into labor on my own. Being induced again was my biggest concern and even though I knew that 2nd babies usually come a little earlier and faster, I was still worried about it. I also really wanted the midwife who delivered Georgie to be there but she was out of the country for most of March so I knew that probably wouldn't happen. At the beginning of March, I did everything I could to get my labor going (pineapple, walking stairs, heartburn-inducing food, hypnosis tracks, etc.) but to no avail and we missed our window for my midwife Dena to be there. At my last appointment with her, I wasn't even progressed far enough for her to strip my membranes - super disappointing. Anxiety reigned supreme during the first two weeks of March as I waited for any signs that it was baby time. Once we passed my due date, my anxiety lessened considerably. I wasn't surprised to go late again and it meant that one way or the other, I would have a baby soon. 

A few days after my due date, I was able to have my membranes stripped at my appointment and that night, I started having some good contractions - finally! They continued the next day, slowed down the next, and stopped altogether the day after that. Super disappointing, again. As per medical standards, we went to the hospital the next day (Friday) for a stress test and ultrasound to make sure the baby was okay. We weren't worried; for us, after doing that twice with Georgie, it was just business as usual. And everything was fine (though every person we talked to was pretty insensitive to the whole natural birth/no induction thing) and I asked the nurse to check me. No progress but she did a "very thorough check" (aka stripped my membranes again) so we left hopeful that we'd have a baby that weekend. And on the up side, our other favorite midwife was on call all weekend and Dena would be back in the country on Monday, so we didn't have to worry about running into the midwife we didn't like.

The rest of Friday was very laid back - Tim took the day off, his mom was in town so we got to hang out with her, and my mom came over for dinner. I had no contractions at all but by the end of the day, I was aching down my legs and back and just didn't feel good. We went to bed at our usual late hour and I remember telling Tim that I felt really hopeful that having a newborn would be better this time around, especially with the warmer weather coming and living in an apartment above the ground with lots of light.

I woke up about 1:30 with strong contractions that were about 10 minutes apart. I tried to go back to sleep but around 2:00, I gave up and got up, cautiously excited that this might be it. By 3:00 the contractions were 5-6 minutes apart, so I woke up Tim just to let him know but told him to go back to sleep if he could. About five minutes later I decided I needed Tim to help me through the contractions and he got up. I got in the bath and Tim timed the contractions; by 4:00 they were 2-3 minutes apart and we decided it was time to head to the hospital. We called Tim's mom to come over and stay with Georgie and called my mom and best friend/doula Natalie to meet us at the hospital. We got there around 4:30 (the fourth couple in an hour to come in), got checked in, and when I was checked, I was at a 5+. We didn't get into our room until 5:30 but we got one of the biggest rooms that was also further away from the noisy areas. (Contrast that to my first delivery in a very small room that was directly next to the nurses' station, and this room seemed amazing!)

The rest of the labor is a bit blurry in my mind. I remember moments, things I said, things other people said. I remember small details but the overall progression of the morning feels very dreamlike to me. I was on my birthing ball for awhile, then I stood for a bit, then I ended up kneeling on the bed and bracing myself against the back. I tried listening to one of my Hypnobabies tracks but it got annoying (we had some jokes going about some of the things on there) so I switched to my compilation of calming songs from my BYU Women's Chorus choir CDs. Natalie talked me through the contractions, especially as they got harder and lower and "pushy", and Natalie, Tim, and my mom took turns giving counter pressure and holding my hands. The nurse offered to check me but at that point, the thought of changing positions was overwhelming, so we waited. I remember getting through some of those harder, pushy contractions and feeling confident, even empowered to realize that I was doing it and getting through it.

By the time Sue came in, I was losing steam. She checked me and I was at an 8; she suggested breaking my water in order to get things to finish and I agreed. The next contraction after breaking my water was so much stronger without that cushion that I started to panic about getting through the rest. There were about 20 more minutes of transition, which I got through on the back of the bed, and then about 20 minutes or so of pushing. I was very embarrassed to find myself getting through the contractions and pushing urges very loudly, but everyone assured me that I was doing great. 

Looking back, I think it was the feeling of being totally out of control that overwhelmed me the most. Everything was so intense and I really lost my ability to be logical for awhile there. I remember screaming, essentially, into the back of the bed for a couple of contractions, and I remember Natalie having to verbally slap me back to myself (aka she spoke sharply enough that it got my attention and she could help me calm down). I remember thinking several times about asking for an epidural but I never said it out loud, so no one knew how much I was thinking about it! Pushing was almost a relief, especially because there was a break in between contractions.

Rosie was born at 8:48 am and as soon as she was out and I was done, it was like my body just quit. I don't think I've ever been so exhausted and wiped out so immediately. I actually couldn't process what people were saying to me for a minute, I was so spent. Rosie was very purple upon arrival but she pinked up quickly, cried loudly, and had good Apgar scores. I loved holding her for those first few minutes but I didn't mind handing her over to be cleaned up so I could just be exhausted. 

Getting me stitched and cleaned up took a long time so it was actually quite awhile before I got to hold Rosie again, but after she was bundled up and handed over to her daddy, she quit crying and just looked around and around. She was just awake and alert and totally calm for hours after her birth - I couldn't believe how calm she was.

Several people have asked how this unmedicated birth compares to a medicated one. One person even asked me just a few hours after Rosie was born when I was still beyond exhausted and I was like, "Well, at this point, I'm never having another baby again, so...." But in all honesty, there are pros and cons to both. Unmedicated was more exhausting and more draining, both physically and emotionally. The pressure of the contractions and the pushing there at the end was so intense that I couldn't keep it all in, hence the screaming like a crazy woman (though I have been assured many times it wasn't nearly as loud as I think it was). But the recovery has seemed much easier this time and I really loved how alert Rosie was afterwards. I think part of what made it so hard was that once I had an epidural with Georgie, I slept until it was time to push and even though I could feel the pressure, there wasn't any of the pain. So this time, I didn't have a frame of reference for where I was in the process; I kept thinking I had to be almost done and then I'd realize I wasn't. It's like hiking and thinking you're almost to the top, only to get there and realize that was just one hill and the actual top of the mountain was still a steep, uphill climb away. And that was incredibly hard on me, emotionally and mentally. So would I do it again? I can't say yet, but I know that next time would be easier, if only because I would know what to expect with more accuracy.

Now for the pictures!

Maternity pics for baby #2

I don't think it's usual to take maternity pics for your second (or more) baby, but I've finally assembled Georgie's baby book and I don't want Rosie's to be half the size because she's baby #2. I mean, how is that fair? So my awesome sister once again agreed to take some photos for us, which double nicely as current family photos. No outfit changes this time (except for Georgie's "Big Sister" shirt) and all pictures were taken in my mom's backyard. For the record, I'm 37 weeks in these pictures, and I think they turned out pretty well! Thanks again, Rachel!!

Because life is full of surprises

Due March 14, 2014

Apparently they don't make "Big Sister" shirts for one-year-olds.

Excited. Overwhelmed. Grateful. Here we go again!

Happy one month birthday, Georgie girl!

This past month has felt both flown by and felt like one very long day and night. We survived the first four weeks, and that "we" includes Georgie. All in all, she has put up with her very inexperienced parents very well and is responding to us more and more - I love it when I can tell she recognizes me or my voice!

This month brought some unexpected challenges with it. Not only have we survived the sleepless nights, we have learned and re-learned and then re-learned again how to breastfeed. We survived Georgie choking and starting to turn blue on her first day home. We survived me having postpartum high blood pressure (basically pre-eclampsia, only after delivery) for two weeks. We survived Georgie not gaining enough weight and the accompanying guilt and extra feedings. We survived finding not one, but two black widow spiders in our living room (plus one outside our bedroom window). We survived my having the beginnings of a yeast infection, which then developed into an allergic reaction to something (still not sure what) that spread across my chest, down my arms, and up my face, swelling one of my eyes almost completely shut. Who knew that my health would be the roadblock to a smooth first month at home?

Mostly, we have learned so much in our Parenting 101 crash course. For example, we've learned that the less sleep I get, the less I am able to cope with a crying baby who won't eat no matter what I do and when I start crying too, it's time for Tim to step in. We've learned Tim's still got mad staying up all night skills when the situation calls for it (and I bless him for it). We learned that setting up a crib in your bedroom doesn't mean that's where the baby will be the happiest sleeping. Cleaning your kitchen takes a very far backseat to sleeping when we get the chance. And having something to watch during the long hours of the night not only makes them go a little faster, it also helps us stay awake. 

Most of this month has been operated in survival mode - one meal at a time, one load of laundry at a time, one hour of sleep at a time - and I'm not afraid to admit it. Just the fact that we made it this far is enough for me. It has felt like a "two steps forward, one step back" dance so being able that we have made progress is very rewarding. We're on the other side of a month and I know that in another month, things will be different again. Maybe not better, but different. Today I took Georgie for a walk, and tomorrow we will attempt to go to church. Slowly, something resembling normal life is creeping back into our home. Par for the Parenting 101 course, I think. It helps that Georgie is so stinkin' cute, makes it easier to remember why we decided to sign up for this course in the first place. And I know that someday, probably sooner than I think, I'll be looking back on all this fondly and wishing a little bit that my girl could be so tiny again.

How she got here

Georgie is three weeks old today, and I feel like I am still processing her birth. Is three weeks enough time to understand such a tremendous experience? Probably not, but I wanted to make sure I got the details down before I started forgetting things. Standard long birth story follows - skip to the photos if you want!

First thing to know is that I planned on doing a natural childbirth. It's something I thought a lot about and I really wanted - I wanted to be able to be fully present for the birth of my baby. Tim and I did the Hypnobabies home course and it was awesome. The relaxation techniques really helped me stay calm and positive throughout my pregnancy instead of being an anxious basket case all the time. I felt prepared and was ready to do it.

Because I had been measuring small and every ultrasound showed that the baby was a little small, we expected that I'd be a late. When I hit 41 weeks, we went to the hospital for a nonstress test and ultrasound. Everything checked out just fine, but one of the midwives I'd been seeing (let's call her Carrie) happened to be at the hospital so she came in and talked to me about getting induced. She wasn't my favorite person to work with before that, but then she threw out things like "increased chance of stillbirth" and "the baby's getting bigger and your pelvis is only so big." Fun things like that. I had to be really insistent that I didn't want to be induced, especially because the only reason for it was that I was overdue - there were no actual medical concerns. I knew it would be much harder to have a natural birth if I didn't go into labor on my own, so I told her no. I was very proud of myself for speaking up, especially when if felt like Carrie was trying to scare me. 

I went back two days later (Wednesday) for another nonstress test. The ultrasound was fine and I thought the nonstress test was too, but then Carrie came in and told me they were seeing some variables on the test. The baby's heart rate was dropping slightly when I was contracting, which indicated she could be in some stress. It wasn't an emergency, but it was a concern. Carrie told me that I needed to be induced and even started talking about keeping me there overnight. I asked to just come back in the next morning, and she agreed - I'm pretty sure it's the only reason she let me leave the hospital. Now that I'm not in the moment, I can see why she was so insistent but at the time, I felt manipulated and scared and heartbroken that I wouldn't be allowed to go into labor on my own. I went home to Tim with a 6:30 induction scheduled for the next morning, but as we talked (and I cried) and processed, we felt strongly like it was all for the best, especially since the midwife I liked the most, Dena, was on call the next day so I wouldn't have to deal with Carrie. We let my doula (and best friend since high school ) Natalie know and got ready and excited to have a baby the next day.

We went in late the next morning because I elected to sleep in a little (and Dena didn't come on call until 9 am). Dena started me on a cervix softener around 9:30 since I was still just at a 1, and since you have to wait four hours after a cervix softener is administered to start pitocin, we watched two episodes of Pushing Daisies while we waited. Dena came back and broke my water at noon, and the contractions started to pick up. In the process of moving around to find a comfortable position, I got really dizzy so I had to be in bed and on oxygen for most of the rest of the day. At two, they started up the pitocin. I think I would have been okay to labor naturally if I'd been able to move around and change positions, but the contractions were already pretty intense so I asked for some drugs in my IV to take the edge off. Mostly the drugs just made me sleepy but between that, the relaxing music I put on my iPod, and my Hypnobabies training, I breathed my way through the next three hours. I went from a 3 to an 8 in that time and was feeling "pushy," but I was already completely exhausted, both physically and mentally, so I asked for an epidural. Once that kicked in, I was able to take a nap for about an hour and a half, which was awesome and exactly what I needed.

When I woke up around 7 or so, I was (finally!) at a 10. We put on my "Feel Good" playlist to help wake me up and set the mood, and when Dena came in to get everything set up, we totally had a dance party. That's one of my favorite details of the day - I can't wait until Georgie is old enough to appreciate that there was literally dancing and singing when she was born! There were only six songs on the playlist (the rest of my music hadn't transferred for some reason) so we listened to them about four times while I pushed. After almost exactly an hour, Georgie was born a minute before 8:30 with lots of blonde hair. The cord was wrapped around her neck twice, but she wasn't ever in distress - her heart rate had stayed steady throughout the entire day, during the contractions and drugs and pushing, everything. She came through it all like a champ. 

They put her up on my stomach right away and those first moments of holding her were indescribably surreal. I was so exhausted and so awake at the same time. I remember lots of people around us, lots of hands reaching in to wipe her off, cut the cord, etc., but they seemed so disembodied; I only had eyes and ears for her. Tim was the only other person in focus - the rest of the room was literally a blur. They cleaned her up and cleaned me up and when I finally got to hold her again, it was just incredible. I couldn't believe we were a family of three and I was holding the tiny person who had lived inside of me for all those months. And watching Tim hold his daughter and bond with her - priceless. He was (and is) so in love. These pictures aren't the best quality, but I love how much they capture the emotions of those moments,

 And even though this photo is blurry, I can't get enough of the look on Tim's face.

And here are some more recent pictures of our sweet girl, just for fun:

 Can you tell I haven't slept much?

 This was totally un-posed, by the way. So stinkin' cute!

This cute little dress is the only thing that actually fits her right now - she's still too little for her 0-3 month clothes.

Tim went to California for a few days for his brother's wedding and holding Georgie was the first thing he did when he got back.

 
This is the look we get when she's totally chilled out. When she purses her lips like that, it means she doesn't want anything else to eat. I think it's hilarious.

Conference weekend

As much as I love General Conference weekend (and I do!), it took a back seat to staring at (and feeding, changing, bathing, and calming) this cutie:

We've survived the first 10 days, mostly with a lot of help from my mom. Tim is going to go back to work tomorrow and I'll be on my own for the afternoons. We are still trading off being awake at night but hopefully we'll be able to all three sleep at night (and all in the same room) soon. Georgie is a very chill baby, for the most part. Just in the last couple of days she's started to sleep less and fuss and scream more, which is to be expected now that she's not brand new. But she's generally pretty easy to calm and we are starting to recognize her cues better, which definitely helps. Mostly we think she's adorable and that makes even the screaming easier to deal with.

I am feeling pretty good, up and about and sort of dressing myself. I don't think I've slept for more than 2 1/2 hours at a time since we came home from the hospital, but Tim is amazing and makes sure I get enough naps to be able to function. We are just taking it really easy, one day and night at a time. Sometimes it's just one feeding at a time, depending on the amount of crying going on (either hers or mine - postpartum hormones are so crazy!). It's amazing how days and nights just run together when you have a new baby, and amazing how much stuff ends up everywhere - wipes, blankets, burp clothes, dishes, water bottles. It's  really about survival at this point, but I keep reminding myself that it will get better and even in just a week, we'll have made progress. In the meantime, I'll just keep enjoying my tiny snuggly baby. Love her!

Georgiana Kaylee Herrick

She's here. She's perfect. I'm still processing what that means, but in the meantime, we are so completely in love. 

Georgiana Kaylee Herrick

Sep. 27th, 2012

8:29 pm

7 lb 3 oz

18 1/2 inches

Still here

41 weeks and still pregnant. We suspected this baby was going to be late and it's a little bit nice to be right, though I'd really rather just have a baby soon. I've made a little bit of progress and everything is still good - she's moving a lot, has a good heart rate, fluid levels are fine - and since I don't want to be induced if I can possibly help it, we're just going to keep waiting until she is ready. But I have a feeling it'll be this week; she's going to be a September baby for sure. 

In the meantime, I finally re-finished the edges of the quilt I made for her that ended up in one of our magazines because we were short a few projects. Here's the quilt and the published pictures:

Hopefully my next post will include pictures of a baby!

Dear Baby Girl,

Today was your official due date but in spite of all your pushing and stretching, you weren't quite ready to come out. I know you're squished in there - I can feel it! - and I promise there's more room for you to stretch on the outside. But you take your time; I want you to be as ready as you can be before you make your debut. It's a bigger world out here, and it'll be completely overwhelming at first, but I promise, it's beautiful. The mountains are dotted with red leaves and the blue sky is absolutely luscious. There is so much beauty here, so much love and happiness and delight. Don't wait too long to start this adventure with your daddy and me, okay? We love you so much and we can't wait to meet you!

Love, Mama

Craziest. Week. Ever.

Life didn't slow down this week, not even a little bit. It was the craziest week. It started out busy (see previous post about nesting) and then Tim got a really nasty virus that pretty much laid him out for two days. (He slept for about 12 hours two nights in a row - he never does that!) I did not get sick, thankfully, but having a sick husband and a crazy nesting instinct is no fun when you can't move furniture by yourself.

Then we had my weekly appointment with the midwives and I was measuring small so they sent us to do a nonstress test and get an ultrasound to make sure everything was okay. We were pretty sure things were fine and my belly was measuring small because the baby dropped, but we weren't going to say no to an ultrasound! I did kinda freak out a little after that appointment, but to help me feel better, Tim took me shopping and we got a few last things for the baby and then we finished getting our room set up. Tim's so good to me. :) The nonstress test and ultrasound were totally fine - the baby's just low and measuring about a week behind her due date which is exactly what we were told at the 20 week ultrasound. So nothing to worry about there. (As a side note, we got a few pics from the ultrasound and we got to see the baby's face! And she has cute little chubby cheeks already - it's kind of adorable.)

Then the night after the ultrasound, we discovered that the pipe from the washing machine to the drain was broken when I did an extra-large load of laundry and all the water from that load flooded our furnace room, entryway, bathroom, part of the kitchen, and then soaked through the furnace room wall to get the carpet in our hallway wet. Yeah. That happened. There was enough water in the bathroom that I had to sweep it out into the garage before I could soak it up with towels. There wasn't a lot of damage, just stuff to clean up, but we were very worried about the walls and carpet mildewing or molding. My awesome brother-in-law Jase does construction so we listened when he told us to pull up the carpet in the hallway to get the pad dry underneath. The pipe got fixed the very next day and the pad and carpet are mostly dry now, but the dry wall in the furnace room will probably have to be replaced which means things are still in a state of semi-disarray. Just what we wanted to deal with right before having a baby, right?

Luckily, my mom had already volunteered to come down and help me do some deep cleaning on Saturday, so she helped us get the kitchen and bathroom to rights, among other things. My parents are so awesome - it was such a huge relief to have them over!

We also went and toured the birthing center at Orem Community Hospital this week and mostly pre-registered. My insurance is still in the process of switching over to COBRA so we only got half of it done and we're now impatiently waiting for my new insurance card so we can finish. 

And then to finish the week, Sunday was our ward's Primary program, which went really well, but was exhausting. I am really, really glad I could be there for it and I kept telling people it was the last thing on my list so I was free to have a baby now. I'm thinking I should probably try to recover from this last week first, but I'm 39 weeks and in spite of the pulled up carpet and dry wall needing to be replace, I'm ready to have a baby!

My favorite part of the week was definitely finishing our room. Everything is so clean and nested! (And yes, we do sleep with two different blankets right now - makes it much easier for each of us to regulate the temperature throughout the night.)

And here's what our hallway looks like - pulled back carpet, industrial fan, and lamp because the light fixture is broken. Good times.

Nesting

So nesting is a real thing. We hit September (literally) and my inner alarm clock went off. All summer I've been mentally counting down to now, saying that once we made it to September, this baby could come anytime. That really hit me this weekend, and so I've been on a sort of nesting frenzy. At least, that's where I assume the bursts of energy are coming from. Rearranging furniture, cleaning, making lists - I just feel like I'm running out of time. And I guess I am - this little girl is due in two weeks! I started out the summer with a very long list of stuff I wanted to get done around the house, and after I got really stressed out about not being able to fit it all in, I started making cuts. I realized that I could have a baby even if the spare room closet was not cleaned out or if my car was not vacuumed. I eventually a made a must-do list and now I'm even starting to cross things off of that. I mean, there are some things that can only happen before the baby is born - there's no point in touring the hospital afterward - but other things can wait if they have to. That's what I keep telling myself, anyway, and I think it's working. 

To cut to the chase: 38 weeks and I'm nesting. Lots of contractions but nothing super strong or long. Lots of things to get done at work but I'm on track to finish it all this week. Lots of things to get ready around the house but with Tim's help, I think I'll get it all done. A few things left to do before I'll feel ready to have a baby. We're days, not weeks, away from meeting our little girl and underneath the stress, I'm so excited!

Baby book review

My goal to read something in August devolved into reading one of the baby books that's been recommended to me and I never quite got around to more recreational reading - a sad harbinger of things to come, I think. Hopefully I can still find time to read once I have a little baby taking up all my attention! (If you are a mother and know better, don't burst my illusions just yet. Just smile and let me discover it on my own.)

In any event, I read The Happiest Baby on the Block by Dr. Harvey Karp and I was/am very glad I finally got a chance to read it. The tips and tricks for calming newborns and all the theories behind them were very interesting and will be sanity-saving, I'm pretty positive. I've heard a lot about the different theories of having a new baby - putting her on a schedule, letting her cry it out, etc. - but this book seemed like a really nice middle ground with a solid scientific backing. Definitely recommended for new mothers (in my almost new mother opinion), and as a bonus, our copy came with a short DVD that I watched with Tim so we are both educated now. Maybe I'll have to do a follow-up post in a few months and report on if this works for us!

35 days

My weekly pregnancy/baby email told me today that I am 35 weeks with 35 days left to go until my due date. 35 days??? Where did the time go??? I might be slightly freaking out now...

Feeling loved

Yesterday was my baby shower and I felt so loved! My amazing sister Rachel went all out creating beautiful decorations and putting together lots of yummy food and organizing onesie/bib/burp cloth decorating - it was so great! And I was so happy to see so many friends. Thank you all for coming!!!

Pictures from the day:

And here are the onesies everyone decorated. Aren't they super cute?

And thank you again and again to everyone who went in on the stroller and car seat. It was so generous and we really really appreciate it - now we can have a baby!