Ada is asleep, my mom is making chocolate cake, and I finally have enough energy to post a blog about my hospital stay :) So here's what happened...
First of all, for two weeks leading up to my due date I was only dilated one centimeter.... my goodness that was frustrating news. The first time the midwife told me that I was dilated to a one I thought, "That's okay. I'm anxious for her to be here, but not anxious enough for her to come two weeks early." I still had to mentally prepare myself for what was to come. Then, on Monday August 8th.... four days before my due date, I go back to the doctor again only to find out I'm still dilated to a one. We made an appointment with the hospital for me to be induced exactly one week after my due date, August 18th... today! The good news was that at the very latest Ada would join our family on the 18th. The bad news? I would most likely have to be pregnant for another week. Yuck. I was not looking forward to that. Not to mention, since I had an "unfavorable" cervix, if I had not progressed at all by the Tuesday before my induction, they would have to place a catheter in me to.... help things move along. That sounded equally uncomfortable. I called my mom after my doctor appointment to update her and to talk about what she would want to do since she had a plane ticket to fly out here the very next day. She thought about changing her flight for a week later because there was no sign of Ada coming any time soon, but I told her to save the money and keep her original flight. If anything, she could just hang out with a super pregnant daughter and her husband for a week until the excitement began. So at this point, I wasn't planning on having my baby for another week and a half and my mom was coming the next day to wait with us.
On Wednesday night, the night before my due date, Niels and I went to our Webelos den meeting. I was feeling perfectly fine, still no sign of going in to labor any time soon. One of our Webelos' moms asked me when I was due. I hated that question now, because yes I was due the next day, but we were really going to have our baby a week later. I told her my due date, but simply said that won't happen because I have hardly progressed. She then proceeded to tell me a little secret. She told me to drink raspberry tea because it supposedly softens the cervix, and therefore helps progress labor. At that point I was willing to try anything. Niels and I had grown very fond of August 11th being Ada's birthday. As soon as Scouts was over, my mom, Niels, and I went on a hunt looking for raspberry tea. We bought some, and I drank a quart of it over the next several hours.
At 7:30 the next morning (August 11th), I had my first contraction. The next one occured forty minutes later, and then another one forty minutes after that. I decided to call my doctor. I scheduled an appointment to get looked at once Niels got home from work. By the time my appointment rolled around at 11:40, my contractions were every ten minutes. To my pleasant surprise, I was dilated to three centimeters and about 90% effaced!! (I hope this isn't too much information....) My midwife told me to go home and wait it out until my contractions were so painful I couldn't walk or talk anymore. We went home and decided to do laundry at the laundromat because there was no way I was going to do it the day we got home from the hospital.
It seems like as soon as we left the doctor's office my contractions suddenly started occuring just five minutes apart. I dealt with that uncomfortable fact for the next hour and a half during laundry time and when we got home at about 2:30 my contractions started getting so bad that I would collapse to my knees in pain, and they were now every three minutes. That's when Niels demanded that we go to the hospital. haha. I didn't want to go yet. I wanted to go back to the doctor to get checked again to see how dilated I was. When another contraction hit, though, I gave in and we quickly went up to labor and delivery, got checked in, and before I knew it, I was in a gown, on a hospital bed, and really REALLY wanting my epidural. Unfortunately, the anesthesiologist got called in to an emergency C-section, so he was busy. I waited for an hour and a half, dealing with the worst kind of pain (I don't even know how to describe it, but I also don't want to alarm any of my friends who haven't had babies yet. I survived, and I have a baby. That's all that matters). I was very... on edge. I wouldn't let Niels near me. I didn't want him touching me, and every time my mom spoke, it annoyed me. hahaha. I sound awful, but I just wanted to deal with my pain alone. My poor husband and mom sat in the corner of the room while one nurse dug a needle into my arm trying to find a vein for my IV, and another one asked me all sorts of questions; all while I moaned in pain. Thankfully, the hospital called in another anesthesiologist to come and rescue me. I let him do his thing and soon I was in paradise. I no longer felt any pain whatsoever, I was smiling again, and enjoying t.v. My midwife showed up, checked me out, and said she wanted the contractions to help roll things along on their own before I started pushing, so she was going to go have dinner and be back at 8:00. That was fine by me. I was happy as a clam, though a little hungry.
At around 7:00, Ada's heartbeat went down, way down. An average baby's heartbeat is between 120 and 160 beats per minute. The monitor showed hers was down to 90 beats per minute. I was freaking out. The nurse was concerned, so she called in my midwife a little early in fear of too much stress being put on my unborn baby if we waited any longer. I began pushing and after an hour and a half of that I had an adorable, yet wet, baby girl lying on top of me. It was incredible.
In a thirteen hour period, I went from having small stomach aches to being a mom. Only about half of that time was spent in the hospital; from the time I got admitted to the time Ada was in my arms. I feel very lucky to have only been in labor for that long. Some women could have been there overnight waiting to become fully dilated if they arrived at the same time I did. I was a very surreal experience. I remember sitting there, between pushes, thinking, "Wow, I'm having a baby. Right now. I am pushing a baby out, and it's nothing like how they portray it in movies. Though, that may have been because I had an epidural. I'm not sure. All I know is that epidurals are my friend. I felt quite a bit of pressure at the very end, to the point where it was uncomfortable, but it wasn't painful. And the actual process of receiving an epidural was less painful than getting an IV. It really was hardly painful at all.
I don't know if it was the raspberry tea or not that brought Ada to us on her due date. I'd like to say it was, but I know there is skepticism out there. I am just so glad she came when we wanted her to and that I have now had my baby for a week, rather than being in the hospital this very day. My midwife told me that if I had ended up having to get induced, that my labor would have lasted longer than it did when going in to labor naturally. Yes, I am so very grateful things worked out the way they did. I am very blessed. And I consider Ada as special; only 5% of babies are born on their due date. :)
This past week has been life changing. It has been a lot of fun, and I can't get enough of my little girl. She is the most beautiful thing I've ever seen. Everything she does is cute; even her massively loud gas is adorable. My mom has been SO helpful while she's been here. She has outdone herself, gone above and beyond. She leaves tomorrow morning, and I'm very nervous. I hope Niels and I can do this on our own. I would completely fall apart if anything ever happened to our daughter.
