April 3, 2017

Welcome to the world, baby boy!

Introducing Caden Michael:
born October 31, 2016 @ 4:58PM, 6 lb. 14 oz, 19" long.

Birth Story:
I was lying in bed that Monday morning and was half awake since Shaun had just hit the snooze on his alarm. He had just gotten back into bed from the bathroom when I was woken up by what I thought was gas pain at first, but then quickly realized that what I felt was a contraction. It was about 5:30 in the morning when I felt the pop.

I quickly sat up and told Shaun, "I think my water just broke." I slowly got up to go to the bathroom and felt more warm liquid and was pretty confident that it was time. I also started to lose my mucus plug at that same time. We were caught completely off guard since I was still two weeks out from my due date!

Once we were both out of bed, I called L&D to let them know and they said they'd see me when I got there. It was really happening!

I rushed around the house trying to make sure that we had everything we needed. Luckily, I pretty much had my bag and the baby's bag packed already and Shaun quickly threw some things in a bag for himself. About thirty minutes after my water broke, the contractions started getting worse. A friend mine told me that I'd know when I was in labor because I would be able to talk through the contractions; I'd say that's pretty accurate! 

We got in the car and headed for the hospital; Shaun drove while timing my contractions. At one point they were about 3-5 minutes apart and I was getting really nervous. In Hawaii, you do not want no get stuck in rush hour traffic and here it was about 6AM and we were right in the thick of it. Thankfully Shaun knew a "short cut" through some back roads and about 45 minutes later, we arrived (should have taken us half that!)

We got to the hospital at 7:00 and didn't have to wait long once we got there. They then took us back to examine me and test to make sure that my water really broke (I was 100% sure of this.) Once it was confirmed we were admitted and they brought us to our room in labor and delivery. It felt so surreal being in that room!

Before I knew it, a doctor had come in to run through everything with me; she kept mentioning pitocin and I was really confused as to why they were talking about that since my water had already broken and I was clearly in labor. Come to find out, if your water breaks, they want you to deliver in 18-24 hours to avoid any kind of infection. They put in my IV (terrible experience resulting in a blown vein in one arm and a very uncomfortable IV inserted into the other arm) and started a very low dose of Pitocin since by this time, my contractions had slowed down to about every ten minutes.

Since I hadn't eaten, they were nice enough to let me order breakfast from the cafeteria since we knew it would probably be a while. Things were going well, however, around 10:30, I was still only at 1 centimeter. They put the foley bulb in around that time and within about 3 hours, I was at 3-4 centimeters. The pain was definitely increasing, but I wasn't sure that I was ready for the epidural. They had me talk to the nurse anesthetist just as a precaution and we decided to move forward with it since he was going to be leaving for lunch and didn't want to come back to me being in extreme pain. Once the epidural was in place, they increased the Pitocin a little bit and I was feeling great.

When we had first gotten to our room, the nurse midwife had done an ultrasound to make sure that baby boy was still head down; during the same ultrasound, they found that he was, but he was also facing up! This isn't necessarily a problem, but can prolong labor and especially pushing. Because of this, they mostly had me lying on my side the whole time with an exercise ball between my knees in hopes that he was flip over (I also wasn't a very big fan of this, not very comfortable especially while experiencing contractions.)

At about 4:15pm, the nurse came back to examine me and I was already at 9 centimeters and baby boy was dropping with each contraction. She said that she would be back around 5-5:15 to check on me, but shortly after she left, I started feeling a lot pressure. It felt kind of painful, but definitely a different kind of sensation that I had been feeling. I was starting to get nervous that I was going to have the urge to push and no one was going to be in the room with us. I also had asked for something to help with this new pain that I was feeling so they had the anesthetist come back and add a dose of another pain medication to my epidural, it helped so much.

Luckily, the nurses were monitoring me from the nurses' station right around the corner because they noticed the baby's heart rate dropping a bit with each contraction. They said that it was due to head compressions when they came back in around 4:40 to start setting up for delivery. I remember thinking that that's what they were doing, but I still thought we had a while to go! Before I knew it, they were telling me to push! I pushed for about five contractions (15-20 minutes) and Caden was born at 4:58PM.

I remember pushing and having my eyes closed and then I opened them and he was there! Again, I had no idea he would come that fast and it was just so surreal. The nurses had asked if I wanted to have a mirror so I could watch and I declined, but I kind of wish that I hadn't. Shaun cut his cord after it stopped pulsing and once they finished examining him, they brought him over to me for a few moments before they took him to get cleaned up. 


The aftermath took much longer than the actual delivery since I had suffered a second-degree tear. Shaun and the nurses kept saying how Caden shot his arm out during the delivery, which probably caused it. That and maybe the fact that he came so fast. They took good care of me though and before I knew it, we had this tiny, little bundle, all wrapped up, and I was finally able to get a good look at his perfect little face. Shaun was loving holding our little guy and we sent photos to both of our parents, who were on the east coast.

Around 9:30pm, we were transferred to our room in the mother/baby unit. We were starving so we decided to order pizza delivery and I ate a whole small pizza myself haha. It was amazing. 

I absolutely could not believe how fast everything happened (just under 12 hours since my water broke), especially since this was my first pregnancy. Everyone kept making it sound like I would go way past my due date and even the nurse midwife told me that many first-time moms can push for up to three HOURS. Boy did we prove them all wrong! 

I feel EXTREMELY blessed to have had an easy pregnancy, a relatively easy labor and delivery and a perfect baby boy. We could not be happier to have our little man in our lives!



Warmest Aloha,




 
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