Violet Evelyn M. (aka, Lil V)
December 7, 2009; 5:09 pm
8 lbs, 15 oz
22 inches
At about 6:15 am on December 7th, I woke up to go to the bathroom. When I did, I realized my water had broken. I woke Tim up, told him I thought it was time, and we decided we needed to head to the hospital. Tim took a shower and we packed up the rest of the things we needed. By the time we were headed out of the house, about an hour later, I'd had a few contractions. They continued in the car but seemed to be pretty inconsistent time-wise and it was hard to time them with Tim driving (hindsight says I could have timed them myself!)
We got checked in to Seton Southwest easily. The nurse first checked to be sure the fluid was indeed amniotic, and it was. I got hooked up to all the monitors, completed all the questionnaires, etc. and they found that my cervix was 5 cm and I was 100% effaced (which I had been for a couple weeks). Apparently, now my contractions were pretty strong on the monitor but they still didn't feel too horrible to me. We decided to walk for a while.
At about 10:30, at 8 cm, I decided to get the epidural. Ugh...I did fine, but it was super stressful to try to stay still while your back gets poked. I started getting numb, which actually was a horrible feeling. I hated it. My legs were numb all the way to my feet and I couldn't move at all on my own. I felt paralyzed and really hated the feeling. At this point, I was wondering if perhaps I should not have gotten it (but in hindsight, I am glad that I did -- and so in awe of all who do it med-free!). I did my best to sleep and just rest for a while.
1:30, Dr. Landwermeyer came in to check me. At that point, I was at 10cm but she decided to let me labor down for another hour before pushing. 2:30 came around and it was time to push. At first, pushing wasn't so bad. I didn't realize I'd get a good break in-between contractions, so even though the pushes were tiring, I had plenty of time to catch my breath. Not too far in, the pushing started to become a lot more painful. I was still focused but it was a vast difference from the early pushing. Tim and the nurse were both really encouraging but after a while I started to feel extremely anxious. I was desparate for Dr. Landwermeyer to show up because that was my signal that I really was close. When she finally got there, the pain was pretty bad. They asked me if it was pressure pain, and I said, no, it was pain-pain. But, I had nothing to compare it to, so I didn't know that it wasn't normal to feel even with an epidural. We then realized that the epidural tube had come undone - no wonder I was feeling so much pain! Looking back, I think it had come undone when Tim and the nurse had been "flipping me" earlier on when we were "waiting."
They called the anesthesiologist back and she gave me an epidural boost. It helped a bit. But Violet was stuck behind my pubic bone and pushing was getting more and more frustrating and I was started to panic a bit. By this time, I was probably 2 hours and 15 minutes in to pushing. Dr. Landwermeyer let me know that she wanted to use the vacuum to help Violet get around and out. She warned me that the pain was about to get really, really intense...and it did. Then, all of a sudden, it got really dramatic in the room. All the nurses jumped into action, pushed Tim out of the way, pushed my legs way back and told me to push with everything I had. I think what had happened was her head was out but now her shoulders were stuck. With one huge burst of pain and pressure, she was out.
They were concerned about Violet's health so they took her right away (but she's great now!). Tim took pictures and videos of her and brought them over to show me while I got stitched up, etc. I didn't get to hold her until 2 hours later, but it was worth the wait! She is absolutely perfect and we couldn't be more in love!
