Okay, I finally got around to it!
Born June 8, 2010 at 0:07hrs
Length of labour: 4 days!
Length of actual labour: 26 hours (pushing *4* hours)
Long story short, I had a very active and healthy pregnancy. Maybe a little too healthy? My baby was BIG... 9lbs, 3oz! He was post-term (not just "late" by dates, but actually almost 2 weeks older than he should have been!)
My water broke on Friday, June 4th, but I didn't realize it as it was very small droplets (!?). On Sunday at 10pm, I finally went to the hospital because I thought I was peeing myself only to be told it was amniotic fluid! Being group B strep positive, I was at higher risk of infection so I was quickly hooked up to an IV for antibiotics and induced. Doctor broke my water (apparently).
From 10pm Sunday night to around 8am Monday, I was awake and walking around the hospital waiting for contractions. They said I was 2cm but I said no... I couldn't feel any pain (no pain relief at this time). 12 hours!
At 8am Monday, the next doctor said my water WASN'T broken, and did it again! Ouch! I spent many hours on gas & air, then cried for morphine (which made baby's heart rate dip 2x), then cried for an epidural. The epidural wore off around 6pm on Monday (10 hours into "real labour") but no anesthesiologist was available for 2 hours. So from around 7-9cm, I was going at it raw! Eeeek.
When I hit 9cm at 8pm, the anesthesiologist came in and gave me another epidural. Suddenly I had to push but couldn't feel it. For around 2 hours, I pushed without any pain. VERY ineffective pushing and distressing to baby.
After 2 hours, it wore off and I could push for real. At around 11:40pm, the doctor told OH that I would be prepped for an emergency C-section at midnight if he wasn't born.
Baby started coming at midnight (I was very very lucky to avoid the section), but got stuck!!! He had shoulder dystocia: https://www.procrea.com/EN/shoulderdystocia.html
Shoulder dystocia can be deadly. Basically, he was so big and I was so small that he got stuck in the birth canal. The doctor broke his left clavicle (collarbone) on purpose to get him out!. If it wasn't done, he could have died.
My plan was to exclusively breastfeed, but he lost so much weight and was screeching for 2 days from the pain of the fracture that I had to toss that plan as well. It involved many lactation nurse visits, overnight emergency room visit for loss of weight, etc. all in just his first 4 days. You can see more about it here.. https://www.babyandbump.com/breastfeeding/347334-first-night-my-own-please-help.html
One week later he is on formula, eating and sleeping fairly good for a newborn
Although it wasn't the best labour and certainly not the perfect outcome, he is relatively healthy and happy. While the fracture is unfortunate and still healing, when put into perspective of what could have happened (brain damage or still birth), that's ok!!
Born June 8, 2010 at 0:07hrs
Length of labour: 4 days!
Length of actual labour: 26 hours (pushing *4* hours)
Long story short, I had a very active and healthy pregnancy. Maybe a little too healthy? My baby was BIG... 9lbs, 3oz! He was post-term (not just "late" by dates, but actually almost 2 weeks older than he should have been!)
My water broke on Friday, June 4th, but I didn't realize it as it was very small droplets (!?). On Sunday at 10pm, I finally went to the hospital because I thought I was peeing myself only to be told it was amniotic fluid! Being group B strep positive, I was at higher risk of infection so I was quickly hooked up to an IV for antibiotics and induced. Doctor broke my water (apparently).
From 10pm Sunday night to around 8am Monday, I was awake and walking around the hospital waiting for contractions. They said I was 2cm but I said no... I couldn't feel any pain (no pain relief at this time). 12 hours!
At 8am Monday, the next doctor said my water WASN'T broken, and did it again! Ouch! I spent many hours on gas & air, then cried for morphine (which made baby's heart rate dip 2x), then cried for an epidural. The epidural wore off around 6pm on Monday (10 hours into "real labour") but no anesthesiologist was available for 2 hours. So from around 7-9cm, I was going at it raw! Eeeek.
When I hit 9cm at 8pm, the anesthesiologist came in and gave me another epidural. Suddenly I had to push but couldn't feel it. For around 2 hours, I pushed without any pain. VERY ineffective pushing and distressing to baby.
After 2 hours, it wore off and I could push for real. At around 11:40pm, the doctor told OH that I would be prepped for an emergency C-section at midnight if he wasn't born.
Baby started coming at midnight (I was very very lucky to avoid the section), but got stuck!!! He had shoulder dystocia: https://www.procrea.com/EN/shoulderdystocia.html
Shoulder dystocia can be deadly. Basically, he was so big and I was so small that he got stuck in the birth canal. The doctor broke his left clavicle (collarbone) on purpose to get him out!. If it wasn't done, he could have died.
My plan was to exclusively breastfeed, but he lost so much weight and was screeching for 2 days from the pain of the fracture that I had to toss that plan as well. It involved many lactation nurse visits, overnight emergency room visit for loss of weight, etc. all in just his first 4 days. You can see more about it here.. https://www.babyandbump.com/breastfeeding/347334-first-night-my-own-please-help.html
One week later he is on formula, eating and sleeping fairly good for a newborn
Although it wasn't the best labour and certainly not the perfect outcome, he is relatively healthy and happy. While the fracture is unfortunate and still healing, when put into perspective of what could have happened (brain damage or still birth), that's ok!!
Our doctor was very good, I had no idea of the danger he was in until she told me after, I'm sure it would have made things a lot worse. Even OH was clueless.
I'm so glad that everything turned out ok and you had such a good doctor there.
