Was this my water?? Pink Fluid

14 hours later...
I came in at 3cm and was still at 3cm when they checked me about 10 hours later.
I really didn't want to be induced at 10pm and then be in labor all night, not sleep, and then be too tired to push so the doctor is letting me go to sleep and not get induced.
They're just going To monitor my temperature in case of infection since my water already broke.

I'm having contractions but they're not doing anything for my cervix even though I've tried walking, pumping, diffusing clary sage and bouncing on the ball.
The contractions hurt so i probably won't be able to sleep anyway!
 
Aaaw hun, still thinking of you. Your little Princess will be so worth it! Try and get some rest!xxx
 
Awww pretty soon. Will be stalking to see when you precious baby arrives good luck hopefully for an easy delivery
 
Aw I hope LO is in your arms soon x
 
Sorry you're having a rough time with labour, hope she is here soon x
 
Good luck! Thinking of you and hope things started progressing throughout the day :hugs:
 
Well, it's been 10 days since she was born but she came after all.
It was not at all how I wanted it and quite frankly, so traumatizing that it took me a long time to even think about reliving it to write my birth story. Everything I didn't want is exactly what I got but I wound up with a perfect little girl so I guess it all works out in the end.


My birth story is long but I had to get it out.

My beautiful daughter was born on August 8th, 2015. She was 7 lbs 15 oz and 21.44 inches long with a full head of hair.
My plan was for a natural, unmedicated vaginal birth. I wanted no pain killers, no epidural, absolutely no induction via Pitocin, and I said if they tried to give me a C-section, I'd run out of there. For my prenatal care, I (thankfully) used an ObGyn and planned for a hospital birth, instead of going with the natural birthing center; and it's probably a good thing because my plan for all natural and free of interventions turned into intervention city and I wound up having an emergency C-section after 31 hours.

My due date was set at August 14th. I knew I ovulated early so the due date I chose to go by was between the 7th and 10th. I was telling people that she’d probably come on the 8th but I keep myself in slight denial of these things, just as I did when I knew I was pregnant but bought tampons instead of a pregnancy test, even though, any other month, I’d wait until I knew for sure.

Mid-morning August 7th is when it all began, exactly one week prior to my due date and the day before I suspected I’d go into labor. I had slept in. It was 10:00am and I realized my water had broken, or was breaking. There was no big gush, no large amount trickling down, and it seemed to stop so I wasn’t really certain that was it. In case it was, I decided to go ahead and notify my hubby (who rushed home from work even though I told him not to, since I wasn’t sure), take a shower, and wait a while to see if more would come out, or if I started having contractions. I called my OB’s office and they told me I could come in at 1pm and they’d test the fluid to determine whether or not it was my amniotic fluid but if it was, they’d send me to the hospital. I opted to just go ahead and head to Labor & Delivery. I wasn’t having strong contractions yet but I was told to go in when my contractions were 3-5 minutes apart OR if my water broke. Even though I wasn’t sure it was my water, I knew it could just be my denial setting in again, so I told my husband it was time to go.

We arrived at the hospital and were taken to the Labor & Delivery Emergency unit. It’s basically a separate ER for the women’s center. They hooked me up to be monitored and my water was definitely coming out at this point. I was checked for dilation and was at 3cm. They told me my contractions were about 4 minutes apart but I didn’t feel anything – just the same Braxton Hicks I’d been having for weeks. Eventually, I was admitted to Labor & Delivery and set up in the room where I was intended to deliver. There was a communication board in my room where the nurses wrote my goals and how they can best assist. That included supporting natural labor, as few interventions as possible, and a goal of having my baby as quickly as possible. The nurse left out that I said my REAL goal was to NOT GET CUT OPEN!! They had me walk up and down a long hallway, let me diffuse clary sage oil in the room, had me use the breast pump, and the birthing ball, to naturally induce labor.

At 10pm, I had made no progress and the doctor wanted to induce me. I said I didn’t want to be induced, be up all night laboring, and then be too tired to push when the time came, so she let me sleep to decide in the morning. Around 4:30am, I’d been having contractions for a while and I was making no progress. My husband was asleep while I had to get out of bed every few minutes to ride out contractions so I began feeling desperate and alone. Since I wanted to avoid Pitocin and an epidural at all costs, the nurse finally convinced me to give in to a lesser form of induction and pain relief. Demoral & Phenergan for pain, and Cytotec (misoprostol) to induce. I regret accepting that because it did not work. It relieved the pain a little bit, so I slept through the contractions; however, once it wore off, they were even more painful than before and I’d only dilated to 4.5cm.

At 10am, 24 hours after my water broke, I gave in to the epidural and Pitocin. My doctor was basically telling me that she’d have to do a C-section if I kept progressing so slowly. Since my water had been broken so long, the longer we waited, the higher risk I was for developing an infection that would be passed on to baby. I was willing to do anything to avoid that, so I accepted and felt like I was betraying myself. I slept a lot and the epidural really did make me feel much better. Eventually, I was checked again and had reached 9.5 and I was so relieved the induction was working.

Around 4pm, a nurse told me I was completely dilated and the baby was effaced at about 0. She had me push to see if I was ready but it didn’t move the baby at all so I was to give it a little more time. When the doctor came in, she said I was NOT complete but still at 9.5cm and probably still -1 effaced. I heard her come in and tell my husband that I was more than likely going to have to have a C-section but I pretended to be asleep because it was so upsetting to hear. A while later, the doctor stormed in telling me she couldn’t watch my monitors anymore. My contractions still weren’t close enough together (I blame the epidural for this) and the Pitocin would not be turned back on to speed them up because the baby went into decline every time it was on. Everything was unfolding exactly as all the natural birthing books and documentaries described it would. She told me I had to go through with the C-section; otherwise I was going to get an infection from having no amniotic fluid left. At this point, it had been 30 hours already and the on-call doctor told me that my OB would NEVER have let anyone go this long so I knew she’d waited as long as she could and my body and baby just weren’t responding.

Realizing I really had no safe choices to make, I started sobbing as soon as the doctor left the room. My nurses came in to get my verbal consent to the procedure and asked if my husband and I needed more time to talk about it. I told them we didn’t know what we were talking about so it wouldn’t do any good to leave us alone just because I was crying. I asked all the questions I could and gave them my consent. I had already been given all the guilt trips about how, as a mother, I’ll have to do plenty of things that I don’t want to do. This was just the first sacrifice I’d have to make to do what was best for my child, whether it’s what I had in mind or not. Frankly, it all seemed a little patronizing to me because I didn’t trust that anything up until that point was what was best for me OR her. I also just kept it to myself, that for years, I had a very strong fear that I would die during childbirth, so every intervention just made that fear grow stronger and stronger.

My husband was given his fancy surgical garb to wear and while I was being prepped, he moved our things to the recovery room I’d be in. I was cut open and being worked on before my husband was even in the room next to me to sooth my uncontrollable shaking. I had him on one side and our anesthesiologist on the other. Between words of support, we just listened to them talking about hospital politics. At 4:58pm I heard it, the sound of my baby crying. It brought me to tears and all I wanted was to see her and touch her. I heard the doctor commenting on my uterus and placenta. I had indeed started getting an infection. She said I felt hotter than I should and had to remove puss that was forming. Due to the infection, baby had to be taken to the NICU to be tested and my husband was informed of all of this while I was finished up on. While I was being closed back up, they brought my baby over to me and I was able to see her and kiss her but I still couldn’t hold her. She was perfect and beautiful and my husband assured me, 10 fingers and 10 toes.

Once I was back in a private room, the NICU nurses brought my baby to try to nurse. She had been given donor milk in the meantime. I remember being so sweaty that my husband and nurses were wiping sweat off of my face. She had tested free of infection but some levels were higher than they liked so she had to go back to the NICU until about 11:30pm and was then allowed to stay with us in our room. The NICU nurses would come in to check on her every few hours, and the Labor & Delivery nurses came in to check on me every few hours. Needless to say, I didn’t get a lot of sleep. Still devastated by the circumstances, I knew that ultimately, the C-section was probably inevitable from the moment my water broke. I’m just glad that we both made it out okay and she’s a happy, healthy baby with happy, healthy parents to love her.
 
I'm so sorry that things turned out the way they did for you. It is devastating isn't it? My first arrived in the world much the same way, I was talked into an epidural, labour augmentation and then it all ended in an emergency section.

It's absolutely heartbreaking. Take time to grieve, and don't let anyone tell you that you should just be happy. It's extremely traumatic to have this happen.

And congratulations on your beautiful baby girl too of course! ♡
 
Wow what a story! Glad all is well enjoy your precious baby!xxxx
 
Wow what a story, thank you for sharing with us. What a long and difficult labour you experienced but at the end of it you have your beautiful baby girl :)x
 
In the end I can say what a beautiful story glad you both are okay!
 
hmm...I was told it's not a real contraction until you can't walk through it. I haven't had anything like that. I think I'll just start my day and see what happens...

I just don't want to be that woman who didn't realize she was in labor

I keep hearing people say this but I've always been told you go into the hospital when you can't talk through it...every woman experiences labor especially the first part differently, and even that can change with each labor, my first was terrible painful contractions from the get go, but my second the contractions were so painless (but consistent) that I doubted I was in labor, went to the hospital just to be safe and I was in full blown labor ;) good luck to you!
 

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