Perfektly Mary

Shocked? Yes!

The past 11 days have been filled with life changing details. Hourly my life changes so I will try to make this some what understandable and not too lengthy.

Thursday we had gone for our 2nd chiropractic apt. to try and get the baby to turn from breech position. Friday, Dustin’s parents came into town for the scheduled baby shower on Sat. I was feeling a lot of rolling and tumbling in my belly and just knew the baby was trying to get head down. My midwife said I really needed to take it easy that day, no excessive walking or standing. So…Friday was filled with eating out at restaurants, pedicures and manicures. The bliss of it all. The pretty toes really were so nice later on when I had people poking and exposing me. It was strangely comforting to have my entire lower half exposed on a surgical table and then have the surgeon say “What pretty toes”. Ok. so I’m a little vain.

Back to the birth…..Friday night after all that movement, I stood up from eating pizza and felt a little pop (?) and then a gush. First thought: “Seriously bladder…is it necessary to be peeing in front of Dustin’s dad? How about a little warning?”. Then I felt all this warmth going down my legs and onto the kitchen floor (who cleaned that up anyways?). I still wasn’t sure what was going on because I thought we had at least 3 more weeks until I was ready to go. I proclaimed: “I’m leaking” and started off to the bathroom, where my water continued to flow and that’s when Dustin called the midwife. I knew the baby had not turned that day and was still breech, so it was likely that I would be having a c-section that night. Definitely not the un-invasive home birth we had planned, but the safest way to have her enter the world with these new set of circumstances. We think that because of the abnormal presentation and all that movement it caused my water to break. Between Dustin and his mom they packed my hospital bag (complete with all the pairs of underwear I own…I may not have had matching clothes, but I sure had underwear! ). We met Sue our midwife at the hospital and got checked into triage. When we arrived I was having “discomfort” about 15 minutes apart…I wasn’t sure if they were contractions or not. They hooked me up and saw that I was indeed having contractions, I was 3 cm dilated and 30% effaced. I couldn’t believe all this was happening. We were really going to have a baby that night or first thing the next morning!

They wanted to check on the placement of the umbilical cord since my water had broke and she was breech, so we got a sonogram. That was the first time I laid eyes on my precious little one. We saw her profile so clearly and I cried looking at her sweet face. We decided not to find out the gender. We had waited to be surprised this long, so what are a couple more hours? She wouldn’t show the technician anyways…she’s very modest :). It was during the sonogram that we were told that she was actually only 34 weeks old, rather then the 37 we had all thought. I knew that it was a pretty good chance that she would have young lungs. I figured she would probably need some surfactant and a day or two of observation. So I was prepared for her to go to NICU after delivery. I think being a nurse really has helped with all of this. I’m not scared of the procedures and knew what was going on the whole time. I can imagine that the terminology can be very scary for parents without a medical background. Several times I heard Doctors and nurses talking about what was going on, not realizing I was a nurse, and was able to translate it to Dustin whether it was serious or not.

They let me labor for about 3 hrs because the contractions helped disperse the antibiotics they had to give me. I can’t remember why I had to have the antibiotics. When the contractions were about 5 minutes a part and really strong they gave me a muscle relaxant to stop them so I wouldn’t go into labor before the c-section. I am so thankful that I got to labor. I have always had this underlying fear of what contractions would be like. Growing up and still to this day I hear all sorts of vague statements about the pain of childbirth which left me fearful of the “greatest pain of your life”. Laboring was one of the most amazing experiences of my life partly due to the pain. I felt like I was freed from fear as I worked with my body and concentrated on relaxing. Dustin and I concentrated hard through my contractions on getting me to relax as the Bradley book had taught us, and several people made mention when they looked at my print out sheet that they were amazed that I was having a “big “contraction…they couldn’t tell. I’m not meaning to sound prideful, but I really am so proud of this whole experience.

At 5:51 am they delivered Madeline with Every little thing she does is magic by the Police playing in the operating room. The surgeon let Dustin announce the birth. She showed Dustin the baby and then Dustin told me “It’s Madeline!”. I started crying the ugly cry and prayed that this all would become real. After they cleaned her up, Dustin held her by my side and we both just marveled at her. Her breathing started getting really labored and forced so I kissed her head and asked them to take her. I remember hearing someone say that they were going to NICU and Dustin and I had decided ahead of time that he was to stay with her. Dustin was with her while they started the process of stabilizing her breathing. He’s made mention of how difficult it was to watch her struggle for breaths. I don’t know exactly what went on, maybe he will post it someday.

This past week has been all about victories. Every day is filled with some little conquest: getting to hold her, doing Kangaroo care, changing her diaper without labored breathing, taking her off the vent, taking out the IV, eating 30 cc breast milk by bottle…etc, etc. She has done so much in this first week of her life. I am so proud of her.

My days revolve around being at the hospital during her times of hands on care. We change her diaper, take her temp and now are currently working on taking 50 cc milk. As soon as she can chug down 50 cc by bottle, the NG tube comes out and she goes home! We are so close. I’m not rushing her though. It’s bliss to hold her, kiss her and see her without all the tubes and wires. She can take all the time she needs. After all, usually babies her age don’t have to do all this…they are just chilling out inside the womb. I have had the privilege of spending time with her early and whatever she needs I will cater too. Right now, it is patience.