Thread: *~*~ Christy's (Mom2ThreeKiddos) Birth Lodge~*~*

I'm so sorry you didn't get your VBAC. Just remember you did EVERYTHING you could to make it happen. As much as we like to think that we can control everything, there is an element to birthing that is out of our control and we just have to go with it and make the best of it that we can. I'm sorry you're in so much pain and I hope it subsides quickly. Rest up mama and enjoy your sweet baby girl.

We are on the way home no will try to do a birth story tomorrow. I will for sure post pics. She is just so darn cute.

I will look forward to reading the story and of course seeing the pictures!

I'm sorry you ended up with pre-e

glad to hear you're headed home. Can't wait to see your cutie pie!

I'm so sorry it wasn't the birth you wanted, but remember that it absolutely was the birth that Elizabeth needed. I hope you're feeling better soon, physically & emotionally, keep taking those pain meds by the clock so you stay on top of the pain. I found my second c-section much easier emotionally because I knew I'd done everything possible to avoid it, hope you find the same.

Just checking in! I hope you're feeling ok.

Hey everyone. Sorry I have been so distant. I have been have been having a lot of pain and Elizabeth doesn't seem to get growing like she should. I just don't know if I don't have enough milk or what. I have always had slow starters, so I am hoping that is all it is. I am getting a little worried though. I let her nurse on demand and I think her latch is ok. I have really big nipples and that may be an issue. I don't know. Anyway... Here are the pics from the hospital:

http://www.our365.com/NewbornPortrai...7-6256ed01d7b8

I will upload the pics from the camera in a minute. I will then post my birth story.

glad to hear from you. I figured you just got busy. She's adorable btw

You all pretty much know already of my journey to have my vbac and how it landed me in St. Louis so I won't rehash that part of it. We went down there a little after 37weeks. I had been having contractions for weeks and didn't know if that meant anything, but I wanted to be prepared. Of course after about 36w they kind of stalled. So me and the kids went down and stayed in a hotel closer to the hospital and my doctor. My doctor was Dr. Vlastos. He is a maternal fetal specialist from St. Louis. He is vbac friendly and was willing to help me achieve a natural birth.

Wednesday April 27th I woke up not feeling so hot. I had a headache most of the day. My husband was on his way down to stay with us (hopefully permanently). At that point he had kind of been going back and forth for work. I had been there with the kids by myself for the most part and it had been pretty uneventful. I had 2 nights of contractions that lasted for hours and then just stopped. I really enjoyed this time with the kids. I did end up with some kind of infection for about 6 days during it. I was on the phone with Jarrod and told him about my headache. He said to check my blood pressure. Which made since since it had been high since about 21weeks. It had gone down again after the dosage increase and on Monday it was 131/76 so fine. It was high at 166/100, but not high enough for me to panic as I had seen that number a few times this pregnancy. I took my last dose of bp medicine and then took it again a few hours later. The second reading was 198/108 in my left arm and 209/110 in my right. That is when I got concerned. At that point Jarrod wasn't there yet, but he was close. I called the after hours number of my doctor's office to find out what they wanted me to do. I knew already, but I guess I just wanted someone to say... go in. Anyway I called Jarrod back to tell him what was going on and waited for the call back. The doctor called back and told me that I needed to come in. I called Jarrod back and luckily he was in the parking lot of the hotel. Then are dilemma started. What were we going to do about the kids. Our whole plan had revolved around me being in labor and having time for my step-son to get here. With this I had to go right away. I didn't want to drag my poor children to the hospital at near midnight at this point. So Jarrod stayed with the kids and I drove in by myself. I felt fine other than the headache. The drive took about 20minutes with no traffic and it was fine with nothing happening.

So I go up to L&D and tell them what was going on. They of course confirm that yes it is high. My 2nd number apparently went as high as 130 before the medication kicked in. They put me on a different medicine. So now I am on 2 bp meds right now. And they put me magnesium sulfate to "prevent seizure". The resident doctor that was on call that night wanted to section me right there and then. Of course I wasn't doing anything without my husband being there and at that point I was stable. The admitted me and started a 24 hour urine collection. At this point they didn't know if it was pre-e or just a spike in BP. I wanted to talk to my doctor. Thursday morning Dr. Vlastos came in and said that we needed to start heading towards delivery no matter what. At this point he was comfortable with an induction. They started with the sea weed sticks whose name I don't know. They essentially manually dilate your cervix but absorbing water. It had to be in for quite a long time. At 10 hours in I was dilated enough that they could insert a foley bulb and so they did that. The whole foley insertion was incredibly uncomfortable. I eventually let go and used my finger drop technique from Hypnobabies to help.

So at this point I have to say that I was about ready to walk out of the hospital. I didn't just want a vaginal birth, I wanted a natural birth so this whole thing was the complete opposite of what I had wanted. Not only that I had to stay on the mag and the nurse told me I could only have clear liquids and I had to be continuously monitored. Apparently this is the protocol for everyone on the L&D floor. So vbac or not it didn't matter. The thing that got me is that I was NOT even in labor. I was waiting for the fun sea weed to absorb water. I was not contracting with any regularity so I was not a risk for rupture. Baby had looked fabulous every time they had monitored her. When the attending doc (my doctor's partner) came in to see me she said that I only had to be monitored for 30min every 4 hours and that I could eat what I wanted. Also I had various people come in and essentially tell me over and over that a vba3c was dangerous and that I was putting my and my babies life at risk. I was about to get incredibly rude and snippy with the next person that tried to talk to me like that. My response was going to be "Yes I realize I am going to die and kill my baby and you can leave now". Ugh! My doctor had never once said anything like that to me.

So the Foley comes out pretty quickly after being inserted. The doctor was able to stretch me pretty good just during insertion. So I was a good 3-4 cm dilated. They were going to start me on pitocin. The doctor told me to get up take a shower eat etc and then they would start the meds. At that point I knew I wasn't going to win the whole monitoring battle since they would want to watch for rupture, especially on pitocin. The plan was to start really low and then only increase by 1 every hour. The max they would go was 6. So it was going to be low and slow and probably take a long time. They were talking about turning it off after they broke my water as long as the contractions kept up on their own. They didn't want to break my water yet as baby was too high and there was a risk of prolapse.

This is Friday morning by this point (it all kind of ran together) I actually feel asleep and they decided to wait to start the pit. I had had a terrible headache the entire time. It just would not go away. At some point I asked the nurse if they had my results of the 24 hour urine and she said yes and told me that it was elevated. It was like 600 something. She said it was high, but not the highest she had ever seen. The cutoff was either 200 something or 400 something I really don't remember. All I know is that is was more than just slightly high. My heart sank at this news. I knew right away that I had pre-e. We had been waiting for Dr. Vlastos and looking back he came in pretty early but it seemed like forever. It was around 10 am or so when we saw him. I wish I could describe him accurately but he is an incredibly caring and supportive man and he really tries hard to think about birth the prospective of the woman. You can just tell buy what he says and how he says it. Anyway he said the words I knew he was going to and I had a nagging feeling in my heart was what we needed. He husband questioned him a little. I think just to be there for me. He left the room and we talked about it and I told Jarrod that I just knew in my heart he was right. The mag sulfate was well pure HELL and the headache was horrid. The only thing that I was going to do was get worse. I wanted to have the baby on my terms not under general anesthesia due to some emergency.

At some point my doula had gotten there. She was incredibly supportive and helpful. When the doctor came back in I said I consented to the c-section, but that I had some requests. 1. That at no time would the baby leave the OR unless there was something actually wrong with her (we didn't know at the time if it was a he/she) 2. If baby had to go to the nursery that dad was to go with, but that I was never to be left alone and that Jessica my doula be allowed to come in with me. 3. Baby was not to get the Hep B Shot. They consented to this and at noon we went in for the surgery.

It took awhile for them to get me open. I am sure I had quite a bit of scar tissue. The nurse who put in the spinal was an idiot and hurt me 3x trying to place it. I had an intense pain my in my left leg that made it jerk involuntarily. They told me everything that was going on. I heard her come out and they told me she was a girl. They didn't show her to me right away. Jarrod went over and watched as they dried her off and checked her out. They brought the scale over to me and weighed her in front of me. It was funny they said 8lb 5.8oz wow she is a big girl. I am like OMG she is TINY! LOL I mean I was 2 days shy of full term. Anyway they gave her to Jarrod and he sat with her at the head of the table for the rest of the operation. So my baby stayed with me the entire time. No one abandoned me in the OR. That I am so grateful for. Jarrod and baby walked with me (ok I was wheeled) to recovery. Jessica came in with us there. I was able to try and nurse right away. I was nursing before 1 hour after birth, so again that was wonderful. I am lucky and don't have terrible side effects from the spinal, in that I am alert, don't have nausea and don't shake. They moved us to the postpartum room at about 45min-1hour after.

Later that night as I was nursing Elizabeth I felt a gush of blood. I had actually gotten movement of my feet back fairly quickly. At Bromenn I was up and moving by this point, but they wouldn't let me since I had to be on the mag sulfate for 24 hours. So I told the nurse about the gush and she checked me. She then went and got the doctor. Then the room filled up with people and a cart was brought in that had the words "hemorrhage cart" on it. They gave me some more pitocin and some other drug to stop the bleeding. Jarrod said I had baseball size clots coming out of me at this point. They ordered up blood. I didn't end up needing it thank goodness. So they did get it to stop. I am fairly certain the mag is to blame for this.

On Saturday I expected to be up and around, but I was not. I did get up with the help of the nurse to try and use the bathroom, but it literally was the most pain I have ever felt in my entire life. The first day was essentially traumatic. I could barely move without intense pain. Sunday was much better and felt more like normal. By Monday I was soooo ready to leave. I couldn't get any rest in that place. They wouldn't leave me alone. My milk took longer to come in than normal. Lizzy lost too much weight so we ended up supplementing her. 2x with formula and 1x with expressed milk. We uses the supplemental nursing system to do this. We were all set to discharge. The night before they came in and said the whole weight loss thing which lead us to meet with the lactation education people and to supplement. But it was right before we were getting ready to be discharged (18 hours AFTER she had been weighed last) that some attending ped that said she couldn't leave. That she lost too much weight and they had to check her electrolyte levels and do another weight check. She said she couldn't garuntee that I would be able to stay with her. OK this is when I about lost it. I literally started cursing at the nurse. Why in HELL was this so bad now when the weight had been done last night. AND we had supplemented her like they wanted. The nurse convinced the doc to check the blood test and then if weight was good at 3:00 pm then we could go. Both things came back fine and we were "allowed" to leave. I have never in my life been so happy to leave a place. We took her to our ped the next day and she said she was fine and to come back in a week.

So we are home now. I am happy to be home and I love her so much. The whole experience was pretty traumatic though and I am having issues coming to terms with some of it. While I realize that pre-e isn't something that I can control the idea that it happened it still hard for me to grasp. I did get to have the baby on my terms though and that I will always be grateful for. The hospital on the other hand is something I AM going to talk with my doc about. I mean he is so great and they are soooo not great.