A Baby Story

I can't believe that our little Katelyn is a month old tomorrow.  Where did that time go?  I haven't written down her birth story and I realized I have been slacking on blogging.  So I figured I'd blog the birth story!  So here goes.

I was originally due October 24th but that day passed by with out really any indication that our baby girl would be gracing us with her presence.  I went to the doctor on October 27th and we set up an induction for November 2nd/3rd.  I wasn't too thrilled with this but I figured it wouldn't hurt to get it scheduled.  She had to come out at some point right?  I really didn't want to be induced.  I was induced with both boys.  I wanted to wake in the middle of the night and frantically have to get ready to get to the hospital.  I left the appointment hoping that my body would do it's job and that I would have this baby on my own.

No such luck.  November 2nd came and no baby.  We dropped the boys off at my grandparents.  The nerves really started setting in at that point.  I kept telling Dave that I wasn't ready for the needles and pain that would be coming.  Deep down my real fear was if this little girl was going to be all right.

We got to the hospital and settled into our birthing room.  These were newly remodeled so that was kind of nice!  They did a cervical check and I was already at 4cm.  I got my IV and they started pitocin around 8:30pm.  My contractions didn't become real painful until around 9:30 or so.  They checked my cervix again - this time a 6 with a bulging bag.  That made mad me a little nervous.  With the boys after my water would break my contractions come on FAST.  I decided that we could let anesthesia know I wanted my epidural.  Of course they were busy so we waited.  Around 10:30 another cervix check - still a 6 - my water breaks!  Oh boy!  I started crying and told them I was scared.

My nurse tells me that maybe I should just do this without an epidural.  I said "Are you crazy?" and she laughed.  She was a sweet lady.  They located anesthesia and told them we needed them NOW.  They came in and decided to do a spinal/epidural combo.  The spinal would do a real good job numbing for about an hour and then the epidural would kick in and the numbness would decrease.  Just before midnight the epidural was in place and I was starting to feel good.  They gave me a popsicle and dimmed the lights so I could "rest". 

A few minutes later my popsicle gets taken away (how dare they!) to put on an oxygen mask.  The baby's heartrate was decreasing with the last few contractions.  5 minutes later the nurse comes in again and baby's heartrate is still decreasing and I needed to flip on my side.  Doesn't help so I have to flip again.  They place internal monitors to track baby's heartrate.  They continue to flip me as the decels were becoming alarming to them.

Just before 1am, 5 or 6 people come in the room (we later found out they were coming in to wheel me to the OR for a c-section!).  During the last contraction baby's heartrate hadn't come back up.  The doctor checked one last time and baby was crowning!  I couldn't feel ANYTHING because of the spinal.  They told me to push - head is out.  Then I hear "don't push!"  The cord was wrapped around her neck and her arm was up by her head as she came out.  With each contraction it was cutting off her oxygen supply.  How scary!  One more push and she was here at 1:10am on November 3rd.

She cried a sweet cry and they placed her on my chest.  She was so little!  I held her for a while and Dave cut the cord.  It was amazing.  7lbs even and 20.75 inches long.  So precious and so perfect.  My smallest but longest baby with a full head of dark brown hair.  We snuggled while we waited to go to our post-partum room.

I had a wonderful recovery.  Honestly I didn't feel like I had just given birth.  We stayed just 36 hours in the hospital.  The normal tests were done - Minnesota newborn screening, hearing, and billirubin level.  And per my request (even with our history, how sad is that?!  I'll have to post more on that next time.) a pulse ox was done on all 4 extremities.  ALL 100%!!

It took a while to finalize a name.  We went with Katelyn Elise.  I have always liked the name Katelyn and I pictured a little Katie with pig tails running around our house.  Dave and I both liked the name Elise.  When pronounced you can hear "lee" which is my middle name.  Elise is also a form of a Elizabeth which was Dave's late grandmother's middle name.  It fits perfectly.

We are so blessed and all so smitten with our little girl.  Our family is complete.  <3