On Friday morning, February 4th, at 36 weeks pregnant exactly, I went to my OB apt to find out the results of my last 24 hour culture and to learn where we would be going from there. I soon found out this would be my last OB apt. My blood pressure was still high, as expected, and my protein levels had doubled, once again. At this point, with my protein levels being so high, my OB decided it was time to take action, I needed to be induced as soon as possible. I had gone in to the appointment fully expecting this to be the case and was at peace with it. So, there was nothing left to do but get excited to meet my hopefully healthy daughter very soon. My OB said that waiting any longer to induce would be just waiting for something bad (potentially fatal) to happen. Neither of us wanted to do that, of course. He went ahead and checked me for any effacement/dilation like every other 36-weeker but, as we suspected, I was going to be starting from ground zero. No dilation or effacement. My OB told me to go ahead and go to Labor and Delivery and that it was probably going to be a very long process, likely over 24 hours, and not to be surprised if I ended up needing a C-section. I said my first of many prayers that this would not be the case.
I got in the car, drove home to get my hospital bag (we literally live 2 minutes away from the hospital) and made phone calls to close friends and family. I drove to the hospital and promptly was checked in to Labor and Delivery room 6. A nurse came in to start my IV and hook me up to the fetal monitors and blood pressure machine. Unfortunately for me, a total needle-phobic person, the nurse blew the first vein she tried to start an IV in, which was, truthfully, one of the most painful moments of the entire birth experience. (I had a really pretty bruise where it happened for a couple weeks afterward.) Luckily, a new nurse attempted the second line and got it right the first time.
Since I couldn't eat anything heavy in case of C-section, I had a bowl of my my favorite soup A couple hours after I was done eating, at about 4 p.m. we started my first round of Cytotec, a medicine used to help soften your cervix. I wasn't able to start pitocin right away since I was starting with no effacement or dilation. You must wait four hours in between each Cytotec dose so I got my second round at about 8 p.m. after I'd eaten my last (light) dinner. It was ice chips only from that point on. I got my last dose around midnight. (Three rounds is the most they can give a person)
By the second round my Mom, Mark, my "In-Loves," Alesha, and my best friend and her husband were already at the hospital to come and support us. They were able to visit me a few at a time. Also, By the second round I started having very minor contractions and my cervix had thinned a tiny bit. It wasn't as much progress as they were hoping but it was something. The main concern with the Cytotec is monitoring how it affects the baby's hart rate. If it affects it negatively, you immediately must have a C-section. Luckily, Leighton handled it beautifully, and was also doing exactly what she was supposed to with the contractions. She was loving them. Me, not so much.
At this point, they gave me ambien to help me sleep until about 4 a.m. when they would begin the pitocin. The ambien did nothing for me, I guess I was too anxious and excited. I'd get about 30 min of sleep here and there but never actually fell in to a deep sleep. At 4 a.m. they came in to start the pitocin. Now, the concern was how my preeclamptic body would handle the intense contractions the the pitocin would, eventually, cause. They don't take chances with patients with high blood pressure, so I had to have my epidural almost immediately after starting the pitocin, even without being dilated. You don't get the choice of going au natural with preeclampsia (not that I EVER would because as much as I hate needles, I hate pain even more.) Many preeclamptic patients have had seizures that can lead to a stroke once the serious contractions begin. Obviously, we didn't want that to happen. If the contractions affected my BP at all, that meant immediate C-section. So, shortly after starting the pitocin, my anesthesiologist came in to administer my epidural and it wasn't as bad (pain wise) as I had thought it was going to be. (The blown vein hurt so much worse.)
I was told, once again, that if anything drastic happened with my blood pressure or Leighton's heart rate it would be an automatic C-section. The way they kept telling me this made me assume they were all prepared for me to have C-section, and no one expected me to have a regular old-fashioned delivery. It made me nervous but I just kept praying that God would allow me to give birth to my sweet girl the way I envisioned, which was not in an Operating Room.
The rest of the day was spent having different family members and friends (at this point we had all of our immediate family waiting in the hospital and a few close friends) coming in to visit for a while, eating ice chips, (I cannot even begin to describe how hungry I was) and being checked every couple hours by my sweet nurse who was really rooting for me. God definitely put her on that shift that day for a reason. She was so upbeat and kept me positive that eventually, I would make some progress. However, every time she checked me I was only a "fingertip" amount dilated, not even 1 cm. The C-section chatter continued.
At one point early in the afternoon I got what they call a "hot spot" in my epidural which means that the catheter that they put in your back has migrated to one side and is providing more meds to that side than the other so you end up being able to feel the contractions in one certain spot. I had an awesome nurse anesthetist come in an knock it out with some hard core drugs quickly, so that I didn't have to feel too many of the contractions.
A little later in the afternoon when my nurse came to check me, she excitedly informed me that I was a solid 1 cm dilated and she could call the OB to break my water! I was thrilled. I know it doesn't sound like much progress but after hours of waiting with no real results, I was happy. The OB came in and broke my water but was still very skeptical about my progress. He then informed me that we were now on a more strict time table and that if I hadn't had the baby by midnight, we would be having a C-section. I tried not to get discouraged (and I failed miserably, I did have one meltdown, then I got over it) but I really wanted to ban the term "C-section" from everyone's vocabulary for the rest of the day.
Well, I guess breaking my water was what did the trick because a couple of hours later I was 3.5 cm dilated and, apparently, the first 4 are the toughest for your body and take the longest. The nurses changed shifts and I was sad to see my sweet nurse leave but God really did have the right nurses with me at the right times. My day nurse was so great at keeping me positive and checking on me often. My new nurse was just an incredible nurse period. You know those people who are just "meant" to do something? Well, this young lady was meant to be a nurse. She was also a wonderful Christian woman about to go on a mission trip to Africa.
So, I was pretty happy with my progress but my happiness was soon taken over by intense pain, as my "hot spot" came back. The day shift N.A. was already gone, of course, so a new guy came in to help me. I tried to tell him what she had done earlier but he decided he wanted to try a different, less drastic approach. Well, his idea did not work one bit. So, for the longest hour of my life, I was breathing through some INTENSE contractions.
My nurse came in to check me and this time I was 4.5 cm. Hooray! She noted that I had "excellent breathing control" which made me laugh a little because I have the worst pain tolerance in the world. Thank God for those birthing classes I attended that taught me how to breathe through contractions correctly or I would have been up the creek. My nurse agreed with me that I shouldn't be in that much pain so she called the N.A. back up to my room. This time he listened to me and did what the N.A. from earlier had done. He said if it didn't work they'd have to re-do my epidural. I prayed it would work so we didn't have to do that and 15 min later I was back to feeling nothing and thrilled about it.
Literally 15 min after that I was feeling some serious pressure but I thought, no way could I be that much more dilated. Well as soon as the thought entered my mind my nurse was in the room asking how I was doing and the way she asked it was kind of odd. So, I confessed to feeling a lot of pressure. "How much?" she asked. Too which I replied, "a lot." She said, "I know I just checked you 30 min ago but let's just see again because your daughter is indicating on the monitors that you may be further along now ...ok... well, you are 9.5 cm dilated. Let's get everything ready and by the time we do you will be ready to push!"
WHAT?! I went from 4.5 to 9.5 cm dilated in 30 min?! (Don't hate me for that mom friends, remember, 30 hours of labor.) I was stunned but SO excited. No midnight C-section for me, thank the Lord. (nothing wrong with a C-section but being cut open kind of scares me to death.) My mother says I was so happy that I actually sprung my upper body out of bed and said "let's do this!" I had a new found source of energy, apparently. I don't actually remember doing that. What I do remember is I was starving and had a random pain in my ribs but none of that mattered. I was about to meet my baby girl. In the back of my mind I was still nervous about her being a month early but I knew God was in control. I said a quick prayer that she would be ok.
Things got a little crazy at this point. They definitely hadn't expected me to be this far along so soon and my Dr. was busy sewing someone up down the hall, the girl next to me was almost ready to deliver,too, and my Dr. was worried he was being called in to an emergency hysterectomy with his father, also an OB in my practice. One of my dearest friends is a L&D nurse at the hospital where I was delivering and she came in to assist so she could take my sweet daughter from my nurse after she came in to the world so she could get her cleaned up and all that jazz.
I pushed for about 45 minutes and then, at 9:31 p.m. my Dr. held up my gorgeous, tiny, daughter. She was perfect. The cord was cut and the cord blood donation girl collected the blood.
With everything that was going on it suddenly hit me that she hadn't cried. And babies that don't cry, well there is something wrong with those babies because in the movies all the babies cry, so it should be that way in real life, right? I started to panic because she was a whole month early, what is something was really wrong? I frantically asked the doctor, while he was working on stitching me up, if she was ok. "She's fine," he assured me; "Sometimes they just don't cry." I still wasn't convinced and I felt like our nurse friend was whispering and hiding something from me. But, as it turns out, she was perfectly fine and could go straight to the regular nursery, no NICU time for her! What a blessing. They brought my baby girl to me, placed her in my arms, and I cried tears of sweet joy and relief that both she and I were healthy and safe. The love I felt in that moment for my daughter is truly indescribable. I spent a few moments just marveling at her.
My epidural began to wear off and I could feel the Dr. stitching me up, not a pleasant feeling. Off mom went to the nursery to get birth stats (5 lbs 3 ounces 18 inches long) and to tell everyone in the waiting room she had arrived! While she was gone the nurse had to start me on magnesium sulfate (aka "mag") which is something they put all high blood pressure patients on after birth so your body doesn't stroke out. It knocked me out! (There had been talk of giving it to me when I reached 5 cm but, obviously, I dilated a little too quickly for that to happen and thank God because it made me so loopy I don't think I could have given birth while on it!) However, before it knocked me out my Dr. told me he was a little concerned with the amount of bleeding I had so he would be back shortly to take me to the operating room just to make sure everything was o.k.
Normally, that would have terrified me out but I was so out of it that I just smiled and said o.k. I woke up again when they brought me to the OR and I think I have mentally blocked out the intense pain I experienced in there. I remember it being the worst pain I have ever been in but I can't exactly remember what it felt like, if that makes any sense at all. I remembered, suddenly, that my mom had no idea where I was and I tried to tell the nurse to go inform her but I was so out of it that I couldn't even form sentences, so they couldn't understand me. I just gave up.
I would later be informed that when my mom got back to my room and saw that I was gone, and was in a panic (my mother almost died during childbirth with my brother due to a rare complication). Mom says she was in tears by the time she saw the doctor sprinting down the hall from the OR to tell her I was o.k.
The next thing I remember, it was 3 am and Leighton's nursery nurse had brought her to me to nurse. I was still very out of it so when I tried to nurse her I just passed out, to which the nursery nurse said, "I'll just bring her back in a few hours." Good idea.
All in all my first birthing experience, though not ideal or at all what we were expecting, was pretty great. Leighton, you are living proof that God is still in the business of miracles. I get misty eyed sometimes just looking at you thinking how I received something so perfect out of such a scary situation.
"From the fullness of his grace we have received one blessing after another." John 1:16
Leighton Elizabeth McGhee. February 5th, 2011 at 9:31 p.m. 5 lbs 3 ounces 18 inches long. 30 hours of labor.1 month early.
