What a Week!

Last week was not like I ever Imagined it to be...  I always imagined my world would be surrounded by endless joy when it was time to meet my son. And it would have been.

Monday morning I was awoken with the tragic phone call that my little sister had died.  She has had drug problems for several years and through those years my parents have tried countless ways to save her.  Ultimately they couldn't, but it wasn't for lack of effort.  She died of an accidental heroin overdose.  The guy she was with was also using but tried to save her when she stopped breathing.  That is all of the details I will share because nobody needs the mental image of what I was left with last week.

My sister was a good person and regardless of her flaws I loved her.  Every time I talked to her she would ask about her sweet precious nephew and how she couldn't wait to meet him once he was born.  Now he will live his life knowing one less aunt.  It breaks my heart.

I new last week that I had to hold it together for the baby. If I stressed about all of those events to much it would effect him while he was still in utero.  I couldn't allow that to happen!  My goal is to always to protect not to harm.  So I set out to hold my sh*t together! That doesn't mean that I didn't have a few breakdowns along the way. 

Being as I was overdue I was not allowed to travel, which I expected but wanted to ask my doctor anyway.  He told me the earliest he would say I could travel would be two weeks after delivery.  I knew that I would miss her funeral.  She knows I would have been there if I could but protecting baby comes first.  

So last Wednesday night I was admitted.  I was apparently having contractions but could not feel them.  They weren't strong enough to make me do anything anyway considering I had not even begun to dialate or efface.  Overnight they gave me cytotech which serves with the primary goal of causing effacement.  It must have worked pretty good because I started feeling contractions on the middle of the night.  Around 6 am baby boys heart rate started to drop at the wrong time so my nurse came in, had me roll over to my left side and started some oxygen.  That seemed to work for the most part but he still had some unfavorable drops so she called my doctor.

My doctor came in around 7:45 and said I was 1cm dialated and since the babies heart rate was dropping some he wanted to break my water and put an internal monitor on the babies head.  The breaking of water was so not fun!  Imagine me grabbing the side rails and arching my back through it, but it needed to be done.  The internal monitor is this wire that has this small cork screw type thing at the end of it that they attach to the babies scalp, leaves a small scab but not to bad.  

After that they started pitocin which is supposed to aid in dilation.  The nurse told me she would come in every 30 minutes to increase the rate.  Well she only had to increase it once.  My contractions really started and let me tell you I had no idea how painful they would be!  Originally I wanted to try to labor naturally, however with the scare that baby boy gave us with the cytotech I feared that he would start having heart rate drops again and they would want to do an emergency c-section, so I opted to get the epidural early!  Not to mention I was not allowed to change positions because he was doing well with me on my left side.  I didn't want to do anything to harm him so I listened.  

The epidural was not as bad as I expected, and it was amazing how after that I did not feel anymore contractions.  Prior to the epidural my contractions were 2 minutes apart and lasting for 90-100 seconds giving me only 20-30 seconds reprieve.

Ultimately the day went quick and my sweet boy arrived safe and sound!