Aidan's Birth Story

I'll be honest, this post really is more for me to have the story of our little guy's birth and his first week recorded somewhere, many of you won't want to read all this, and that's fine :) I just wanted to make sure that before I completely loose my mind to sleep deprivation I take time to write down some thoughts and memories of the days immediately surrounding Aidan's entrance into the world. There you go, that's your disclaimer :) Feel free to stop reading now if you so desire!

We had said all along that we didn't want our son to arrive too late, since my mom only had 3 weeks vacation and I wanted to take full advantage of her time on baby help! But we also didn't want him showing up too early since she didn't fly into town until Thursday Jan. 12. We all jokingly said that having the baby on Friday Jan. 13th sounded like a great day based on our family schedule, and wouldn't it be great if he cooperated? Well Friday rolled around and I was still very pregnant. On Friday evenings here in Granada Hills a ton of food trucks from around Los Angeles come and park on a street a few blocks from our apartment, and we thought it would be fun to introduce my mom to the LA food truck phenomenon. So Charles, mom and I walked up to the trucks (more like ran, for some reason the two of them set the pace and I did all I could to keep up--we later blame the race to the food trucks as the walk the sent me into labor!) and got dinner. We were joking about how on Sunday afternoon after church we were going to go visit a restaurant in Hollywood that has this famous salad known for inducing labor. It's been on national news and on the TV show The Doctor's. Something about the herbs in the dressing--it's literally known as "The Salad." Turns out we never got to go eat The Salad.

That night we climbed into bed around ten and my husband promptly fell asleep. It always takes me a little while to settle my mind down so about 20 minutes later I was just drifting off when a stomach cramp woke me up. It wasn't super painful, just different than what I'd been experiencing with Braxton Hicks contractions up until that point. It went away and I worked on going back to sleep. Soon enough another cramp woke me up, so I checked the clock and found that 20 minutes had passed since the first one. The next two hours found me dozing as these pains (which I knew by now were contractions) came and went every 15-20 minutes. At one point I got up and went out to the living room so as to not wake my husband yet, and went back through the paperwork from our childbirth class so I could remind myself what to expect and what signs meant "head to the hospital." We had downloaded a "contraction timer" app onto Charles' iPhone, so eventually I went back to bed and lay there timing them. Finally about 1:30 I woke Charles up, mostly with my tossing and turning. When he asked what I was doing and I said "timing contractions" he definitely woke up! We hung out together watching TV, timing contractions, and putting the last things into our hospital bags for a couple hours. As a side note, going into labor at night, as you're headed to sleep, is one of the worst times in my opinion. You've already been up all day and are just looking forward to a good night's sleep when you find yourself up all night again. And then in my case up all day the next day and half the next night too. That's a lot of days/nights with no sleep.

But I digress. We finally woke my mom up around 3 to ask her what she thought we should do. They tell you to labor at home as long as you can, and head to the hospital when either A) you can't handle the pain anymore and want drugs, or B) you are at a 5-1-1 stage--your contractions are 5 minutes apart, they last for 1 minute, and this pattern continues for an hour. My contractions were 4-6 minutes apart, lasting for about 45 seconds, but weren't really increasing in intensity (something else they tell you to look for). Finally at 5 we decided to head in just to get checked to see what was going on. Both my mom and sister had fast labors, so we were assuming genetics would play a part here and mine would be too, and already I'd been laboring longer than it took for my mom to have me. The world's nicest nurse met us at admitting and got me all checked out, and said she'd call my doctor and ask what the doctor wanted me to do. I was only at about 2 centimeters, so I still had a long way to go, so there was a chance I'd be sent home to continue laboring there for awhile. They decided to admit me and let me walk the halls of the hospital for a couple hours seeing if that would help things progress. So that's what we did, only it didn't really cause anything exciting to happen. I was still at a 2, maybe 3 centimeters after a couple hours of walking around. I was starving and so since we still had so far to go they let me eat jello and a banana for a little energy, and about 30 minutes later the pain increased and my breakfast promptly came back up in response to my contractions. Yup, not eating red jello again for awhile!

I felt bad for how long and boring the day was for my poor mom and husband! They were awesome though, they took turns doing pressure points and massage on my back, feeding me ice chips, holding bags as I got sick, walking the halls with me, and Charles even entertained me by reading to me from the book we're reading aloud (Percy Jackson and the Lightening Thief). Finally at 2 I'd had it--I'd been up all night, the pain was increasing, and I knew I still had such a long ways to go that I asked for the epidural. It had been my plan all along to get one, I didn't feel bad about it at all, nor did I feel any desire or need to try for a natural childbirth. The anesthesiologist came in and he was amazing, so so funny and kind and kept me distracted and calm through the inserting of the epidural. Wow. Talk about amazing relief after hours of not being able to rest. It was incredible and I would have no qualms about recommending an epidural to anyone! It allowed me to get some sleep which I needed so badly.

A little while later I was dozing and all of a sudden there was a ton of commotion in the room. The anesthesiologist was there, my nurse came running in, the charge nurse came in and maybe some others? My mom's expression looked worried, and I had no idea what was going on. I know that oxygen was put on my face and I was told to take deep breaths to help the baby out, and a nurse said "I'm going to give you a shot in your arm right now" and I heard them say "have them on standby" (I'm assuming they were talking about the OR). Everyone nervously watched the monitors and eventually decided things were okay. Apparently what had happened is I had a tetanic contraction that is essentially one really long contraction with no break (mine lasted over 2.5 minutes) which puts a lot of pressure on baby's head and usually causes a sudden drop in their heartbeat. Which is exactly what happened, Aidan's heartbeat plummeted. So they gave me a shot super fast to stop the contraction and let the pressure ease up on him, and thankfully it worked, but it was pretty scary. I think this happened one other time during my labor, I know I was given oxygen more than that once, and I know at some point they turned off the pitocin they'd been giving me to let things ease up a bit.

Contractions continued and at some point the doctor came into break my water to see if that would speed things up a bit. It didn't. She said she'd be back to check me at 10 that evening, but if no progress had been made then she was predicting Aidan was tangled up in his cord and wasn't able to make the descent he needed to, and if that was the case there wasn't really anything they could do besides a c-section. The hours dragged on, broken up by a super sweet visit from our pastor and his wife. Jim and Chris drove all the way down to the hospital just to bring my mom and Charles coffee and to pray with us. It was so good to see them in the midst of a long day! Eventually it was 10. Pretty much no more progress had been made even though I'd been having strong contractions every 90 seconds for hours. At that point, I think we just wanted things to be done, we wanted our baby out safely. And the doctor, nurses, and my mom reassured Charles and I that this was in no way a result of any choices we'd made, there was absolutely nothing we could have done differently to have a different outcome. They moved pretty quick after that, and before I knew it I was in the OR being moved to the operating table being prepped for surgery. My husband was given a super cool outfit and was brought in to sit by my head. I was really surprised at how fast the surgery was, before I realized they'd even started (I was SUPER numb, literally could not tell anyone was even touching anything below my chest!) I heard the beautiful sound of our baby wailing away as they brought him out. Then I heard the doctor say "I was right! He was wearing his cord like a necklace and couldn't move down." Everything after that was kind of a blur, I know they toweled the baby off a bit, and handed him to Charles right away. He brought him over to see me, but I was shaking SO badly from the medicine I couldn't really touch him. I started crying asking if he was really okay. He was howling but quieted quickly as his daddy settled him down. The nurses took our first family photo and then they took Aidan to the nursery to clean him up and check him over. Charles got to go spend those first two hours with him while they put me into a light sleep to finish up the surgery and get me into recovery. I remember waking up in a different room, still really numb, and my mom was there. I remember asking her if she had seen him yet and she said yes, she had held him and he was perfect. I still had not really seen the baby but they said he would be brought in shortly. My mom let me make the 2 phone calls I had really wanted to make myself--to my dad and sister. I was too drugged to do much besides that, and all I remember was how parched my throat and voice felt from not being allowed to drink and from wearing the oxygen mask. I could barely talk but I was able to tell dad he was a Papa again and Megan that she was finally an auntie. Finally Charles came back wheeling the bassinet. The nurse and my mom helped me sit up and hold him for the first time. He was so little! It was pretty fantastic holding him, and we tried feeding but I don't really remember that. I think he sucked a few times and that was about it. I was exhausted and kind of groggy, so after a bit I handed him back to his daddy. They transferred me to my postpartum room and by now it was probably almost 1 AM. All I wanted was sleep. I sent my mom and Charles home (first major mistake made by me, I thought I'd be fine just sleeping there alone...I should have asked someone to stay the night with me) and we had them keep Aidan in the nursery for the night. I was completely incapable of even picking him up or getting out of bed to care for him, so they kept him in the nursery and fed him there. I was at the point where that was completely fine with me--even though I know it went against all the rules of establishing a good breast feeding habit with a newborn.

The rest of that night was a long blur of feeling drugged, incredibly nauseated (yes, I even threw up ice chips, I didn't even know that was possible), sore as the meds started wearing off, and bleeding way more than anyone was expecting. I think I was making the nurses nervous, but I was so out of it I didn't know that at the time. I slept fitfully, unable to really move on my own to roll over or reposition myself. First thing in the morning I called home and told my mom and Charles I needed them to come back, they wanted to bring the baby into the room and I couldn't mentally or physically handle being alone with him. For the first couple days I felt like the world's worst mom. I had so much physical healing to do, I couldn't get out of bed to pick him up, I didn't know how to feed him, I couldn't get up to change his diapers or swaddle him--everyone else had to do those things for me. These are all things you're supposed to do as a mom, and I couldn't. It really hit home when I called my grandparents first thing Sunday morning to make sure they knew Aidan had arrived and grandma asked what he looked like. I just started crying and had to say that I had no idea, I'd still only held him the one time late Saturday night, and I was so out of it all I could remember is that he had dark hair. What kind of mom can't even picture what her own baby looks like?? It was a horrible, horrible feeling. I remember crying a lot those first few days--feeling disappointed that things had gone so differently than we planned, dealing with a lot of physical pain, feeling like a failure because everything they tell you to do in the first "essential few hours with your baby" I couldn't do, and feeling completely and utterly exhausted.

My dad arrived about 1 on Sunday, having caught the first flight he could on Sunday morning to come meet his grandson, and we had a lot of other visitors throughout the day on Sunday of people excited to meet our baby. As much as I wanted to see close friends, and introduce them to Aidan, looking back that's one thing I think I would have done differently. I think I would have asked visitors to wait until Monday, and would have protected that first day to be just family--which would have helped me get some rest, and I still hadn't really spent much time holding and looking at my own son. As it was I wasn't able to nap at all that day because of so many people (both medical staff and visitors and even people via Skype that "met" Aidan from long distance) in and out of the room. By Sunday night I was an emotional wreck partly from hormones and partly from sheer exhaustion--I really thought I was the world's worst new mom, and all I could do was cry. I think one thing I'd say to new moms is that it's okay to say you need rest, your close friends will love you enough to understand and be happy to come see you on day 2 or 3 when you're feeling a little more human! I sent Charles and my dad home that night to get some good sleep and had my mom stay with me mostly because I needed a nurse--I was so physically miserable I needed someone to take care of me while Aidan spent another night in the nursery (although I was able to nurse by now so they brought him to me for feedings and then took him back so I could sleep more).

Thankfully by Monday morning I'd turned a bit of a corner--they finally unhooked my IV, took my catheter out, took the compression boot things off my legs and let me get out of bed for the first time and take a real shower and put on my own clothes. Oh my gosh I felt like a new person. I moved slow, but I was able to get out of bed and sit in a chair and nurse from there, and was able to eat real food again--since I'd successfully been keeping my liquid diet down :) Charles stayed with me that night and we did our best to deal with the infamous "night number 2" of having a newborn. Apparently it's super common for babies to be up all night on the second night, wanting to nurse constantly. Our little guy was no exception and we spent a long night together trying different soothing techniques. I was finally discharged Tuesday afternoon which was awesome--they were going to keep me until Wednesday but my doctor correctly predicted I'd be in great hands going home with two nurses, and would get way more rest at home than in the hospital. So we packed up, headed home, and began the journey of adjusting to life with a newborn! I will write more about our first couple weeks at home later, but this post is getting long enough, if anyone is still reading I am impressed! As much as we had hopes of our birth experience going differently, we are so grateful for a healthy baby boy and that my recovery has gone really well (after those first horrible 24 hours!). God has blessed us beyond belief, and we look forward to sharing more of our adventures and stories of adjusting to parenthood with you all!