How far
along: 38 w 4 d
Cooper’s
Birth Story:
On the Friday afternoon after my OB appointment, at which I was told my
placenta previa had returned and was put on bed rest, my contractions were a
steady 10 minutes apart. Later that evening, they began coming 7 minutes apart,
and got a bit stronger. Adam told me to go lay in bed and drink a bunch of
water, hoping that we could make it through this weekend since we had a
C-section scheduled for Monday, and with the complications of going into
natural labor with placenta previa hovering over our heads like a super storm,
we didn’t want to take any chances. I was able to fall asleep for an hour or
so, but was woken up at midnight with the feeling of leaking fluid… not much…
but enough to take notice. I went back to bed to lie down, told Adam, and tried
to fall back asleep. I fell back asleep until 6 AM, when I felt more fluid. At
this point Adam was getting ready to go to work. I told him I was going to call
the OB, since we had an appointment with her that day to discuss the surgery we
had planned for Monday. Adam left for work and I waited a bit for the doctor’s
office to open. At about 7:30 I tried calling the office, with no answer. My
contractions were now 5 minutes apart, so I called the L&D unit at the
hospital and told them what was going on. I was told to pack my bags and come
on over! Adam came home from work & helped me get everything packed in the car, just in
case this was the real thing. We got to the hospital around 8:30 AM. I was
admitted to the L&D unit, hooked up to all of my fancy machines, once
again, and waited to be seen by my OB. The resident and fellow came in to do an
ultrasound to check the placement of my placenta. They were a bit confused when
they saw that it was not in fact, covering my cervix, leading to a misdiagnosis
of the return of placenta previa. They waited for my OB to come in to confirm.
Once it was established that the return of the placenta previa was an error on
the ultrasound OB’s part, they checked me again to see how my labor was
progressing. I was now 2 cm dilated with contractions 2 minutes apart. Dr. Frenn,
my OB, said that she would allow me to try for the natural labor that I had
planned on, but admitted that she wasn’t too optimistic about it. At this
point, my contractions were centered in my lower back, and Baby H was still
lodged under my ribs with every one. I decided to take Dr. Frenn’s advice and
agreed to the C-section. And with that there was a world-wind of nurses in and
out, papers being signed, medicine being administered, and scrubs being put on
(Adam just looked so darn cute in his scrubs and cap… which he in fact tried to
keep, until the nurse said she needed them back once we were in our post-partum
room). My parents made it just in time, grabbing my bags from Adam’s car,
allowing me to put my hair into somewhat of a messy braid since the bobby pins
that were holding my bangs back were not allowed in the OR. Within an hour of
agreeing to the C-section, I was being wheeled away to the OR. Adam had to wait
in the L&D room until my spinal was placed. Being in the OR as a patient
was certainly not as exhilarating as being the health professional. My spinal
was placed, the curtains were put up, and Adam was allowed into the OR. With
Adam seated by my head, we waited for our precious baby boy to arrive. I felt nauseous from the get-go so I asked for medicine. It seemed to work for
a while. There was a lot of pushing and pulling and then finally at 2:06 PM on
April 12th, 2014, Dr. Frenn told Adam to stand up if he wanted
to see our little man be born. Before he was even out all of the way, he let
out a thunderous cry. Tears filled both of our eyes, as Adam held my hand
tightly, watching them bring our precious Cooper James Holmstrom into the world
at 9 pounds, 10 ounces (surprisingly close to what he was estimated to be via ultrasound), 20 and a half inches long. They brought him around the
curtain so I could see his beautiful face for the first time, and then brought
him over to the table and asked Adam if he wanted to cut the cord, and of
course, he did. Once his cord was cut, they brought Cooper over to me and
placed him skin-to-skin on my chest, allowing him to nurse for the first time.
We spent what seemed like forever that way, Cooper on my chest, Adam & I
just staring at this beautiful life we created. After about 20 minutes I began
to feel extremely nauseous. I told Adam to take Cooper, and thus began the
funniest part of the entire experience. Adam’s response was “I’m not wearing
gloves!” I repeated, “Adam take the baby” and again I heard “But, I’m not
wearing gloves!” In a much more dire voice, I yelled at him to take the baby so
I wouldn’t throw up on him and the anesthesiologist looked at him and said
“Take the baby!!” So finally he took the baby, just in time for them to suction
my mouth out and give me more medicine. The pediatric nurse asked if it was OK
for them to take Cooper to the nursery at that time, to do all of his tests,
while they finished bandaging me up and getting me to the recovery room. I
agreed and told Adam to accompany him. They were quick to finish me up, and I
was in my recovery room within 10 minutes. I began to throw a lot of clots, so
they had to administer some more medication to stop that. Within a few minutes,
Adam came to the recovery room. However, Cooper was not with him. He informed
me that his blood sugar was extremely low, and even though it was against my
birth plan, they were requesting our permission to give him some formula via a
dropper to raise his blood sugar. I of course agreed, in the best interest of
his health, but was very adamant about only using the dropper and not any
bottles. Our amazing doula, Lindsey, was waiting in the recovery room for me. I
had a horrible pain in my neck/shoulder from lifting my head so much to see
Cooper in the OR. Lindsey gave me an amazing, life-saving massage, which made
the pain practically disappear. Within a few more minutes, Adam brought Cooper
into the recovery room, and once again was placed skin-to-skin with me and
allowed to nurse. How I cherished those precious moments with him. We stayed in
the recovery room for almost 3 hours, since I was still having issues with blood
clots. We were finally moved into our post-partum room. Lindsey took some
amazing birth photos, and after we spent some more alone time with our little
man, we allowed our family to come in and meet Cooper. Lindsey took some more
awesome pictures of Cooper with his grandparents, godfather/Uncle Alex and
godmother Zibba. After a while, it was time for the nurse to take Cooper again
to do another blood glucose test, as he needed to pass three in a row in order
to be cleared of his low blood sugar issues. We spent the next 4 days in the
hospital, with daily visits from friends and family. We both quickly adapted to the roles of being new parents,
changing diapers and nursing every 2 hours. Adam was such a huge help those
first few days as it was very difficult for me to get out of bed due to my
incision. We were finally allowed to bring our baby boy home on Wednesday. Mama
and baby were given a clean bill of health and we drove off into the sunset as
our fabulous family of three!
No comments:
Post a Comment