So, I was due around October 20th. I ended up being a week late! We tried everything to get our baby out, but she did not want to come out! My mother had been here for a week taking me out every day to keep me busy so I would not lament over the baby not coming out. No matter what - those last few weeks of pregnancy were tough. I was just tired, sore, big, swollen and anxious. Very anxious. Not knowing when it is going to happen is the hardest part. Having people waiting for the baby, also makes it worse. So, when my Doctor gave me the option of scheduling an induction after waiting for a week, we went ahead and did it.
I checked in to St John's in Santa Monica on Sunday, October 24th at 9 PM. The plan was to start me on Cervidil to soften my cervix...reason for this natural inducing drug was because I was only 1 CM the week I was due and still when I checked in to the hospital. You have to have Cervidil in your system for 12 hours to get it to work, so my parents and Tim and I went to the hospital and the process started. I was very nervous that it would not work and they would send me home. Thankfully since I was a week late, they would get that baby out now. So, Tim and I sleep very little and wait for morning to see if the Cervidil works. I wake at 3 AM or so and stay awake, reading my new Ken Follett book on my iPad. Morning finally comes and I am not supposed to eat much, so I have a little egg and toast. The nurse comes in to take the Cervidil out around 10 AM, and check me out. Unfortunately, I am still only 1 CM and the nurse tells me my cervix is posterior, which means it is facing toward the back. This seems to be the problem keeping me from opening up. But thankfully, my cervix is soft so they decide to start the Pitocin, which is the main inducing drug. I am ready...my parents have shown up and the nurse tells us there is a strong possibility that the baby will no come for another 24 hours or so. I decide to be patient, at least I am at the hospital and the process has started!!!
Pitocin starts around 10:30 AM and by 11:00 AM my parents and Tim notice my contractions on the monitor getting really big. "Do you feel that", they ask....I say no...a few minutes later, I do....and they are coming quickly and painfully! The pitocin - combined with the cervilix really kick starts my labor and the contractions begin to be extremely painful. Within the hour, I am crying uncontrollably and buckling over in intense pain. Tim is trying to calm me down, the nurse comes in to say breathe through it, and I want to smack her and say, Screw you!!! Breathe through it my butt!!!! I have never experienced such intense pain in my life....finally, another nurse comes in to check on me and says patients are coming out of their room asking if I am OK because my crys are extremely audible!!! I am embarassed but the pain is out of control. My mom asks for a pain reliever - we are trying to wait to hit 5 CM to get the epidural - but they tell me they try not to give narcotics if they can. So I say, fine, I will wait...30 minutes later I scream for the epidural, I don't care how far along I am....They do not put up a fight and get the process moving. Unfortunately, the anesthesiologist is busy so it is going to take some time. My original nurse comes in to check on my, and I am now 3 CM and my water breaks...on its own! Not fun...I was in so much pain I thought my uterus and the baby were going to fall out right there and then. I was scared to be honest. They decide to turn off the pitocin since I am in so much pain....and the contractions keep coming on their own at the same intensity....finally, around 2:30 PM the epidural guy comes in and I am ready to kiss the ground he walks on...Of course, nothing is easy during my labor and the guy cannot get the damn needle in my back. He is praising the strength in my back due to my doing yoga and I just want to fall off the bed and crawl into a little hole. Tim is trying to hold me as the contractions come fast and hard and a guy is putting a needle in my back...super fun. Finally he has me lay down and it goes in...ten more minutes and finally my 3 hour pain ordeal calms down. I am so tired at this point from fighting the pain and crying and the lack of food that I want to sleep for a week.
As the epidural does its job, my labor moves quickly and I am around 5 CM and moving. I try to nap and my body starts shaking...I am getting the Baby Quakes as they call them, which is due to the transitions coming so quickly in my labor. I start feeling really cold. My Doctor comes in with a nurse to check on me and the baby - her heartbeat has gone up. They find out I have a fever of 101. Not good....they give me a tylenol...which I quickly throw-up. Did I mention I have never been in a hospital...never had an IV in me...never took heavy drugs...my body is in shock. The tylenol has a mild affect, my fever goes down but they are worried about the baby. Finally around 7:30 I am almost 10 cm and they say we will start pushing in the next 30 minutes. It takes another hour and finally we start pushing.
So, I am thinking pushing is easy...I feel no pain and I am in good shape. Did you know they make you hold your breath three times in a row for 10 seconds each every time you push....yeah, well, I am not in good cardio shape and with my fever, exhaustion and no food I quickly become tired. By 30 minutes of pushing, I want to stop. I throw up again from the constant ice chips I am eating...Tim, my mom and 5 people are in the room...5 people cheering me on pisses me off so I tell my mom and Tim to stop talking. I need quiet to focus. I even turned off the mix I had playing on my iPad. I swear I pass out twice from the exhaustion...
Finally 1 hour and 20 minutes into pushing, Doctor Pushkin tells me this will be the last one. So I am encouraged (BTW, I was told I was a GREAT pusher - very strong - thanks to Yoga again, but I had trouble concentrating, my brain got in the way, which is typical for me). And she was right, baby Riley comes out on the next set of pushes and it was the most amazing moment of my life. So surreal...I wish I could have bottled it up and kept it in my pocket because it was so cool. I even touched the head during the process....just amazing.
But Baby Riley was having some problems, she was not really crying so the baby doctors and respiration specialist were concerned. They spent a while trying to clear her lungs and had to take her to the nursery to ensure they could clear her. I threw up again after they gave me some juice concoction that after no food was not good for my tummy...I would rather have had a cosmo at the point=) Anyway, Tim goes with them to the nursery and they quickly fix me up. I am worried...what could be going on....Tim is texting me to tell me how things are going...Finally, they get her cleared and after 3 hours I finally get to hold my baby!
After all of that - 24 hours - I had Riley in my arms and life began a new for us!
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