Fin's Birth Story

This has been a draft on my computer for a while, so I thought it was finally time to publish it.
I was never a fan of hearing other people's birth stories until I got pregnant. Then I wanted to read as many as I could so I wasn't totally clueless when I went into labor. Some of them scared me waaaaay too much, but most of them actually helped prepare me for what to expect.

Our baby was due on August 19th. I thought that he would come late because I was two weeks late and everyone in my family was late. We went to the temple on the 13th to do sealings but we didn't realize that it would be our last date before the baby was born. Riley told me on our date that he thought Finley would be born over the weekend. Little did we know I would go into labor a few hours later! 

At two in the morning on August 14th, I woke up to go to the bathroom (one of the greatest things about not being pregnant anymore is that I don't have to get up and pee every couple of hours) and when I got back into bed I had cramps. I had had cramping for a few weeks so I wasn't too concerned about it, but I couldn't fall back asleep and it just kept getting worse. I finally felt a contraction around three in the morning and I was like 'what was that??' I'd heard that you can have contractions and not be in labor, so I wasn't convinced that I was in labor yet. I downloaded a contraction timer app on my phone to time the contractions and they just kept getting closer. By the time it was five in the morning and they were 4-5 minutes apart, I thought for sure I was in labor.

At 5am I got into the bathtub. It didn't help contractions but it did help with the cramping in between. After I had been in the tub for a while and it wasn't really helping much anymore, I turned on the shower. I realized that my contractions felt better if I was standing up and leaning over the counter or holding on to something, so I tried to stay standing instead of laying down. When I got out of the shower at 6, I woke Riley up and told him that I thought we were going to have our baby today. We both seemed pretty calm about it and I don't know if we even realized what was going on. We got ready and Riley made me some breakfast. I knew I wouldn't be eating all day, so I wanted to eat, but the contractions were hurting so bad that I thought I was going to throw up if I did. I only ate a few bites.

Getting checked at the hospital. In-between contractions, obviously.

We make sure that everything was in order at our apartment - that the trash was taken out and the dishes were done so that we didn't come home to a dirty house. There is nothing worse than coming home from a trip to a dirty house. (Every night for a few weeks before this, before I went to bed I would make sure that everything was clean and all the laundry was done so that I could go into labor in the night to and not to worry) Riley gave me a blessing right before we went to hospital. It was weird because I felt fine when I wasn't having a contraction. In-between contractions, when I asked a nurse where we should go, she asked me if I was in labor. I'm sure she thought I was a dummy because I didn't look/feel like I was in labor (at that moment).

When we got to the hospital, they took us to a labor and delivery room had me get already as if I was staying. They checked me and I was only at 2 1/2 cm, but the nurse was nice and called it 2 3/4. At my appointment two days before, Rick had told me that I was dilated to a 1 (I had never been dilated any appointment before that, so we were really excited). The nurse at the hospital called Rick and he wanted to have us wait an hour to see if I would dilate more. By now the pain was pretty intense and I was so nervous about being sent home. I didn't know if I would be able to handle the pain if I had to go home. We sat around for the next hour and my contractions were getting pretty bad so I thought for sure they would be dilating my cervix, but when she checked again around nine I was barely dilated to a 3. I thought that they were going to send me home but she came back in and said that they were going to wait another hour before they admitted me to see if I would progress on my own.

Timing contractions

The nurse gave me a birthing ball to sit on during the contractions which helped a lot.  Riley asked the nurse for some water but I wasn't allowed to drink anything; the only thing she could give me were ice chips (but I couldn't drink water??). They had flavored ice chips too, so that was kind of fun. While I was sitting on the ball my water broke and it was the weirdest sensation ever. It just kept coming. I was nervous about how much fluid there was, but the nurse said that it was fine and once I was done on the birthing ball I got back into bed. They finally admitted me around 10am because my water had broken, even though I was still at a 3. Since I was admitted, they could give me pain meds now! While I was waiting for the anesthesiologist who had a C-section and a couple of people before me, they hooked me up to an IV and gave me fentanyl. They said it would make me a little loopy and almost immediately I was feeling it.

I was in so much pain at this point and even though the fentanyl took the edge off, I was counting down the minutes until I got my epidural. I was squeezing Riley's hands as we waited for the anesthesiologist and the pain was so bad I was just crying during contractions. Finally he came around noon and I remember thinking that he was the nicest man. I had heard that the epidural needle was huge and I'm scared of needles but the pain was so bad that I didn't even care (also I didn't look).

Once he had me rollover, we had to wait for a contraction to end before he could stick me but when he finally did the epidural start working within like 10 minutes, so I only had to go through a few more contractions without medication. The right side of my body could really feel it; almost immediately my right foot felt like it was asleep, but the left side didn't feel like it got any medicine at all. They think it was because I was laying on my right side. I was still feeling the contractions on my left side. It seemed like because only half my body was feeling contractions, the contractions were MORE painful on that side. There was so much pain in just my left side, and again the anesthesiologist was in another C-section and couldn't get to me for a while. I don't know how long it was, but it felt like an eternity. He finally came and gave me more meds and had me lay on my left side to help even it out.

Once the drugs kicked in, I was just a happy camper. I think it was around 2 by the time I was really feeling good. I couldn't feel anything, not even pressure, so I didn't even realize when I was having a contraction. I took a nap and Riley went and got lunch. I could feel my legs most of the time I had my epidural, which scared me a little. I kept asking the nurses if that was okay, and they kept telling me that yes, it was okay as long as I couldn't feel anything in my lower torso and pelvis. I couldn't, but I just kept getting scared that they would ask me to push and I'd feel everything. They gave me a button that I could push every 15 minutes to add more meds to my epidural if I needed it, which I used a few hours later when I started to feel pressure from contractions. When I really felt like I needed to push the button, that green light took forever to light up giving me the go-ahead, but it always started working quickly after that.

Riley getting a snooze in after I got my epidural

Throughout the afternoon, they kept checking me to see if I was dilating, but I was moving pretty slow. They wanted to give me pitocin to speed things up but during each contraction the baby's heart rate would drop and that worried them so they didn't give me any. I also had to be on oxygen for about 3 hours because of his heart rate. The oxygen mask was making my throat sore and my mouth really dry. Because I couldn't drink water, I had to eat ice chips to try to fix it but then I was taking off my mask to put the ice in my mouth every few minutes. I also made the mistake of getting blue raspberry chips and they turn my mouth blue for a few hours. (If these pictures weren't black and white, you may have even be able to see the blue in pictures after Fin was born)

Around 5 pm, I was dilated to a 9 which the nurse was really happy about because I jumped up quickly on my own. Around that point I started to feel really crappy. I felt really warm and the nurse confirmed that I had a fever. I felt nauseous and fuzzy like I had the flu and I had the most horrible shakes. I honestly thought that I was just getting nervous for the pushing and that's why I was shaking so bad, but it was uncontrollable. The doctor said that a fever and flu-like symptoms can be pretty common in labor but hopefully would go away after I have the baby.  Riley kept a cool washcloth on my head which made me feel a little bit better and I fell asleep. When I woke up and they checked me again, I was at a 10. Instead of starting pushing right away, Rick had us wait about another hour just so that the baby could get itself in the birth canal and I wouldn't push as long (hopefully my contractions would do some of the work pushing the baby down which I'm really grateful for because pushing was exhausting). I still felt so so crappy during that time so I fell asleep again for about another hour. When I woke up again around 7, the nurse wanted me to start pushing and I told her I couldn't push because I was going to throw up and she said "oh we can give you zofran for the nausea". I was like that would have been awesome 2 hours ago. She put it in my IV and it started working within a minute and I felt so much better after that.

She had me start pushing with just her and Riley there holding my legs. I was a little hesitant to push without the doctor there, but she said that he would come as I progressed. I only pushed for about 15 minutes and the baby's heart rate was dropping, so she had me stop pushing and wait until Rick was there to continue to push just in case. While we sat waiting for him it was pretty uncomfortable because I could feel the baby's pressure in the birth canal. Rick was only about 20 minutes away, so it wasn't too long of a wait.

When Rick finally got there he had me start pushing immediately and it was really hard. For some reason I thought having the epidural would make my labor easy and that pushing would be a breeze, but it was still hard hard work. Maybe even more so with the epidural because I couldn't feel the contractions to know when I was supposed to push. Riley kept telling me "he has so much hair" over and over and I was kind of in shock; I didn't know what he was saying. I was just concentrating on pushing. Rick had to stretch me and I still had to have an episiotomy. At that point there was a ton of pressure down there and I was just so uncomfortable I didn't care what they did to get that baby out. I pushed for about 45 more minutes and everyone kept saying, "he's almost here, he's almost here". I finally gave a couple of huge pushes and I felt that he was out. I didn't hear him crying and I couldn't understand why. I couldn't seem him yet, but I didn't think anything was wrong because Riley didn't seem nervous. He just kept saying that he has hair. Rick and the resident were cleaning out his lungs for a little bit and finally I was able to hear him cry but I still couldn't see him. As soon as he was crying they laid him on top of the towel in front of me and had Riley cut the cord. It was so fast, I didn't get a good look at his face. They took him away to do something else and clean out his lungs more before they gave him to me and I just kept looking over at him wanting them to put him on me and took forever. They weighed him and called the time that he was born: 8:11pm. He was 7lbs, 8oz, and 20 inches long.

 

Our first family picture

Riley holding Fin for the first time

When they finally gave him to me for skin to skin, it was incredible. It took them a while to stitch me up, but I just laid there with him and it was wonderful. I thought for sure I would cry when I saw our baby boy, because I cry about everything, but I was just so exhausted and glad that he was safe. I felt so weak and a little dizzy, but really really happy. When I was all stitched up, they brought me the most delicious turkey sandwich, chips, a big cup of water, fruit and two cookies. I ate everything so fast and I felt a ton better after that. And I remember really appreciating the two cookies, like hey, we know you just pushed out a baby, so you deserve TWO cookies. And oh man, I dream about those cookies all the time. Our families were waiting in the lobby so they came in and met Finley after about an hour. They were all so excited to meet him and I was trying to hold some conversations with them, but I was still out of it a little bit. They didn't stay long, and then Riley and I spent most of the night watching him get a bath, getting his shots, trying to nurse, just looking at him and having 4 different nurses trying to put a catheter in...that was fun. We didn't get much sleep at all.

Fin's first bath in the nursery

I really enjoyed my time in the hospital. We got a lot of visitors, which made the time pass quickly - maybe too quickly! We were pretty much set on the name Finley (my maiden name), but I was still unsure until the day we went home from the hospital and we had to fill out his birth certificate. But Finley just suits him. His middle name is R, which stands for his dad and two grandpas: Riley, Rodger, and Randy. Three birds with one stone :)

Our handsome guy

Those first few days with a baby straight from heaven are some of the greatest days of my life. Everyday with Fin is great and we couldn't be happier to be his parents.

13 hours old

Proud Papa

 

Leaving the hospital....right before I had a breakdown.
Suddenly being a mom had set in and I didn't think I could take care of him on my own. Luckily, that was the only real breakdown I had apart from a little bit of baby blues when Riley went back to work. I feel really lucky it wasn't worse.