Our little hapa arrived at 2:05 AM on the 23rd, just two hours past her due date. She weighed a whopping 5 lbs 7 oz and was 18.5 inches long. We call her A*n*n*i*e. She's as darling as can be. Her first name showed up on our name list pretty early in the game. It means "graced with God's bounty." We liked that. When we saw a name meaning description that mentioned it being a combination of Hannah and Elizabeth, two women from the bible who were infertile and eventually blessed with children, we were hooked on it being the perfect name for our Chipmunk. Her middle name is given by her paternal grandfather in Korean-American tradition. It means "wisdom" and it pronounced "Gee-Heh" or
[ʤi hɛ] for IPA geeks like me.
I started having contractions on my way home from work on Monday. I was psyched. They were very manageable, I didn't have to worry about my water breaking in my office chair, and it looked like she was going to be born on her due date. I looked at the clock in my console and it seemed that they were 10-12 minutes apart. When I got home, we started loosely timing them while we ate dinner, excited about the rest of the evening. By 9 PM we figured we should get some sleep, since the contractions were still not all too powerful or close together. At 2:30 I woke up knowing there was no way I was going to be able to sleep.
I got in the tub and found that contractions were running about 6-7 minutes apart. The tub felt great and I'm not sure if it was the position I was in or what, but it didn't take long for us to hit the "5 minutes apart lasting 1 minute each for 1 hour." I called the OB on call and she said we could go in for a labor check. At that point I noticed that things seemed to slow down. All the sudden we were back to 6-7 minutes apart. I leaned over our exercise ball, trying to recreate the position in the tub, and as soon as we got a few more contractions that were 5 minutes apart, we notified our parents, let the dog out, and headed to the hospital.
At the hospital we had a nice long stint in triage. When we first got there, my blood pressure was high. This was a first for me. They had me lay on my left side (you'll find this left side thing will become a theme) and took it again. Still high. The OB wanted to draw some labs, have me lay there for a bit, and see if my BP would come back down. Eventually it did. My labs were fine and Chipmunk's heart rate was thumping along happily. Problem was that my cervix was only at a two. That's right, a two. 80% effaced. This was more dilated than I was at my doctor's visit a week before, but still disappointing. They were well aware of our desire for a natural birth and didn't want to admit me before 4 cm in an effort to avoid interventions. So they had us walk to hospital floor for about an hour. During our stroll, contractions were coming much stronger and more frequently, but still didn't seem altogether regular. When I was checked again... still a two. No movement at all. The consensus was that I was in early labor, my contractions were real, but my body just wasn't getting into a rhythm for whatever reason. The OB recommended going home or "going for a walk around the mall" (WTF?). She said a good way of knowing when to come back was when it was impossible to breathe through my contractions. This was the dumbest thing I'd heard. If it was impossible to breathe through contractions, why did I spend so much time learning how to breathe through contractions? J kept telling her that I have an ungodly high pain tolerance, but she just brushed it off as OBs tend to do. So home we went, tails between our legs, feeling a little silly. I had a regularly scheduled OB appt for 3:30 and was told to keep that visit because it would be a good way to check and see if I had progressed.
My 3:30 appointment was with the only doc from the practice I hadn't met before. I knew I wouldn't meet her until late in the game and was totally anxious that I wouldn't like her and she'd end up being the one delivering our baby. When we got to the office, I was honest with her that things hadn't seemed to progress much since we'd left the hospital. She checked me and said, "Well, I think you're doing pretty good! You're at a solid four. Head on back to the hospital and I'll meet you there!" Fist pump! We were ready to go!
This time our arrival at the hospital was greeted with a immediate placement of wrist bands and a room. We got all checked in and settled. They wanted to put the hep lock in and get some labs back before they let me start moving around. The nurse put me on the monitors for a mandatory one hour check while we waited for the labs.
J was mesmerized by the heart rate monitor and watching my contractions on the screen. He kept giving me play by plays. "She's still at 150. Kid's heart rate has been solid this whole pregnancy. Crazy. You're having a contraction? I can see it. That's a long one. Your blood pressure still looks good too."
We'd been awake since 2:30 AM at this point and J and I started dozing off here and there. I had been listening to the "beep beep beep" of the fetal monitor for so long, that when I suddenly didn't hear it, I noticed. I yelled out J's name and we could see on the monitor that Chipmunk's heart rate had dropped to zero. I hit the nurse button and just yelled "Something's wrong." Within nano seconds there were three nurses in the room followed closely by the OB I'd just met. (Let's call her Wonder Doc.) I was on my left side with an oxygen mask on my face and a doctor between my legs before I could blink. "Lisa I'm just going to break your bag of water so I can put a scalp electrode on her and get a better reading of her heart rate." Swoosh, I feel my water break and instrument number one is inserted and secured to my inner thigh. There was meconium in the fluid. Her heart rate still wasn't going up so they flipped to my hands and knees with my butt in the air and my chest pushed to the mattress. Then we could hear the monitor start "beep beep beeping" again and there was an audible sigh in the room.
We managed to get me back on my left side and all was well with Chippy. My blood pressure had dropped in the scuffle so they started me on an IV and wanted me to keep the mask on. Wonder Doc laid it out. She wasn't ready to give up on natural labor, but wanted us to understand that if this happened repeatedly or if her heart rate dropped for an extended period of time, we'd be looking at an emergency c-section. We told her that baby is number 1 for us and she said that mom AND baby were number 1 for her. She'd like us to be able to do a vaginal birth if at all possible, but that we might want to think about an epidural. Her main concern was that we would be looking at an emergency c-section and that without having an epidural placed for a spinal, they'd have to put me under general anesthesia and J wouldn't be able to be there for the birth. That made a lot of sense, but also, it had been a long freakin' time since I'd slept and I was really feeling like I wasn't going to have the strength to push.
And I was still at four cm.
Wonder Doc wanted to place an intrauterine monitor to see what was going on with my contractions since I still wasn't progressing. Obviously this would be something that would be best done with an epidural in place.
I agreed to the epidural, while being very nervous about what changing my position to get the darned thing would mean for Chipmunk's heart rate. The IV fluids were making me shake like crazy too. The anesthesiologist was there shortly and the nurses and my doc managed to get me into position while keeping Chipmunk happy. It was an easy and painless placement, but they had to put me back on my back to let the drugs flow properly. That didn't last long. Her heart rate started dropping and I was turned back on my left side. "Beep beep beep" she was happy as a clam again. The intrauterine electrode (crotch equipment count two) and catheter (make that three) were placed.
At this point I didn't want anyone to move me, period. I was perfectly happy to attempt to give birth on my left side. Apparently, you can't lay on one side like that for forever and a day. They tried moving me to my right, no go. They tried putting me on my back with the head of the bed elevated and that seemed to be okay. So I tried hanging out there for awhile, mask still on.
One of the nurses was prattling on, trying to calm us down I think, asking about how we chose our dog's name. I tried to answer her and promptly threw up. Heart rate dropped again and came back up as soon as I was on the left side. They thought the throwing up was good though! Surely it must mean I was in transition, right?
Nope. Still at four.
Wonder doc explained that my contractions weren't strong enough to move me past 4 cm. She wanted to add Pitocin in little bits because if Chipmunk couldn't handle stronger contractions, she wasn't going to be able to handle a vaginal birth. They were trying to keep the epidural to a minimum to keep from slowing labor down which was fine with me. I was handling the contractions okay. Every time I felt one coming on I would breathe and count the "beep beep beeps" from the heart rate monitor while J murmured what the rate was and how strong the contraction was. Bradley and Hypnobabies it wasn't, but it was all we had.
Several hours later, Pitocin had only moved me to a five. I vomited again, and when blowing my nose in the aftermath, her heart rate dropped again. It was completely clear that this child was not going to be down with labor and neither was my cervix. Wonder Doc was explaining that I couldn't give birth only on my side and I said "If I can't blow my nose, I'm thinking I can't push." "My thoughts exactly," she answered and we were off for an immediate C-section.
It's amazing how quickly a group of professionals can sweep into your room, shave your lady bits and get you all prepped for surgery once your doctor says the magic words. Before I knew it, I was being wheeled down the hall, still on my left side with my trusty oxygen mask attached, ready for a quickie C-Section. J was dropped off at another room and given hasty instructions on how to change. Luckily, four IVF transfers and three egg retrievals had him well versed in OR dress code.
Once we got into the OR, the tricky part was how to keep me on my left side and keep monitoring Chipmunk's heart rate while they prepped me. All the staff already knew the issue by the time I arrived. I carefully moved onto the OR table with help and they quickly put a wedge under my right side to keep me tilted. I was washed, draped, and drugged in the blink of an eye. You could hear the heart rate monitor in the background and it was still going, but not all that quickly. Wonder Doc said, "You know what she's telling us right now? She's telling us we made the right decision." Once I was prepped I had to be flat on my back. Scalpel went to belly and she said, "Tell me when you don't feel any sharp poking anymore." My reply went something like this, "I feel that, I feel that, I feel that, I feel that, NOW!" "Cutting," she answered and we were off just like that. J came in shortly after and Wonder Doc told him we'd started. After what seemed like forever she announced, "She's out!" We knew that they were purposefully not making her cry because of the meconium, but I heard her whimper and I started sobbing. The NICU staff whisked her away with a "take a look mom" but all I saw was feet. They told J he could follow them into the next room. I heard her cry when they opened the door. That's when my hallucinations started.
I was shivering uncontrollably, which I know is a really common thing, but it was really awful. I swore I saw bugs crawling across the floor. A large group, followed by a solitary straggler. Then another large group, followed by another solitary straggler. I don't know why I didn't say something. There were two anesthesiologists sitting right by my head, but obviously they would have noticed the preponderance of bugs in the OR if they really existed.
I was trying to hear what was going on the next room and had my eyes stuck to the door. Wonder Doc said she looked good and that she was just a little slip of a thing. I told her one of the other docs was estimating 7-7.5 lbs. She laughed and said she might be 6. There was a lot of laughing going on next door and I heard things like, "No dad, you have to take a picture of that. She'll want that. Here, hand me the camera and I take the pictures."
The NICU staff came out with an announcement that she was 5 lbs 7 oz and looking good. J brought her over so I could look at her for a few minutes. She took my breath away. The first thing he said was, "Look! She has a pointy ear like you!" I could see myself in her and I wasn't expecting that at all. She just stared into my eyes in wonder and mouthed the edge of her blanket. J was beaming from ear to ear. The NICU staff said they had to take her to the special care nursery just for a few more checks, but that she'd be in recovery waiting for me. I sent J with them.
Later J told me that when he went into the room, one of the NICU nurses said, "This is an IVF baby, so she's extra special." That warmed his heart. He didn't know if Wonder Doc made it a point for them to know that or if they saw it in her chart. They also informed him that Chipmunk had been using her cord as a pillow, hence the desats. I just hope she wasn't doing that regularly during my pregnancy.
The sewing up portion lasted a really long time and finally I was able to go to recovery. They transferred me to a different bed and wheeled me down the hall. Chipmunk was getting a bath and wailing away. The charge nurse commented on how strong she was and how surprisingly loud her yell was given her small size. That made me smile, maybe she'll be a singer like her mama. She finished up her bath quickly so we could do skin to skin and try nursing. I held my little bundle in my arms and the whole world changed. They were pushing on my belly and doing all the crap they needed to do to me, but I didn't care. She latched on like a champ and I never wanted to let her go. It was the scariest and most wonderful day of our lives.
She was 30 grams below the threshold of being categorized as "low birth weight" so we've had a lot of follow up at the hospital and apparently we will have more from the state. A neonatologist would come in to see her and mention that sometimes due dates are off and she could just be small because of that. We tell them she was an IVF baby born 2 hours after her due date and they change their tune to, "Well, you guys are small people." We aren't really concerned. She seems strong and alert and she's already back to her birth weight, plus an ounce. We've been back to the pediatrician already and she gave her a clean bill of health so far. The biggest issue is finding clothes to fit her!
Our room in the hospital overlooked the entrance to the Women's Center. The first day after Chipmunk arrived, James was holding her and looking out the window watching the couples walk into the center for labor class with their pillows and yoga mats. "They lie to you," he muttered. I was struck by that. There were so many things in our labor class that were briefly mentioned as "that never happens" interventions which we, of course, received. There was no talk of C-sections, even in the generic hospital class. We planned and prepared for this natural birth, determined to make it happen. During IVF and even IUIs, we were always learning about the worst case scenario. We wanted to be prepared for what could happen, but when it came to actual birth, we wanted to make it happen a certain way. Instead, we like so many others, became that couple that walked in with a birth plan and walked out just feeling grateful for a healthy baby.
