Tuesday, April 14, 2015

Birth Story part 3: It's a....

"What is it?"

Those were my first words after I heard my baby cry. I was waiting on N to say something, that was the plan anyway but he wasn't so a nurse said, "It's an Oliver". Then they took him away to do all that crap they have to do. I stared at him, my little boy, while they wiped him down, poked his little foot and weighed him.

While they were doing that, my doc popped up and let the student have the pleasure of delivering my placenta.. Now let me tell you something, the moment that placenta leaves your uterus it's like the biggest relief in the world. I mean WOW. I though pushing out the baby was getting rid of pressure but that thing slid out and it was like my entire body exhaled a breathe it had been holding forever. 

The nurse said "You just gave birth to a football player!" How big is he? 

Oliver is a whopping 9lbs 3oz and 21 inches long. All I can think is I'm so glad I didn't give him another week to pack on a half a pound!

N was in charge of photos and frankly, he sucked. Most of them are blurry and I found out later that he was taking selfies with the GoPro while I was pushing.. he's lucky I love him even more lucky that none of them turned out... I've never been so happy there isn't a flash on that damn thing











So there you have it. An induction story with a happy ending.

12 hours from water breaking till Oliver entered the world. No C-section needed (no stitches either, I tore so slightly that my doc preferred to let it heal naturally)

We hung out just the 3 of us for almost an hour then let family back so they could finally go home. I sent my mom to IHOP.. I needed food like NOW. 2 slices of french toast, 2 strips of bacon 2 eggs (scrambled with cheese) and hashbrowns with cheese.. and I ate every single bite.

N when home to let the dogs out and get some sleep. My mom stayed with me. Nurse 8ft helped me out of bed to go to the bathroom and clean up. Not going to lie.. when I left that bathroom it kinda looked like a scene from Dexter. 

When they tell you those mesh underwear are awesome.. they aren't lying. I love those things. I wish I had gotten about 10 more pair. I tried to stand long enough to dress Oliver in his gown but I got too light headed so my mom had to finish. Then of course they made me hang out longer to check my bp. 

Once they were satisfied, I was finally wheeled to the postpartum room. It was 3am and I was exhausted and I wanted this GD IV catheter OUT OF MY ARM. They said I needed to keep it to get my RhoGam. The HELL I DO, i'll take that shot right in the ass like I did the first time.. TAKE IT OUT SO I CAN HOLD MY BABY WITHOUT PAIN. (I was seriously pissed about it... I have a SCAR now)

I took Oliver and we snuggled but I'll admit, I made them take him to the nursery for a couple hours while I slept. It was a short sleep, he was a hungry little dude and wanted to eat often!

N came back in the morning with food and the crap we left at home. He finally got to talk about the birth. He wanted to confirm that I didn't feel guilty or bad about taking the epidural. As I thought about it, I realized that no, I didn't. I was ok with the way it went. It wasn't perfect, but it was ok.

He told me that the few seconds it took him to cry seemed like the longest ever. N is a paramedic, he's actually delivered 6 babies in less than ideal conditions, he KNOWS they don't cry, he KNOWS they are all a little blue at first but he said he was glad I didn't look at him because he was terrified. His exact words were "If no one got my baby to cry, I was going to intubuate him myself"

Turns out, N looked too.. he said he wasn't going to look when the baby was coming out, but he couldn't help himself. He was also surprised I was up walking around, they were a little rough yanking Ollie out when he got stuck one arm in, one arm out! I felt good. I kept up on my Motrin and didn't even need anything stronger my entire stay. That day was a whirlwind of visitors and gazillions of pictures




And then that night we were alone again. It didn't make sense to me to have Nick stay at the hospital and sleep on a couch when home was just 10 minutes away so he went home again. I chose to send Oliver to the nursery for one more three hour stretch and attempted to sleep. He came back in when he was hungry and ate like a champ... I was having pain though but everyone told me it would take some time for my nipples to "toughed up" so I brushed it off.

I'll never forget that first night when he screamed. I mean, cut loose WAILING it was 3am and I have NO CLUE what set him off. I changed him, he screamed, I attempted to feed him, he screamed. I stripped him naked to see if something was bugging him, still screaming. So there I was, a mom for less than 48 hours alone in a hospital room, topless holding a naked screaming baby. To be honest, I thought a nurse would check on us any second... they don't really just leave you alone do they? Don't they know I have no clue what I'm doing? Turns out, a little skin to skin and swaying goes a long way with my little guy, and he made sure I knew that upfront!

The next day, we were allowed to head home. He was only down to 8lbs 10oz but they were convinced (despite an awesome bilirubin number) that he was jaundiced... So we have to bring him back in 2 days just in case (BTW, not jaundice, he's tan... he's got hispanic blood in him, duh)



So there it is... the ending to the birth story!! I can't decide if I'll keep it all here for updates or move everything over to the wordpress blog... I'll let you know :)

3 comments:

  1. What a cutie pie!! Glad everything turned out just perfectly for you :)

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  2. Congrats!!!! He is a cutie!!!!

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