Sunday morning (February 23rd) I woke up at 6:30 am knowing that something was going to happen that day, but didn't feel anything. I decided to go to church since I was feeling okay, just really tired. I only went to sacrament meeting because I started to feel very uncomfortable. Around 3, I started to have contractions, but didn't know they were contractions. I was complaining that my back hurt and my tailbone was killing me. Luckily, my mom was in town and knew exactly what was happening. Mark was doing other things for church and didn't get home until 5. When he finally got back, I told him that we needed to go to the hospital. My contractions were 3 minutes apart and I had been bleeding all day. When we got to the hospital, I was only dilated to a 2 and it wasn't progressing so they almost sent me home. I asked how I would know when I'm supposed to go back to the hospital - I'm in SO much pain and my contractions are 3 minutes apart! We were sitting there waiting for a few hours until they finally checked on us again. I guess we were the only ones there when we got there, then right after all of the rooms were full. So we were last to me admitted - yeah, makes sense to me (not).
When they told us we were going to be able to stay, I was more than thrilled. Our nurse really talked up my pain (I really was in a lot of pain) and convinced the Doctor to let us stay. The doctor that was there wasn't my doctor that I'd been seeing this whole time (he was out of town). This lady doctor was really acting like I didn't need to be there over night and I should go back home - thank goodness for wonderful nurses. It was about 10:00 by this time, and I was completely exhausted and SO hungry...we didn't eat any dinner before we came to the hospital...a decision I completely regret. I really wanted to get some sleep, so the nurse gave me some pain medication (I didn't want an epidural yet) and the medication made it WORSE. I hated the medicine! I remember saying "I have never been drunk, but I imagine this is what it feels like" and I kept telling Mark that I hated the way the medicine made me feel and I don't want the nurse to give me any more. I think I told him that about 10 times. And I was hooked up to an oxygen thing, so whenever it would beep because it was under a certain level, I would wake up and freak out thinking something was wrong with the baby.
After the pain medicine wore off around 3am, I got an epidural. Even though it hurt and felt really weird, I am so grateful for epidurals - I was finally able to go to sleep for a little while and not worry. They finally broke my water at 6 to see if it would help at all. The whole night, everything was going okay, other than the fact that I was not dilating at all. At 7, we got a new nurse and a new doctor and they decided to give me pitocin to help move things along. I was still only dilated to a 2, but they could tell that she was making her was out, so basically our baby was ready but my body wasn't ready. They didn't give me a lot of pitocin, and eventually ended up taking me off of it because it was making my contractions go crazy and the baby wasn't responding well to it. I could hear her heart rate drop from the monitor that I was hooked up to, and it really made me nervous. Every time it would drop, the nurse would come running in to see what was wrong...ahh freak me out. I was starting to dilate, but her heart rate kept dropping with the really strong contractions. The doctor thought that she was trying to push herself out and was pulling the cord down with her, and that was what was making her heart rate go down. She told us that if her heart rate continues to go down, we might have to do a c-section, but that we weren't going to worry about that quite yet. I asked Mark to say a prayer, and I knew that we were going to end up having a c-section, but I wasn't prepared for it yet. Around 10:45, the doctor came in and told us that we had a choice to make, we could either do an emergency c-section and get her out now, or we could wait to see if I progress quickly and do it on my own (by this time I was dilated to a 7). She told us that we had to decide right away, and I was so tired and couldn't really comprehend what she was saying quick enough to make the decision right then and there - of course I didn't want a c-section, but I wanted what was best for my baby. After about 30 seconds of looking at my husband with tears in my eyes, the doctor said she was actually doing to decide for us and we had to do an emergency c-section. The tears poured out of my eyes and I couldn't control my emotions. One of my biggest worries was coming true. I did NOT want a c-section. There were a few things that I really didn't want to happen, and a c-section was one of the biggest ones. But since I wasn't on pitocin anymore, I knew that wasn't the reason why her heart rate was dropping, and we really did need to get this baby out as soon as possible. While the doctor is telling me all of the things to prepare for, I was having a hard time breathing and bawling my eyes out. They rushed us to the OR, but Mark didn't come in with me. Of course I was freaking out and kept asking "Where is my husband? I need my husband in here!" I think I said that about 3 times, even though they reassured me that he was just outside and was going to come in once they had everything prepped. They strapped my arms down, put an oxygen mask on me, and sent Mark in. I'm claustrophobic, so that wasn't the best thing for me and I was having quite the panic attack. Once Mark came in and held my hand, I was able to calm down and look at him and feel comforted.
After that, everything started to move very quickly. I had been in labor a very long time, but was finally about to meet my little girl. After about 15 minutes I heard her crying and knew that everything was going to be okay. They showed her to us and boy did she look TALL! She had a huge cone head because she had been in the birth canal for so long. That poor little thing, I can't imagine how tired she must have been after trying to get out for so long. Anyway, Mark went over to cut her cord and take care of her while they stitched me up. I was able to hold her for a few minutes before they took me to the recovery room and her to the nursery. After about an hour and a half of being in the recovery room, I was finally able to see my precious little girl and hold her.
I couldn't believe it - our little girl was FINALLY here!!! Later that night, they decided that she needed to go to the nursery for the night to be under the lights because of jaundice - ugh really??? Don't take her away from me!! She's still the cutest thing ever under the lights. We called them "party lights" to make it a little better.
I was trying to figure out how to feed her during the night, and 3 different nurses were telling me 3 different things. It was so frustrating, but eventually it all worked out just fine and she ended up coming back to the room with us sooner than we thought she would.
They wanted to keep me in the hospital until Friday, but on Thursday I was doing so well and Bailee was doing great that it wouldn't have made any sense at all to keep us until Friday.
We are SO in love with her!
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