It was a Thursday, just like any other Thursday. I woke up, got ready, and headed into the office. I had been registering high blood pressure, so I was scheduled for testing twice a week at that point. My doctor’s office called that morning and asked that I go to a different location because their machine was not working properly. I had been to the other office on one other occasion when my doctor was booked. I was excited to go to that location the first time, because I would be seeing a midwife and was very interested in having a natural, medication-free birth. As it turned out, I really disliked her, and hoped to never see her again.
Everything looked good at this appointment, until the nurse tested my blood pressure. She said, “I need to go speak with the doctor. You may have a baby today.” As someone who was struggling with high blood pressure, and was in an unfamiliar office, I really wish this nurse would have been a little more delicate with her words. They decided to send me to triage at the hospital.
I had actually already been to triage on Monday of that week, but after several hours they sent me home because everything looked good once I was there.
This time, the on-call physician came in the room and my blood pressure immediately went up to 170/110. Guess who! It was the midwife I had seen before and disliked so much.
We had a birth plan. We had attended childbirth classes and knew how we wanted our experience to go. My doctor had been very understanding of our plan and is always very conscientious of how I feel. But this lady’s bedside manner was unforgivable. She showed no regard for how I felt or any understanding of how upset we were. They took a urine sample to test for protein, drew some blood samples and started an IV.
We were admitted that evening.
They immediately wanted to put me on magnesium sulfate due to my high blood pressure, but that would have meant that I would need a catheter as well, which terrified me. You also cannot have anything but ice chips while on this drug (At this point I could only have clear liquids, popsicles, and jello, so moving to only ice chips sounded unbearable!). So, I continued to refuse the magnesium sulfate, despite multiple doctors trying to convince me. With the support of my nurse that night, my blood pressure remained low enough that it was not much of a concern anyway.
The induction process started around 8 PM. They placed a Cytotec pill by my cervix to help me to start dilating. Several hours later they checked to see if I had made any progress, and I was 1 cm. They decided to place a second Cytotec, hoping it would dilate me further. Several hours passed and I had not dilated past 1 cm. Next, they wanted to try a method using a Foley bulb, but they had to break my water first. A Foley bulb is a catheter that is inserted above the cervix and then inflated to form a bulb, placing pressure on the opening of the cervix. It took them three attempts to get it placed correctly, all of which were very uncomfortable. They were surprised that I was able to endure this process without an epidural, but I was determined not to have one. My nurse continued to tug lightly on the Foley bulb every so often to see if it was ready to come out. It would come out when I reached 4 cm. After the Foley bulb came out they started me on Pitocin, which was given through an IV drip.
Over night and into Friday morning, I had started to feel a lot of anxiety. I struggle with anxiety on a regular basis as it is, but to be put in a situation where I was uncomfortable with the on call physician, overheard a woman screaming bloody murder, and to have my whole birth plan unraveling before me, really set me over the edge. I was so surprised on Friday morning when my doctor showed up! It was such a relief to talk to her. I am still so grateful that she came by, because it’s not something that she had to do. She was able to talk me down a little, and she also ordered some medication for my anxiety which made a huge difference. She was the first person to tell me that I was now considered preeclamptic due to the protein they found in my urine. I feel like someone should have told me that before then. (Note: My labs on Monday showed no signs of preeclampsia, so this is something that can change within just a few days.) I shared my concerns about the midwife with her and told her that under no circumstances could she return to my room. I felt bad, like I was being a brat, but there really is no explaining just how upset that midwife made me.
It is my understanding that the Pitocin makes labor and contractions a much more difficult experience than I would have had if our baby had come on his own. Casey and I continued to labor for hours, and hours, and hours…
We used several of the coping techniques that we had learned about in childbirth class (rocking, breathing, birthing ball, etc.). He fed me ice chips that were like little pieces of Heaven. They would check me and we would learn that I had gained a centimeter, maybe. But more often than not they would say that there was no change, despite our efforts. I specifically remember getting stuck at 7 cm for four hours, then 8 cm for four hours. Contractions had gotten so frequent and strong that I was vomiting with each one. I cannot explain the place I slipped into during labor. I was so focused on getting from one contraction to the next, everything else faded away.
Finally, Saturday morning, I agreed to accept intervention for the pain. The anesthesia team brought in nitrous, commonly known as laughing gas. Unfortunately, that did very little to comfort me, however, I am still not certain that it was hooked up properly. When that did not work, I reluctantly gave in and requested an epidural. I believe that was Saturday around noon. I was also given a catheter at that time, so I allowed them to begin the magnesium sulfate. It did not take long for me to realize that that the epidural was not doing its job. They had to adjust it several times to numb me completely. I fell asleep within minutes once the epidural was working correctly, and when I woke up for them to check how dilated I was, they told me it was time to start trying to push. It was just the nurse, Casey and me. I said, “Don’t we need a doctor?!” The nurse said we’d try to push and just see what happens. It only took one or two pushes before she said, “DON’T PUSH!! I’m going to get the doctor!”
I remember it being much easier than I had anticipated to push the baby out. The hardest part was holding my breath for 10 seconds during each push. I have always been a very emotional person, but being with Casey has really mellowed me out. I fully expected to cry when our baby was born, but all that I could do was smile and look from Casey to our baby and back to Casey again. Shortly after he was born, the doctor asked me to push one more time to deliver the placenta. I had a 2nd degree laceration, so the doctor and medical student stitched me up. We remained skin to skin for the first hour, and then they took him away for all of the other routine things that follow birth.
The hours that followed delivery are a little foggy for me, but the baby was brought back-and-forth between our room and the nursery so that we could get some rest. The nurses would come in and “massage” my abdomen every little while and it wasn’t near as bad as people had told me it would be.
As the hours passed following delivery, I continued to feel gushes of blood as I moved around. At first they were not concerned about it but when it did not stop, they became worried. They did an ultrasound to confirm that there was no placenta remaining, but they did see some blood clots. They ended up needing to perform what I later found out was basically a dilation and curettage (D&C), which is a procedure to remove tissue from inside your uterus. This was very painful! I remember there being multiple doctors, nurses, and members of the anesthesia team present. They gave me morphine and attempted the procedure, but the pain was too much. Next the anesthesia team gave me a drug called ketamine. I knew it was serious when the anesthesiologist double checked with Casey to confirm that he wanted to be there while this took place. As soon as they got me the right dose of ketamine, everything went grey (By “grey”, I mean the color grey. It was all I could see!). I could somewhat hear what was going on around me, but it was as if I had left my body. I remember thinking that I might be dying, and that if I was, it was not that bad as far as pain or anything, but that I really did not want to leave Casey and our new son. They finished up in a matter of minutes. While I was in this altered state, I heard a nurse tell me that she was going to give me a shot in the leg and that it would give me diarrhea (Thankfully, it did not!), but I could not respond to her. I ended up losing about a liter of blood and they began to discuss whether or not a transfusion was necessary. I’m so thankful it was not! The assumption regarding why I was bleeding so much is that my uterus was too tired from laboring for so long that it could not contract back properly and stop bleeding.
We were moved to the postpartum area after I was taken off of the magnesium sulfate (you have to stay on it for 24 hours after delivery). They continued to monitor my temperature and blood pressure. They were concerned that I was running a bit of a fever. They came in to take blood to check for infection, but they were taking four vials, not just one. The nurse explained that someone had been stuck with a needle during my delivery! While I was continuing to be monitored, they were also concerned about the baby. His blood sugar levels were getting low and he was quite jaundice. Luckily, we were able to get him fed just enough to raise his blood sugar levels without supplementation, and to keep his jaundice numbers somewhat down. They kept track of my urine output, and I drank as much water as possible in order to meet their requirements ASAP. My temperature never really went down, but they released us Monday afternoon at rush-hour. I got a call the following day to let me know that I had a urinary tract infection, go figure! For being a relatively healthy person beforehand, I was very out of my element to be facing these struggles.
One of the most scary parts of this whole experience was by far the anxiety that I suffered about 3 or 4 days after delivery. As someone who struggles with anxiety already, I was taking escitalopram before pregnancy. I was able to drop my dose down to 20mg during pregnancy, because everything was great. When I started feeling this anxiety post-delivery, I knew it had to be bumped back up. Luckily, after being treated for anxiety for so long, I am able to recognize when my medication needs to be adjusted. The things I felt for those 48-72 hours before my medicine kicked back in where downright terrifying. I was not worried about making it from one day to the other, I was worried about making it from one MINUTE to the next! I could absolutely not wrap my mind around how I could make it through. Through what? I don’t even know! Watching TV made it worse and having visitors made it darn near unbearable. I had no appetite and could hardly bring myself to eat for days. Everyone was bringing us all this lovely food, and the only thing I could stomach was yogurt, berries, and applesauce, and even those things had to be forced. I was so worried that my lack of appetite would affect my milk supply. Thanks to Casey, during those rough days, I was able to get away to our room to sleep it off a bit. What helped me most was getting out of the house. It didn’t matter where we went as long as we went somewhere. I could not stand the thought of Casey going back to work at the end of two weeks. Yet somehow when that happened, I survived.
The most important thing that this experience taught me is the amount of love that I have for my husband. There is absolutely no way that I could have gotten through the labor, delivery, and aftermath without him. He was the perfect partner, there to support and coach me through every moment. There were many moments in the weeks after our son was born that I’d find myself in tears, thinking about how much I love Casey and how thankful I am for him. I am forever grateful that God chose me to be his wife and the mother of our son.
