My Gigantic Baby Has Arrived........

And he ended up not being so very gigantic!

Two weeks ago today, I went to my weekly doctor's appointment at Kaiser. My doctor was not at all pleased with my blood pressure. He said to me "I think it's time we got this baby out". I said, "OK - when were you thinking?" He says "How about right now."

So, I waited until the histeria died down just a tad, then called my husband. I think I actually asked him if he was sitting down......... he wasn't, but I told him anyway! I picked up my son from day care, and luckily my younger sister was already at the house by the time we got there. I gathered a few things together, found the infant car seat, and hunkered down next to my son while he was eating dinner to explain to him what was going on. He was mostly interested in eating, so we left without too much fuss.

We arrived at Labor and Delivery at about 6:30 pm. They told us we should go eat some dinner in the cafeteria while the room was being cleaned. I ordered vegetarian lasagne, but I couldn't eat anything. I was too nervous.

At about 9 or 10:00, the doctor began inducing labor. I had a Pitocin drip in my IV, and something called a foley inserted into my cervix. They blow that up with air, and it manually opens your cervix to 4 centimeters. I sent my husband and all the other family members home for a good night's sleep.

At midnight - the nurse checked on the foley by tugging on it to make sure it was snug. It popped out when she did that. I was mortified - and in my head said "Dear God please don't tell me they have to insert that thing again!". But the nurse said it meant that ym cervix was at 4 centimeters. I was amazed that it had only taken two hours, and was deciding if I should call my husband back to the hospital. I decided to wait a bit, and see if anything "exciting" happened.

The only "exciting" things that happened over the next 29 hours were a parade of doctors and nurses who apparently took some kind of sadistic thrill in causing me pain. I still don't know how I managed to not kick someone right in the face while they examined me for the hundreth time to tell me I was still only dialated to 4 centimeters. My bag of waters was broken, which did not strengthen the contractions like they thought.

I was apparently given enough Pitocin to kill an elephant - but the baby refused to drop. After the blessed deliverence of the Epidural, the doctor did a very thorough exam and said that when she touched the baby's head, it swam away from her fingers. This was at about 1:00 am Saturday morning. She recommended a C-section, and at this point I had to agree with her. She said she would be willing to let me labor for another 2 hours, but I wasn't interested in that. The baby's heart rate was dropping with every contraction at this point.

I have never had surgery in my life, and I was scared shitless that I was going to have a C-section. Everyone has commented since then that they were worried about me because I grew so quiet. There was just nothing to say. I was trying so hard to keep my composure while stemming the flood of feelings and fears that were threatening to drown me. My biggest fear was that the anesthesia wasn't going to work properly, and also that I would become physically ill. I was wheeled into the operating room, where I lost my composure for a few minutes. The doctor was wonderful. SHe held my hand, and looked me right in the eye, and didn't let go until I had calmed down. After that, I was totally fine.

I didn't recognize my husband when he sat down next to me, I assumed he was one of the other doctors or nurses in the room. He said "hey", and I was so glad he was there. I held on to his hand for dear life. I thought it was amuzing that at one of the rogher stretches of the surgery, where they were tugging my body to pieces, he kept saying "squeeze my hand". I thought I had already broken his fingers!

I think it took about 15 minutes before the babhy was born. He started crying right away, and they announced he was a boy. My husband said "We really need to pick out a name now!" I think my next comment was that I was outnumbered.

They took the baby to the other side of the room, and after a few minutes my husband got to be with him. I couldn't see him because of all the machinery in the way. It took a while for them to put me all back together, but my husband got to bring the baby over before they took him to the recovery room. He was just beautiful. I was anxious to know what color hair he had - I didn't take off his cap, but could see little brown curls on the side of his head.

By the time they brought me to the recovery room, it was about 3:00 am. My older sister and two of my sister in laws were still there. They waited until I was wheeled in, then went home to get some sleep.

My husband and I were both fighting to keep our eyes open at this point. I made my poor husband stay until I was taken to my room, at about 6:00 am. My new baby and I slept together for a couple of hours, but I didn't sleep very well until I came home on Monday. That's OK though - when all you have to concentrate on is feeding a baby every two hours, you don't need much sleep!

We are all adjusting very well. Old Baby seems to love New Baby, and New Baby is just as mellow as can be.

Until later................