Delivery

After about a half hour of pushing, the doctor decided that I needed a little bit of pitocin because my contractions were coming about 5 minutes apart, and that was leaving just enough time between contractions for her to climb back up. Soon after receiving the pitocin, I had several contractions that came about 2 minutes apart, and labor was progressing well. However, my next contraction didn’t come for about 10 minutes, and then they started up again about every five minutes apart. Over the next 3 hours, the same irregular contractions occurred, even though I was getting more pitocin. The nurse and the doctor said they had never seen something like this, but it looked like my body was responding to the pitocin for a while, and then somehow counterbalancing it. By 3:00, I was getting really exhausted (I had been pushing for almost 3 hours), and really frustrated. The doctor told me that when I became too tired, we could use some interventions (ie vacuum) to help get her out. I was reticent to use it, because it seems kind of scary, and I wanted to do it on my own, but my doctor said that they use it just to help guide the baby out, focusing on getting the baby’s head past the pelvic bone. By 3:15, I still had not made much progress, so I decided that I needed the help. The nurse and the doctor were in my room within a couple of minutes and had us all hooked up to the vacuum. After a couple of contractions, I heard the nurse say, “Oh, she’s cute!” I remember wondering how she would know that, since we just started pushing again. Right at that time, I saw a little head appear and a tiny little body follow. I couldn’t believe she was out so soon. They put her on my stomach for just a few seconds, and took her away pretty quickly because when my water broke, there had been some meconium. They spent a good 15 minutes working on her in the labor and delivery room. She cried right away, but they really wanted to make sure that her lungs were clear. After about 15 minutes, they took her to the nursery so that they could check all of her vitals, give her a bath, and really make sure everything was OK with her lungs. Jeremy went with her to the nursery, and I stayed in my room and got all sewn up! She was in the nursery for two hours, I didn’t get to see her until 5:30, so I was really anxious. But I knew she was in good hands, and I knew that Jeremy was there, and that if there was really anything serious, he would let me know.