Early back when I was 4-5 months Paul and I kept guessing that Brandon would be early, we just had a feeling, that same feeling I had that he was a boy from very early on. Well I took things a step further and 4-5 months pregnant I told Paul I thought Brandon would be born around the closest full moon, which so happened to be April 28th, who knew that would be his birthday! We have a full moon Baby!
I began writing this blog the morning I went into labor, I never finished it in time for obvious reasons, but for all you curious minds here is what went down from mommy's point of view Tuesday April 26 until today!
I warn all of you right now, it's very detailed and personal so if you don't want to hear the details of child birth then just skip this entry and enjoy Paul's short and sweet summary.
Well Tuesday I had my 38 week midwife appointment, I thought it would just be a boring appointment. They checked my weight for the first time since the very first appointment, that was not fun seeing I've gained 45lbs (YIKES) checked my blood pressure and the Brandon's heartbeat. They were a little worried because I explained how he was moving a lot less and I could only feel him 2-4 times a day, but this may be because I was not paying as close attention to the movements anymore. Nevertheless the midwife sent me to the Ob/Gyn office at the hospital to have a heart film done for Brandon, it stressed me out that I had to make a trip to the doctor without Paul, but I survived. At the office they took blood, strapped a heart monitor around my belly and had me lay there for 20 min to read baby B's heart. Everything turned out 100% healthy. THEN I saw the doctor, a different one from our normal one we used to see, this doctor was Irish and fluent in English....thank goodness, for the first time I had an appointment with someone who I could get my point across to, she was also pleased to speak English because it made it easier for her too! She did an ultrasound to check Brandon once more. The only measurement she took was of his femur and it measured at 39wk +1 day, that was a growth spurt and made me think maybe that's why I was having such a hard time getting comfy last week, he had a growth spurt in the legs!! Well after almost 2 hours in the office I got home and spent the rest of the day relaxing.
Wednesday morning I woke up at 5:45AM (only 15 earlier than my normal wake up time) But this time it was not for hunger or having to pee. I actually already felt like I peed my pants, but just a little. I went to the bathroom and found my panty liner tinged with blood and very wet. About 1 hour later contractions began about 10 minutes apart and have been pretty consistent ever since. Our midwife came over around 9:45AM and checked me and Brandon. So far I was almost 1cm dilated and my water did not break. But I asked her if she thinks the baby will be here in the next 24-48 hours and she said she's about 80% sure he will be. Sooooooo let the excitement begin.
After this I stopped my blogging because 1 sitting down in a chair during contractions is not comfortable and 2 they were getting closer and closer together at what felt like lightening speed.
I decided that I should not try to brave out these contractions alone anymore, so I called Paul at work and told him to get home now because "I was a whimp" (i really said that) and could not handle it alone, I was pretty useless with trying to finish packing my birth center bag and gather things for Brandon when I only had about 4-5 min between contractions....yeah in just 1 hour after the midwife left they went from 10 min to 5min. But at 5 min apart they were manageable. By 12:30 I decided we needed to call the midwife again to ask what to do, she said to call if my water broke or if things got closer, I wanted to wait until my water broke, but with the way things were speeding by I didn't think it was smart to wait (and later I couldn't be happier with this decision) Ciska (pronounce Sis-ka) was already at the birthing center and told us to pack to car and head over now.
The car ride was not long, maybe 5 minutes, but we live in a city with brick streets, tram lines, and old roads. These in combination with contractions were horrible. I almost feel like the bumpy car ride speed my labor along even faster. We got to the hospital and of course stubborn me says no to the wheel chair and I try to walk into the Sophia Birthing Center. During this no less than 300 feet walk I had 2 very strong contractions that stopped me dead in my tracks. We finally got to the birthing center floor and I saw a wheel chair, never in my life did I want to sit down than at that moment. The nurse took us straight to the birthing room and we waited for Ciska, thank goodness we had her cell phone on us because I'm pretty sure they never told her were were there, She came in and examined me. 3cm dilated, I thought "Hooray this is really happening, I'm in labor!!!" Then she said it would be about 1 cm per hour. Then she told us that the other birthing rooms in the hospital were busy and I would have to wait 1 hour before I could get my epidural, but for the time she would put me in a warm bath. This immediately took me back to when I was thinking about doing a water birth, and Paul made a comment aloud about it at the time. The water felt wonderful for 45 min, it didn't slow things down, but weightless feeling of my legs relaxed my muscles and made it easier to breath. Then the heat/contractions made me very dizzy and faint so Ciska and Paul got me out of the tub, dried me off, and helped me back into bed to examine me. My water broke in the tub (i think I felt it, but really thought I peed myself again, but in a bigger gush) ,I was now 5 cm dilated, and they were ready for me in the hospital wing. So I was wheeled off. Once I got there I was introduced to nurses and other hospital midwifes, they set up an IV, put heart monitor on Brandon and me, and a contraction monitor. Paul said that the contractions monitor showed how truly strong they were, the spikes went all the way to the top of the screen. I was checked about 30 minutes later and was now 8cm dilated and was asked if I felt the urge to push, I told them I did and I think that got them excited, they said he would be here really really soon. My mind went crazy with fear because the anesthesiologist was not there yet and probably was not going to come for another 30-40 min AND I had a conversation with Ciska on Tuesday about when the epidural can be given and can't and she said once you get to 9cm it's no longer an option. The hospital midwife, who is probably super sweet started telling me I must do this without the epidural. I kept telling her I can't and I needed it, I begged. Both Ciska and hospital midwife left the room and when they came back I was told that I was still going to get my epidural, but I had to wait and get set up for it, I'm pretty sure Ciska fought for me and I love her for that. During that time any person who walked in the room I asked them if they were the anesthesiologist and if they weren't I told them to go get them, I really felt like they were trying to take there time with getting her in. Finally around 4:30PM she came and gave me my drugs, but it wasn't exactly the relief I thought it would be. Maybe I was to far long or it was put in wrong, but I felt full labor pains on my left side and absolutely nothing on my right. I couldn't even lift my right leg to push without assistance. (Of course with the epidural in I thought maybe I should have tried to do this with nothing, but I think the drugs were blocking the thought of what the real pain would feel like.)
Once the epidural was in, which by the way was pretty painful because of the needle size and the matter of me not being able to bend over without leaning to the side or raising my shoulders (maybe this contributed to the fact I felt almost everything in my left side) Well once it was in about 15 min later things slowed down. I told Paul I needed it to slow down, everyone kept telling me that with your first child labor is long and drawn out. I thought at 10AM that morning I would maybe be having Brandon the next day, because at the time I was only 1/2 cm. But not this lady, from 10AM-4:30 I went from 1/2cm to 8.5cm. Paul thought I was funny because I'm the only women in the world that wants her labor to last longer than it could have been. So from 5-10 we waited. They kept checking, we tried some pushing at 8PM but the epidural was to strong on my right side and I couldn't feel the urge to push like I did when I didn't have the drugs. So they lowered the drugs and we waited 2 hours for them to wear off. At 10PM I began pushing. After 1 hour of pushing myself and Brandon were both tired and I was having trouble feeling the contractions. I had to look at the monitor to watch when they were coming. The screen looked so different from when I was without drugs compared to with. And once I started pushing for some reason I could not feel them any more. I remembered I read somewhere that you can look at the screen to see when they are coming, but who knows if that's right, it wasn't helping. I was also very angry and frustrated with the hospital midwife because during my pushes she stopped helping me with my legs to answer her cell phone....it could have been her on call midwife cell phone, but I think when you're in a room with a woman who is in the final stage of child birth you should hold your calls until she's finished, there was only about 15 minutes left until he was born.
After 1 hour the midwives and nurses decided to take a different approach to delivering Brandon. His head not to low and needed some assistance so they called the doctor to administer the vacuum. I read about this in our "what to expect" book and knew i was going to be awful for Brandon but it needed to be done because we were both exhausted and there was no way were going to risk exhausting Brandon anymore, he had a long night ahead of him. Just seeing the device they were attaching to his head was horrible, it looked like a medieval torcher device (and felt painful for me when they put it on and pulled) They did two pulls with the vacuum after I did 3 pushes, the pushes felt like I was being gutted like a fish because of the chains being pulled out. Once he crowned (which was painful and I wanted it to end the moment it began) they took it off and had me do the rest. I never felt more relief once he was out, but I was so confused when he came out because he didn't make a noise until they put him on my belly, then he let out some gurgling and finally once his throat was clear he cried, music to my ears!!! We got to have some good bonding time while I things finished delivering the placenta and got stitched up (6 stitched) I had to get stitched because they ended up cutting my perineum to make a little more room for Brandon's head when he crowned. One of my friends said you should let it rip naturally, but I really couldn't speak up in between pushes and ask them to not snip, I also think it would have take much longer if they didn't cut. But the cut was not bad, I felt it but the worst was just hearing the scissors making the snipping noise.
Well after they cleaned Brandon and I up we were told that we needed to stay in the hospital for the night to be watched, especially Brandon because he had a huge bump on his head and it was giving him a headache, and from the looks of the suction mark I could tell it hurt. Around 1:30AM Brandon and I were settled in a room, luckily we got all to ourselves. Paul wasn't allowed to stay the night with us, which made me sad, but I could tell he was exhausted, he didn't eat much all day, stood by my side, and stressed out from watching me go through labor and delivery, he was a big help. He held on to my legs a couple times when the doctor of midwife couldn't. He was also very nice in keeping his distance from me when I was without drugs. I was so snippy to him, he would try to touch me to help or sympathize and I would just say "Don't touch me!" But once the epidural was in I was much nicer to him and even apologized for my snappiness.
So Paul brought the car home, got some food, called the grandparents, and rested for a couple hours. Then he brought some new supplies for baby B and I. It's nice to live so close to the hospital you can just take the metro and save on parking garage costs.
Well Brandon's first night was a long one. I didn't sleep much and neither did he, we stayed together all night, even if the nurses asked (they didn't) to take him to the nursery room I would have said no. We started breast feeding and got some good snuggle time in. He was on a pain killer and glucose prick schedule (they did this test because he was a heavy baby for coming 2 weeks early, everything came back normal), so about every 3 hours they were taking him into another room to do something, he was just miserable. Once 6AM came the doctors started to arrive at the hospital, they examined Brandon again (at night the only doctors there were interns and residents so that was another reason both Brandon and I were not allowed to leave, we had to wait to be examined by another doctor)
The best thing was being told that Brandon was okay and we could go over to the Sophia Center in the afternoon. I even saw my Irish doctor who I met on Tuesday. She came over to meet Brandon and told me she was not surprised that he came so early and that he was almost 4 kilos, and neither was I. I'm just so relieved that I didn't have to wait another 2 weeks to meet him. Now that he's here I couldn't imagine waiting another day.
We've been at the Sophia birthing center for 2 days now. The baby nurses are wonderful, they've been teaching us how to feed, bath, and handle Brandon. They come in our room 2-3 times a day to check up on me and the baby, then the rest of the time Paul and I have alone to ourselves, but it's nice that help is just a call away. The room is nice too. Brandon sleeps in a bassinet or with one of us (he loves sleeping on our chests) he's such a good baby. Rarely cries, and breast feeding is going very well. The nurses are even surprised how fast he's taken to me, normally babies to have the vacuum extraction don't want to feed because of the head pain, but he latched only 30 min after being born. The days and nights blend into each other, but I'm happy it's spring time because at least we have tons of day light to help ease the fatigue, which has not been very bad Brandon is a good sleeper, we quickly figured out a routine that works very well.
We decided to leave the birthing center 1 day early, so Sunday at 10AM we'll check out and bring Baby B home. Paul will stay home with me Monday, go into work Tuesday to just catch up and show off pictures to his co-workers, they are all pretty excited for him and eager to see pictures. Then Wednesday he has off for WW2 remembrance day. Both Paul and I are very happy with the day Brandon's birthday fell on, it means Paul can spend lots of time with us, but not use up to much personal vacation, until later in the summer!
Hope you enjoyed reading this blog about my pregnancy with Brandon and his birth story. I'm very excited to get back home and start getting settled into our new chapter of life.
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