Home and Well

Wow! The last few days have been quite the whirlwind. We are home and doing well after a few crazy days. I always like to hear other people's birth stories so if you aren't like me, just look at the pictures!

I had a scheduled induction for 11:00 on the 10th. We arrived at the hospital around 11:30, you would think we would have been on time! At 12:15 Dr. Meredith came in and broke my water and I was at a 2. At 1:15 they started me on pitocin and I started feeling contractions about an hour later. The contractions weren't too bad for the first hour and then I started to feel them! At 3:45 the nurse said the anesthesiologist was next door and could come give my epidural after and I gladly accepted! He didn't get there for another hour and by 5:15 it had kicked in and I was back to enjoying life. The nurse checked me at 5:45 and I was at a "good 4", I think this was the time she said she could feel hair on the baby's head! We watched Glee and The Office while we waited for things to progress. At 7:45 the Dr. checked me and I was at a 9! By that point I was starving and all I could think about was eating. I also got the bad "labor shakes" which were not fun at all. Around 8:30 my contractions were 90 seconds to 2 mins apart. I'm not really sure the sequence of things after that, cause all these times were based on texts I was sending my sister, and quit sending them because by then my epidural was wearing off and I was in lots of pain. I pushed the epidural button to give myself more but it didn't really work, so they called the anesthesiologist to give me more stuff. It then kicked in again but made my arm and chest numb so he got worried and shut it off for a little bit. Around 9:30 I started pushing and shortly there after the epidural was starting to wear off again and I could feel the contractions. Around 11:00 the Dr. came in to see how I was doing. He had me push a couple times with him there to see how things were going and decided that he needed to use the vacuum because her head was turned side ways and wasn't coming over my pubic bone. By this time I was in so much pain and I remember saying and thinking there was no way I could push anymore. It's a good thing Dr. Meridith was a good "coach" as well as doctor because I don't know how I would have done it with out focusing on him and everything he said. When he told me he only had 3 tries with the vacuum I knew I had to get her out cause I was not going to last any longer. She was born at 11:21 pm! I was so not with it because of how much pain I was in that I don't really remember everything which makes me sad. Every now and then I will remember things that people said or things that happened and had to ask Brennen, my mom, and Shantay lots of questions about what happened. When they put her on me I remember thinking how good she looked, she didn't have any of that white stuff on her, just blood. The after birth and stitching me up was the worst thing ever because by that time the epidural was completely gone. I'm so glad my mom was there to stay with me for all that so Brennen could be with Avalynn. Really, I don't know how I would have done it without my mom and Shantay there! About an hour after she was born the nurse was massaging my stomach, which is so not fun, and I passed about 5 baseball size blood clots.... which leads me to the next story!

After she was born the nurse massaged my stomach 3 times within the next 2 hours and every time I passed several blood clots and lost a lot of blood. I woke up in the morning and felt fine, not more clots so that was good. Saturday morning I woke up and passed another baseball size one, and through out the day and several other smaller ones. The doctor didn't seem too worried, said its normal for some people, etc. As I was getting ready to be discharged I had another large one, so the nurse called the Dr. and he said I was fine to go home and to just keep an eye on it. We got home about 6:30 pm and by 9:00 I was bleeding very heavily and had passed 3 more fist size clots. I called the Dr. and he said to meet him at the emergency room, so back to the hospital we went! He manually tried to clean me out and see if there were any more clots and they then monitored my bleeding. After a couple hours he didn't feel comfortable with how much blood I was loosing so he wanted to keep me over night. I was so frustrated at this point because they wouldn't put me back in the Mother/Baby unit instead put me on the Med Surge floor. I was paranoid about having Avalynn in the hospital but didn't want to be apart from her. My mom came to my room with her when they moved me from the ER to see how things were going. I needed to go to the bathroom so I got up and passed a grapefruit sized clot! By this point we decided that Brennen would stay with me and my mom would take Avalynn home for the night ( well I guess morning... it was 2 am). Around 3 am they came in and said the doctor wanted to do a DNC right away, so next thing I know I'm being told I will be intubated, being hooked up to the sleepy medicine, and was being wheeled to the OR. I got back to my room around 5:30, and they told me I lost more blood in the OR and the Dr. wanted me to have a blood transfusion. So for the next 12 hours I was hooked up to IV's receiving 4 units of blood! They let me go that night after my counts were tested and were high enough. Let me tell you, it was quite the experience!

Other than all that we are doing great! I actually feel pretty good, I get tired easier, and I was a little sore on Mon and Tues, but now the only reason I remember I have a bunch of trauma and stuff going on down there is because I still have to use the little squirt bottle after I go to the bathroom! Well enough of all the details, here are some pictures of our little princess!