Last year at this time . . . part 2

So where was I. 

Ah yes, February 18th, 2010. It was a couple days before my due date (2/20) And I was feeling pretty normal, for the most part. My feet and ankles had grown larger than any person's feet and ankles should, but I can't complain because I only had that lovely side effect for a couple of weeks, at the very end, and I know people who have had much worse!

So 5:15ish in the morning I wake up to the call of nature, as many very pregnant women do I think. So I rolled . . . literally, rolled myself out of bed to go to the bathroom so I could hurry up and go back to sleep. Much to my surprise, not only was nature calling, so was the baby. My water broke. I think I stayed in the bathroom for about 15 minutes trying to figure out if it was real or not before I finally decided it was and I should wake up Jay, and my mother, who had stated the night before, that if I wanted to have the baby before she left, that would be great! :)

So I waddled myself back into the bedroom and franticly woke up Jay, who is impossible to wake up, by the way! Then I went to go call the hospital and decide our plan of action. I had tested positive for group B strep earlier in my pregnancy... which is nothing to us big people, but for a little person it can be bad, so they told me to take my time and shower since I wasn't having contractions yet, but come on in so they could get be started on antibiotics for the baby before he arrived. So I did that. Then, I got out of the shower, my Mom was wide awake, and Jay was back asleep. (typical) so I woke him up AGAIN, this time in a full-blown panic because reality was setting in. Once it clicked for him he was up and at-em too and packing the remainder of our things for the hospital.

We got to the hospital probably around 8am. My mom volunteered to stay back at our place and watch the dog and cat, and clean up the house for us. We made the necessary calls and everyone was very excited since Joshua was the first baby for both sides of our families.

Contractions weren't really happening at first, they were light, and sporadic. But since my water had broken, and I was on antibiotics the doctors wanted to speed things up a bit. So they hooked me up to pitocin to get my contractions on track and move things along. So we did that, we paced the halls, and talked about what was happening, visited with our family in the waiting area. THEN the contractions picked up. We went back to the room, and I breathed, a lot. And I swore silently in my head, a lot. When the doctor came in to check I hadn't dilated as much as they wanted yet, so they upped the ante on the pitocin and offered me Nubain for the pain since I was trying to hold off on the epidural because I was nervous it would wear off... dumb choice, in retrospect.

Nubain, in my opinion, is dumb. It didn't do much for me, other than make me lightheaded. I guess it did take the edge off a little so I could rest a little easier, but I wasn't a fan. I think if there is a next time, I'll skip right to the epidural.

Now note, from about this point on, they were monitoring me pretty heavily, because my contractions were coming very irregularly. I would have them a couple minutes a part for a stretch of time, then none for 20 minutes. Then I would get a little while where they were coming 2 right in a row or so, with no rest in between, and they didn't know why but thought maybe it had something to do with the pitocin. It was also causing Joshua's heart rate to drop a little, so they kept turning it off and on and hooking me up to oxygen.

Fast forward to about 6pm. Finally, the doctor came in and said I was 10 centimeters and ready to have a baby! I was pretty tired, but ready to bring our little man into the world. So the pushing began, and the doctors and nurses all were telling me how well I was doing, and all was going well. . .Until Joshua hit the pubic bone. Before this point, when checking me, the doctor could tell he was head down, but would not tell which way he was facing because of how he dropped, and how big his head was. Well, he was "sunny-side up" as they say (facing the ceiling, not the floor), and he was pressing with the side of his head, not the top. So I pushed, and pushed, until his heart rate really dropped, to where they had me stop, and roll over onto my side, take oxygen, and brought in another doctor to help decide how to proceed. I did NOT want a c-section. That was the one thing I was afraid of going in to the hospital. So they decided to let me push a little longer. Joshua's head was too far behind the bone so using the suction, or the "claws" was not an option for us. In the last bout of pushing, Joshua decided he had enough, as evident by the meconium in the water. So they decided he needed to come out, and now, because he was getting stressed.

So we got wisked away into the operating room for a c-section. I was nervous, but knew it was for the best so I was trying to hold it together and be strong. The only real "birth plan" I had, was to have a healthy baby by any means possible and play it by ear. 

Then finally, after a day full of labor, and 3 hours or so of pushing. We had us a healthy beautiful, screaming baby boy at 10:20pm. Joshua Paul Pearlman weighed in at 8lbs and 11oz and was 21.5 inches long. He was perfect. He needed to have his lungs suctioned out because of the meconium, but had no adverse effects because they got him out quickly. I needed some extra stitches because he caused tearing where it should not be on the inside because of the way he was pushing and trying to come out. Jay and baby left the room to go settle into our new maternity room while I was being put back together :) After a nice half hour nap on the O.R. table, I was brought back to rejoin my family. Joshua had his first bath, and after, we invited our families in a couple people at a time to meet him. Once everyone left, we finally had time to bond, and eat, and sleep. A few days later we came back home plus one more. And the rest is history!

HAPPY FIRST BIRTHDAY TO MY BEST BOY :-) We love you SO much!