I'm a lot different of a person than I was 5 years ago, and that really became apparent to me throughout this pregnancy. Where I used to be unendingly trusting in doctors and the medical world, I guess I've become a lot more skeptical of all that, especially when it comes to childbirth. There are a lot of things this pregnancy, labor, and delivery that I wish I'd done differently, and altogether it's made me look back on this delivery with regret, sadness, and disappointment. I know that what matters most is that Archer and I are both home and healthy, but I guess I'm still trying to work through things not going how I'd hoped.
After my PE postpartum last time around, I was determined to not get an epidural the next time because I wanted to do everything in my power to make sure I was up and walking and actively preventing a blood clot. I know epidurals don't cause blood clots, but in my mind it made sense to do everything I could to mitigate my risk factors. Plus, I had gotten to a 9 without any pain medication before, so why not go all the way this next time?
When I got pregnant with Archer, I knew I'd have to be on blood thinners from second trimester through six weeks postpartum. This alone makes labor and delivery more difficult, because they don't want your blood thinned while you're delivering, but at the same time they want you on a blood thinner as much as possible if that makes sense, ha.
About 17 weeks pregnant I found out I had gestational diabetes. My fasting numbers were the most telling sign; they were extremely high and out of control. Unfortunately I wouldn't be able to control the diabetes by diet and exercise alone, so I got put on an oral medication.
I continued to look into natural childbirth, all the while knowing that I'd most likely have to be induced, and I had heard from a lot of people that pitocin contractions are a whole different ballgame.
Near the end of the pregnancy, baby was measuring big but not gigantic, but my doctor still wanted to induce me at 38 weeks. This is where I wish I had stood up for myself a little bit more. My diabetes was relatively under control, the baby was healthy... so I wish I would have asked for more time before an induction.
I was scheduled for Saturday morning at 8 am, so my girls went to sleep at my parents' the night before, and my awesome sister even came from out of town to be there. At 5:45 am the hospital called and pushed the induction back "til they weren't so slammed". Cool. Are there any other moms out there that totally prefer spontaneous labor to an induction?? I was SO nervous! With both my spontaneous labors, there's no time to psych yourself up! So I just walked around my house feeling nervous til they called and told me I could come in.
The car ride to the hospital was a lot more pleasant than my spontaneous labors though. :) They got me into my room and without giving me any choice, got me strapped to monitors and an IV was put in. At this point I gave my nurse my birth plan, which I'm sure she was rolling her eyes at because it was pretty much the opposite of what happens when you're induced... ha. I asked to start with something else besides pitocin because I was hoping something else would be enough to kickstart my body into labor. I wasn't starting with nothing; I was dilated to a 3 and 70% effaced, but my nurse said the opposite really; baby was high up and my cervix was really far back. She told me the way they always do inductions start the pitocin and break the bag of waters. She said if I didn't want to be induced then I could go home. This almost made me cry and in fact I did cry later because I hadn't come to be induced for fun, I'd come because it was recommended for medical reasons. So she called my dr in special just to come talk to me. Basically I was made to feel like I got no choice in anything, they do inductions one way and one way only. So we went ahead with what they wanted to do. The upside to all this was they allowed me to labor being up, even though I still had to have baby monitored continuously and be hooked to an IV. They got me a special wireless monitor and a birth ball and let me use those.
I kept waiting for contractions to hit me, just walking around my room and talking to Cord and my sister, but they never really did, at least not what I was expecting. TMI, but I was feeling a little bit of cramping but mostly was just feeling pain in my butt. Also, my legs. I asked my nurse what this could be and she said it sounded like I was starting back labor. NOOOOOO. I had heard of this back labor thing and it wasn't good. I continued to try to find positions to get baby to turn into the right position so we could avoid the back labor, but he didn't seem to want to oblige. The pain was getting bad but it was SO weird. I was dilated to a 6, but my contractions weren't unbearable like they had been when I was at a 6 with Skylar. In fact, they didn't feel like contractions at all, just a whole different type of pain. At this point I freaked out a little. I had no idea if I could handle transition if I had back labor, and my biggest fear was getting to a 9, just like last time, and NEEDING an epidural, just like last time. Somehow in my mind, if I could avoid the circumstances of last time, I could avoid getting a blood clot. Does that make sense? Not really but it did at the time. So I decided to get an epidural right then. The anesthesiologist was super quick and was in the room before I knew it. It was the most painful epidural I've gotten. I don't know if I just wasn't in enough pain yet that the epidural feels like nothing, but that was definitely not nothing.
Almost immediately I started feeling HORRIBLE. Like, kind of like I was dying, horrible. I was having a hard time forming thoughts and speaking and I felt weak and dizzy and sick. Turns out my blood pressure had dropped considerably from the epidural, and honestly feeling that way was even worse than the pain of labor. They got me some medication to raise my blood pressure and that helped some, but I was basically bawling at this point because none of this was what I wanted. I wanted to go into labor spontaneously, I wanted a no-pitocin labor with normal contractions, I wanted my water to break when it was ready, I wished immediately more than anything that I hadn't gotten an epidural, I felt like no one listened to a damn thing I said, and I just wanted to go home.
The rest of the labor was slow and uneventful, and the best part was my mom bringing Aria to come see me before bedtime for a little bit. Oh and one more complaint against the stupidness of hospitals. You can't expect a diabetic pregnant woman to eat nothing but popsicles and ice chips for 10 hours or more. So I snacked on a muffin all day and I don't feel bad about it, not one bit.
Finally at long last it was time to push the guy out. I always thought it'd bug me if I had anyone in the room with me besides my husband but with this being my third, I honestly was fine having my sister there too. I pushed the little guy out in less than 10 minutes, and this time I remember feeling impatient between contractions, like come on let's get this done! I had made sure I didn't up my epidural meds at all so I was able to feel the pressure to push, and it was perfect. He was out and unlike my other two, he hadn't passed meconium in utero, so I got to hold him immediately! That was awesome. I couldn't believe how much hair he had!
My only other disappointment was due to complications little guy had while in the hospital. He had several low blood sugar numbers, a couple times where his oxygen dropped, and couple time where his temperature dropped. I just keep wondering; did he have these issues because he was two weeks early? Had I not controlled my diabetes well enough? Was it because he was induced? I don't know, and never will, but the whole experience this time around makes me feel a lot of sadness and disappointment in myself. I wish I would have gone with a midwife (side note, I don't even know if I really could have because of being so high risk), I wish I would have delivered at the University of Utah hospital (they seem a lot more hippie), I wish I would have pushed to be induced later, if at all, I wish I would have trusted myself more and gotten through back labor without an epidural... I just wish things had been different.
I feel like the tone of this whole post is pretty negative and I'm sorry for that. I really am so grateful that my baby is here and healthy and that despite my complications I had in pregnancy, he is ok. It's just interesting that the more labors/deliveries you experience, you know more and more what you want it to be like. And I think that's ok. It's ok that things didn't turn out how I'd hoped, and it's ok that it has taken me some time to be alright with how everything went down.
Anyway, this kind of turned into a novel; if you made it this far, thanks for reading!
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