Annika Ellen Paskett

So, here is the full play by play of my delivery:
At about 1 AM on the 21st my water broke. Feels a lot like peeing your pants, except you can't control it at all. Kelly was extremely calm and just started loading things up to go to the hospital. I was in a blind panic, trying to call my doctor, who was on vacation, calling my mom to ask her what to do and trying to not forget anything, because I hadn't bothered to pack a bag. I wasn't having any contractions until we got in the car and were halfway to the hospital. They didn't really hurt because my amniotic sac only had a little tear in it, so I still had a lot of cushion. We were admitted into the hospital at 1:30, dilated to a 1, and then were just stuck in limbo until 6 AM when the shifts changed.

Once the shifts changed and the doctors got in for the day we got some orders. They put oxytocin (a contraction inducer) into my IV to get the contractions closer together and called for the epidural.

The slow leak in my water had removed a lot of the cushion so the contractions were getting very painful by the time they got around to the epidural at 7 AM. I was dilated to a 2. I think they may have gone a little heavy on the medication because I couldn't even tell when I was having a contraction. I only pushed the button 3 times during the whole thing, and 2 of them were while I was pushing.

After the epidural, I couldn't have cared less about what was going on around me, I was just happy as could be. My primary nurse was training another nurse, so I was the guinea pig. She was explaining how to check dilation and about to show her, when I mentioned that I was a little uncomfortable with having my business on display when they turned on the spotlight and just ignored me. I guess I knew I wasn't going to have any modesty left at the end of it.

By about 9 AM I was dilated to a 6, and at 10 AM to 8. Somewhere during those two hours the nurses determined that the slow leak in my water had stopped because the baby's head had pushed it tight enough that it closed off, so my water was going to have to break, again, before we went any further.

At about 11 AM, I was fully dilated. During the course of the dilation, I started getting sick and throwing up every hour or so. At 11, I started feeling sick again while the nurses checked the dilation. I leaned over to throw up, and the head nurse got all excited and told me to do it again. While mentally cussing at her, I started, involuntarily, hurling and I heard the most sickening splash noise. Apparently a little poke was all my water needed and throwing up is better than the best push a person can do.

The nurses told us that there was meconium (fetal poop) in the fluid and that NICU nurses would have to be there during the delivery. We asked, well Kelly asked, because I was still really stoned and barely knew what was going on, what the long term issues could be from a meconium baby, and what we needed to be prepared for. All she told us was that her son had been a meconium baby and now he was "just a big shit." I thought Kelly was going to rip her head off. She finally told him that 99.9% of meconium babies are just fine, and that the NICU nurses are there to protect against the .1% that have problems. Several hours later we finally got someone to explain that the baby inhales the contaminated fluid in the womb and that it coats the lungs and can cause very serious infections, but usually doesn't if suctioned out.

The nurses had me push from a little after 11 AM till she was born at 12:41. All in all, it was 11.5 hours of labor and an hour and a half of pushing.

They suctioned out her lungs and she was doing really well, except she was blue and wouldn't cry. She was fussing and grunting, but the nurses could not get her to cry. They finally handed her to Kelly, and he brought her to me. My parents came in shortly after that. She was still really blue, but everyone kept saying it was normal. After a few minutes her eyes got wide, her mouth went slack and she stopped breathing. I panicked, started to pat her back, and hit the call button several times, while mom flicked her feet. She started breathing again just before the nurses got there. She did the same thing, twice, when I tried to feed her a few minutes after that. Kelly finally got the nurses and told them to take her to the nursery and figure out what was wrong with her. After they tried to feed her a bottle and she did the same thing they sent her down to the NICU. We didn't get her back until 10 PM. They suctioned her lungs several times and monitored her oxygen levels. Finally, she started crying and eating normally, and that was when they sent her back. We sent her to the nursery that night so they could monitor her sleep, and brought her to me to eat. She did fine all through the night, so the pediatrician that had been with her through the day before said we could leave that night.

She has a tendency to sleep through feedings and wake up so hungry she won't stop crying or latch on, so I've had to wake her up to feed her every 2.5 to 3 hours. Yesterday evening she was insisting on being fed every hour and a half. I'm learning to listen to her better. She'll start to fuss and whimper when it's time to eat, but won't wake up enough to cry.

All in all, she is an angel. She doesn't cry unless she's really hungry, dirty, or being messed with. She doesn't like diaper changes or getting her clothes changed much, but she's getting better about those two, and stays pretty calm.
She's telling me it's time to eat, so I'm going to bring this blog to an end.

Thank you so much to everyone for all their support and love!