Welcome Alexavier

Okay so I suck at blogging. I think that's obvious. :) Here is my birthstory with Alexavier.

My Birth Story with Alexavier Joseph Yeater

Hmm where to start. I felt like “labor” started quite some time before I actually was “in labor”. For weeks before I went to the hospital I was having regular contractions about 20 minutes apart. Each week I had my doctor’s appointments and scheduled NST’s (Non-Stress Tests). Starting at 36 weeks we noticed my heart rate was quite high, and they kept me in Labor & Delivery after the appointment to observe me for 6 hours. The next two weeks my NST’s showed that the contractions were about 20 min apart, and over time got more intense. My doctor had said that because I was diabetic she wouldn’t let me be pregnant past my due date (10/24/08). So going in to the week of the 19th of October she called and said to bring all my stuff with me, and we would induce on Wednesday the 22nd of October. I go to the appointment with all intentions of going up to L&D afterward. My NST showed that I was having contractions 6-10 minutes apart. I go to the regular doctor’s appointment – and she says I am not going to be induced. She said that she didn’t think she needed to check me, because I didn’t “look like I was in labor”. So we head home… very mad! Mind you I had brought my mom up from Aberdeen (about 70 miles) to stay with JJ while I am in the hospital. So we drive the hour ride home, (still having contractions 6-10 minutes apart). I go grocery shopping with my Mom, make dinner and start to notice my contractions were a lot closer together. There were no more 10 minute intervals, they were every 5-6 minutes and getting stronger. We call L&D, explain what is going on, and they say “Weren’t you supposed to be induced today?” “YES! But my lame Dr. told me I had to wait, but I’m in Labor now so can I come in?”
Josh and I head out to the hospital at 11:30pm, get there at 12:20 and they set me up on another NST. It shows the contractions are now 6-7 minutes apart. They ask me to walk the hospital for at least an hour and a half to get the contractions closer together. So walking we do and boy are hospitals scary at night time. We come back to L&D and back on the NST machine. It’s to the point now that I am doing some serious breathing. Alexavier’s heart rate kept dipping, so they put us in to an observation room, gave me 2 shots of morphine and told me to get some rest. The morning crew comes in to tell me they want to give me pitocen to get the contractions started, and want to move me to a delivery suite. WOO HOO!! FINALLY! We move to the L&D room at about 8am, I eat breakfast and then they start me on the pitocen at about 9am. My contractions start going pretty quickly but I am able to get up and move around, so that was nice. I spent a lot of time on the “Labor Ball” and I guess that helped him move his way down the birth canal. At 3:37pm my water broke naturally, and by 4:30 I wanted the epidural. That’s when the problems started. I was given the epidural, and I guess with the combo of the pitocen and the epidural both mine and Alexavier’s heart rate and blood pressure dropped. I personally thought I was just taking a nap cause of the effect of the epidural; however I guess that wasn’t the case. I woke up to Josh holding my hand and asking me to pray with him, about 20 Dr’s and nurses in the room, and the anesthesiologist hovering over me giving me double shots of epinephrine. I didn’t really know what was going on, but everyone kept saying I was okay, and Alexavier was okay too. Finally the anesthesiologist said that I had a problem with my blood pressure. They stopped all the drugs. No epidural & no pitocen. Once the contractions got painful again they started the epidural again THANK GOD! So they gave me a button to up the epidural meds every 20 minutes. They kept the drip really low, but allowed me to have a button. Woo hoo! Things slowed down a bit, since they slowed down the pitocen, and although I was still laboring heavily, they kept checking me and did a couple of ultrasounds. They noticed that Alexavier was “sunnyside up”. Meaning his face was facing my tummy instead of my back. This freaked me out, because I was really scared of a c-section. We tried different positions to get him to turn over, but he’s a stubborn little guy and wouldn’t move. The doctors decided that it was best for everyone for me to have a c-section. I was not happy, but wanted to do what was best for the baby. So they wheel me into the Operating Room at about 10:15. Josh comes in a few minutes later all scrubbed up and ready to hold my hand. The whole time I am trying not to cry, thinking something is really wrong. So as they get me ready to go, they check me one last time and Alexavier has turned over! So they told me to push I pushed about 6 times and it hurt SO BAD cause the epidural definetly wasn’t as strong as with JJ. But out came the baby! I had 2 nurses and Josh holding my legs for me, and another one pushing on my stomach. I was freaked out but he was a very healthy little guy. I guess on the last push they noticed his little hand trying to come out first, so they had to push it back in… and then his head came out. But besides that it was not that bad. I got to hold him right away, and they took us back to the normal labor & delivery room. We stayed down there for about 1.5 hours. He got his first bath after I breast fed him and had to lay under the warming lights a bit cause he was shivering a lot. They said his base temperature was low, (it was 98.0). Finally I got to eat something. So it was all day with no food but it was worth it. J We got sent upstairs to the recovery room. We spent 2 days there and finally got to go home with our little guy.