(This is longer that I thought it was going to be, so I'm going to write it in two posts)
Part 1.
I just realized I never wrote down my thoughts/version of Lydia's birth story and she's almost 4 months old!!!! yeesh.
I was so excited for Christmas morning. Warren was finally old enough to realize what was actually going on. We had to wake him up because our church started at 9. He was so excited and I was loving watching it.
I didn't feel any different that morning, just the same ole very pregnant feeling, I was still 2 1/2 weeks away from my due date. After we had a little Christmas morning fun we hurried up and got ready for church. As most Sunday mornings, I forgot to grab some snacks for the little man. Everyone else was out in the car waiting for me. (Seth, Warren, my Dad) My mom was already there practicing for the musical number. I was waddling around upstairs trying to grab a few extra things for Warren when I all the sudden just "wet my pants". I stopped and thought, "you've got to be kidding me, I did not just pee my pants right before church, or did my water just break?, Nah, can't be my water." My water broke with Warren and it just kept coming and coming and coming. This did not just keep coming. I ran to the bathroom, yada yada and ran out to jump in with the fam. I looked over at Seth and whispered to him, "I just peed my pants". He looked at me like I was crazy and we drove on to church. We got all situated and right after the opening song I told Seth I had to go the bathroom again really bad, so I got up and went.
I sat back down and was distracted for the rest of sacrament meeting. I couldn't get the thought out of my mind of questioning if that really was my water that broke or if little miss was just putting so much pressure on my bladder that out it came! I wish I could have payed attention to the program but I honestly was searching on google for all things that had to do with "water breaking". Seeing how Warrens birth was, I would be lying if I wasn't a lot nervous that the same situation might could happen if we didn't get to the hospital fast enough after my water had actually broke. I never told anybody, but deep down I was really scared we were going to lose this baby at birth, but then again I just knew we weren't.
Sacrament ended and as we got home I did a little more research. A lot of websites said to lay down for half an hour and if your water did break it would pool up and then when you stood up, you would know that it had. I tried that. No poolage. No water. Bummer. I was excited for the mere fact of being DONE being pregnant. I was NOT mentally prepared yet to have another baby. I was also not ready with all the "before baby comes" checklist. I still needed my 2 1/2 weeks. We went throughout the day doing all the Christmas festivities. We opened presents with the fam, had a nice dinner and then got it all cleaned up. Meanwhile I peed my pants twice more. I was really kind of getting annoyed at this. I was getting close to the end of my clean "underwear" supply :) And I don't ever have problems with bladder control, even when I have to go REAALLLY bad.
By the time 6:00 PM rolled around, I was kind of freaking out inside. "What if my water really did break... you only have 24 hrs before infections and stuff can start to happen..." and so on and so on....It had already been 9 hrs since the first wetting myself incident.
My lower back had started to hurt a little with a dull pain, I finally convinced Seth he needed to call the doc just to see. My doctor was out of town and it was Christmas, so Seth called a lady in our ward that was the head nurse at the office I go to. Then we finally got a hold of someone else. They said their protocol was to check any signs of labor out after 20 weeks just to be safe, so into the hospital we headed. I said some weak goodbyes and gave warren a hug and kiss and told them we'd probably just be back in 20 minutes, we're just going to get things checked out.
We get to the hospital and the nurse asks us what's up and I just say, "I think my water broke, but not sure". Awesome, haha. She kind of gave me a giggle so I felt like I needed to explain myself. I told her how my water had broke before with my first and how I peed my pants 3 times during the day, blah balh...so she checks me in and I put on the cute little hospital robes and lay on the bed.
A nurse came in and asked all the same questions again and so she says she'll take the initial PH test to see if I had ruptured. She checked me and I was maybe a finger tip, then she took the test and it didn't look promising because it didn't start to change right away. She says sometimes it takes up to ten minutes so she left us in the room. Right before she came back into the room, I felt it. There was the flowing of waters that I remembered feeling with Warren. I was excited but not ready all at the same time and it was Christmas, I didn't want her to have a Christmas birthday! (Now I think it's pretty cool, she may not for a few decades though)
Once we knew it had broke for sure she asked us what our plan was. I told her I had had an emergency C-section with my first but I was wanting to try a V-BAC. (Vaginal Birth After Cesarian)((Ive been asked a few times what that means, so that's why I added :))) She didn't really say anything just kind of made the, "well that probably is not going to happen" look. I didn't catch it, but Seth did. I was set on the VBAC and that's what I wanted. No one was going to stop me. I wanted SOOO bad to have that experience. I was set on it. Ya, call me crazy but I wanted the experience of pushing and helping bring my child into this world and then being able to hold her right after she was born and have that first moment with her, and oh I could go on and on....
They called my Doctor but he was out of town with his family for Christmas and so they called the Doc on call. He got there in about ten minutes. Immediately when he came into the room and said hi, I felt comfortable with him. It was the coolest thing. We started chatting about our plan, he listened and then got down to business with us. In a nutshell he first started of in a round about way, saying how dangerous it might be to try a VBAC since it had already been almost 12 hrs since my water initially broke and since I was not even at a 1, and since I hadn't dilated with Warren, my chances of laboring on my own and being at a 10 in another 12 hrs was not very promising.
I started to get really mad and frustrated inside, not at him, just at the fact that I may not be able to do a VBAC. I was holding it back and just listening and nodding my head. He then told me he was giving me advice as if he was talking to his sister about what the safest thing for me and baby would be. That's where I lost it, I couldn't hold the tears and hurt back anymore. I started sobbing. All I could think was that I would never ever have the chance to deliver any of my children "normally". After 2 c-sections, they won't even think once about a VBAC. I would never be able to experience what I so deeply wanted to experience. I wasn't prepared for that. My whole pregnancy I was planning on a VBAC and in 5 minutes I had to just let that dream go. Part of me wanted to be stubborn and just try and see, but I knew it wouldn't be safe for Lydia.
The Doctor was so caring and understanding. He whipped my tears off my face with the sleeve of my cute gown, haha. He promised he would take care of me and then asked if we needed time to discuss and bawling I told him we didn't need time because I knew a c-section is what needed to be done.
After I let out all the tears, I started to get excited, we were going to have a baby! And on Christmas!
deconstructing healing
5 months ago

Thanks for sharing your thoughts, feelings, and desires. I can understand the disappointment you felt in not having the type of birth you wanted so much to experience. Thanks for being a great Mom. Love to you
ReplyDeleteI enjoyed reading about your thoughts and feelings concerning Lydia. She is such a precious, special baby girl! I'm also sorry that you didn't get to experience the normal delivery that you wanted to, but you were able to have a healthy baby & your recovering went better than with Warren, so that was good. You definitely are a very caring, wonderful mother to your two little ones! Hugs & much love to you.
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