Longest/scariest day of my life.

This is long so please bare with me.

On Wednesday, the 12th, I woke up around 4:30 in the morning with slight cramps. They were not very painful and I did not think anything of it. I woke my husband up at 6am when I realized they might be actual contractions. He is not and easy man to wake up but that got his attention. We tried timing them but there was no real pattern to them yet. So we decided to fix up some last minute things for baby. When the contractions started to become slightly more intense I decided to shower and throw together my hospital bag.

I went to the hospital around 11:00 and by 11:30 I was admitted. I was almost 4cm dilated and my baby girl’s heart rate would dip down a bit. I had to keep moving the position I was laying in to bring it back to normal. After a few hours the doctors were saying that they were considering giving me pitocin to make me progress faster. They were starting to get worried about the heart rate going lower. They told me that getting an epidural might help speed things along and that they would administer pitocin afterwards.

I have scoliosis and getting the epidural was painful for me and took the anesthesiologist a lot longer to complete it.

Eventually I stopped feeling the contractions in my back and abdomen but my baby’s heart was still dropping so they put in a catheter in case I ended up getting an emergency c-section. They made a small tear in my water and put an internal heart monitor on my baby’s head and put tubes in around her head to add more fluids around her. Shortly after I started to feel this weird pressure that became a little painful. I told the nurses and I was now dilated to 9cm and the baby’s heart rate continued to drop. I was scared at this point that something was very wrong. The pain kept getting worse and the doctors were very worried. I had to get on my hands and knees and rock my hips to try and keep her heart rate up. I kept feeling this strong urge to push and had to fight that. My delivering doctor was 15 minutes away when I was 10cm dilated and the high risk doctor stepped in.

There was no time to get a c-section and my baby’s heart rate was not picking up. He told me to get on my back and he used forceps to help her come out faster. I had no time to try and give birth without it.

Came out with her cord wrapped around her twice. Once around her body and once around her neck. But by some miracle she came out crying and healthy. The epidural made my legs numb after I was done being sewn up. Which took around an hour or so to do. I had a few 2nd degree tears but she was worth all the pain.

My rainbow baby Natalia, 6lbs 6oz, 19in exactly. Born 8:03 on 9/12.