39 Week Induction- Gestational Hypertension

I had a perfect, healthy pregnancy up until 38 +6. I was at Target and had a headache. I went home and decided to check my blood pressure (I did this regularly... and it was always normal). I had an appointment just the evening before this and everything was fine! To my surprise, my blood pressure was 150/90. I rechecked it a few times before calling the doctor. He told me to come to triage. The hospital is over an hour away and I was convinced my blood pressure would be fine by the time we got there, but it was still elevated (140/90). My cervix was closed and long and labs all came back normal. Just when I thought we’d be sent home, the doctor comes in and says ITS TIME TO HAVE A BABY 😮 He said he would rather induce me then send me home with any risks (he must’ve been bored, lol). I was given a dose of cytotec orally and started to have contractions. I reached 1cm and 70% effaced. Once the contractions stalled, I was given another dose of cytotec vaginally, and started to have stronger, more regular contractions. Then, we started pitocin. After about 8 hours, I decided to get an epidural because I hadn’t slept in 36 hours at that point. I had a window of pain on my left side, so the anesthesiologist gave me a bolus of something strong (I don’t even remember what) and I passed out 🤷🏻‍♀️ About 4 hours later, the nurse woke me up because apparently my contractions were long and close together. She started to check my cervix and before she could put her fingers deep enough, she said “oh there’s his head!” With just my nurse in the room, we did 4 practice pushes and he was already crowning. I sat and stared at his head in the mirror as she gathered supplies and called my doctor. When the doctor came in, we did about 4 more pushes and there he was!!

My beautiful 8 lb 2 oz, 19.5 inch long boy born at 5:13am.