Well as I sit in the emergency room a day after bringing my baby girl home I’ve decided to write about my birth experience.

Let me start by saying regardless I’d do it all over again because I’m absolutely in love with my little girl Arabella Rose. I had a pretty good pregnancy overall, I had GDM but was controlled with diet. She was perfect and I was in good health.

Sunday 8/2/20 I was called in for my induction. We arrived at 11:30am and by 1pm I was prepped and ready to begin. They first tried to insert a balloon into my cervix 3x but failed (hurt pretty bad), then they decided to give me oral meds to get moving. I took 3 doses over the course of day/night/following morning. At 6:30am Monday my waters broke but slow leak. At about 2 I felt more fluid leak and my plug finally fell out. By 3pm on Monday 8/3/20 I was 100% effaced but still only 1cm dilated. I was in a lot of pain at this point. The nurse gave me a little morphine until I could get a room in labor & delivery. My husband rubbed my back for hours. I bounced on my ball, took hot showers and was ready for an epidural. I was then sent to labor & delivery to get my epidural. My entire body was shaking from the pain and I felt like I was having an outer body experience. I was checked and now 4cm dilated. So now here comes the fun part....

I got my FIRST epidural and they placed it in wrong so had to replace. Once it was in a SECOND time my blood pressure dropped to 78/56 (something like that) baby’s heart rate shot up and now the doctors were saying they were pulling fluid from my spine and I may need a blood patch later on. (Whatever that meant) I was out of it, I was completely numb from neck down (they messed up the SECOND time too) My husband began getting very nervous and called my family immediately. They stopped the epidural and baby’s heartbeat was better. I on the other hand was not well. They then began pitocen, which I started feeling my contractions again. The chief of anesthesiology came in to check the epidural line, everyone seemed nervous. He then administered another drug to test out the line. It failed and I had to receive another epidural. This time I thought it went fine. I was numb in the right places. Now it’s 11pm and the doctor checks me, I’m still between 4-5cm and was told I have a narrow pelvis and the baby won’t be coming on her own.

So C-Section was then scheduled. I just wanted to get it over with. At 12:45am Tuesday 8/4/20 I was wheeled in to the OR. They set me up and began asking if I felt “this” I said yeah you’re pinching me. Now my husband joins me by my side and they begin cutting me which I was like hmmm I can kinda feel that I remember saying to myself. Next thing I know I felt layers of skin being opened and tugged and I screamed. They kept giving me drugs through epidural but never worked, they then knocked me out.

I remember waking up crying because I didn’t see my baby. They reassured me that she was fine and absolutely beautiful. They finally took me back to my room and there was my husband holding her and rocking her. I couldn’t stop crying. I finally got to hold her. After a couple hours they took us to another room where we spent 3 long days. I was in so much pain. My husband literally took care of our daughter and me. I did breast feed and tried my best to help get up to feed her and change her. My husband was a saint, cleaned my bloody self, wipes me every time I used the bathroom and showered me. He’s such a great Daddy too!

So fast forward to yesterday Thursday 8/6/20 we were so excited to go home. Arabella was doing great and passed all her tests. I was moving a little better too. Nurse did say my bp was a little high and so was heart rate but I could still go home just had to watch for certain symptoms. We had a great welcome home. My baby had a great first night at home. But I started getting really swollen in my legs and feet, fever, headache and chills. I continued pumping my breast every 2hrs but by this morning my fever was 102.7. My neck is hurting and my feet are so swollen I can barely walk so I called my doctor and he told me to go to ER immediately. So here I am in the waiting room, STILL!

After all this craziness I still wouldn’t change a thing, my little miracle baby Is perfect!