Ian’s Birth Story

This is the story of how Ian was born.

On 9/30/2012 I went in for a normal sonogram, everything was fine until the doctor was measuring his head and tummy size.  Ian had stopped growing, so a call was made to my OB doctor and a nurse came in and said she wants to induce you on 8/6 at 7am and you need to take a stress test.  Mr. Amusing and I just sat there looking at each other and thought “what just happened?”.  So as I reclined on the over sized armchair with a heart rate monitor strapped to my belly and pushing a button every time Ian kicked, I was thinking I’m going to have my baby on Monday!  I was so excited, I’m going to meet my baby boy in just a couple of days.

 

Mr. A and I started emailing and calling people and letting them know.  Everyone was happy and excited for us, except Mr. A’s mom, she is very against medical intervention when it comes to pregnancy and birthing.  She kept calling and emailing Mr. A that day and begging us to ask the doctor to push the induction date. I had a doctor appointment the next day, so I discussed whether or not we could push it, but the doctor was very concerned that Ian wasn’t getting the nutrients he needed in the womb.  She also believed that Ian would actually come out on his own before the 6th.

So I called Mr. A and told him we can’t move the date.  On Saturday Mr. A’s mom continually called and emailed letting us know her opinions on inductions and finally that night I broke down crying.  I thought why is she trying to ruin one of the happiest days of my life!  Mr. A assured me she wasn’t trying to ruin anything and was just concerned that the doctor didn’t have the baby’s best interest in mind.  That night I prayed that Ian would come out on his own I hate drama.

 

Then Sunday morning came, one more day before induction date!  Mr. A and I decided lets go and have a nice breakfast at our favorite breakfast place, The Egg and I, before we become a family of 3!  While sitting there eating I kept feeling slight cramps, I told Mr. A that I was feeling kind of weird and he asked if they were contractions.  I had no idea at the time that that’s what they were and that I was in the very early stages of labor.  We went home and just relaxed and I made sure my bag was ready for the hospital for the next morning.  Around 5pm I really started feeling more sharp cramps and I still had no idea, but I did think maybe I should start timing these.

I ate a small meal around 7, at this point I know that these are real contractions they were coming very strong and regularly.  By 10pm they were 30-45 seconds long and coming every 5 min.  In our class we were told wait until 5-1-1, 5 minutes between contractions that last a minute and for one hour.  So I told Mr. A lets go to the hospital just in case.  He put all the bags in the car and tried to start the car and nothing…the car battery was dead!  For some reason we thought we had to have the car seat installed when we got to the hospital (later we learned you just have to have it installed when you LEAVE the hospital) so Mr. A moved the car seat to his car, after that he laid down a puppy pee pad on the passenger seat that we still had from when our puppies were potty training and made me sit on that, Mr. A really likes his car 🙂

 

We get to the hospital and get checked in, the nurse asked me a bunch of questions and strapped on the heart rate and contraction monitors on my belly.  They were concerned that the contractions were coming too fast and every contraction Ian’s heart rate would slow way down, so they got an epidural going for me, which I totally wanted!  I also was running a slight fever. By this time it was midnight, Mr. A and I tried to sleep which was practically impossible.  First, the blood pressure cuff going off every few minutes was more painful than the contractions, I even had marks on my arm the next day.  Second, I’ve never had so many machines hooked up to me so it was very difficult to get in a comfortable position and I obviously couldn’t move my legs.  Third, I was so excited, nervous and scared of what was going to happen.

Around 5:30 am I told Mr. A he should probably go let the dogs out since we haven’t been home since 10 pm and I didn’t think the contractions were that close yet and with the epidural I really had no idea how far along I was, plus we live only 5 minutes away from the hospital.  Around 6 am Mr. A hasn’t come back yet and my epidural decided to run out and I’m in the hospital room by myself.  Contractions are no joke when you are 8cm dilated!  I’m texting Mr. A “WHERE ARE YOU!!!”  Luckily the anesthesiologist came and refilled the epidural because around 6:30 there are lot of nurses in the room as well as the on-call doctor and my doctor because 7am is staff change time.

Then in comes Mr. A and he told me he thought he had time to eat a bowl of cereal…I’m guessing around 7am they start asking me to push there was some meconium staining, I pushed about 4-5 times and out came in Ian at 7:11am with the umbilical chord wrapped around his throat, which the doctor expertly and quickly unraveled.  Due to the medical concerns they had, my high blood pressure  and fever during labor and meconium staining, the doctor cut the chord and got him weighed and tested quickly.  About 5 minutes later I had my perfect baby boy in my arms.  He weighed 5lbs 11oz so yes on the small side, but perfect nonetheless.

We had our baby on 8/6 but on Ian’s own terms.  Babies always have a plan of their own don’t they?