Madelyn's Arrival

I was soo uncomfortable when my 40th week came around that I began hinting around to my OB to induce. He decided that if Miss Madelyn hadn't come by Saturday, April 3rd (her original due date) that we would induce at 7 that morning. Finally, I had a date to look forward to that was certain!

Friday, April 2nd, I went to work just as I normally do. Justin and I went to lunch at Olive Garden, and I started complaining of back pain with braxton hicks (BH) contractions. Now, I had been having braxton hicks contractions for 4 weeks now and the back pain was no new news but the two together was different. Justin took my patients, he is such a sweet husband, and let me leave work after lunch that day.

That night I continued to have BH with back pain, and I asked Justin if he thought these were real contractions. He had no idea and I certainly didn't know either. Around 10 that night I began timing them and they were about 10 minutes apart but not real consistent. I called the labor and delivery unit at the hospital and they just told me to take tylenol, drink lots of water and keep an eye on them. They didn't want me coming to the hospital unless they were 5 minutes apart and continuous. So I decided to try and go to bed.

I finally began to drift off to sleep when a sharp pain in my back woke me at about 11:30. I dragged myself out of bed thinking I was never going to sleep. For some reason, looking back on it, I was never overly anxious about the morning (when my little one was planned to be arriving) which is weird. I would normally stress over this known fact. I guess the BH had all my attention and the back pain was growing which I was annoyed by. When I crawled out of bed, I noticed that I felt something running down my leg. Sure enough my water had broken and my contractions were now very much known contractions and coming every 3 minutes. I woke Justin and he was frantic getting everything ready and sped us to the hospital with his hazard lights on. I remember telling him, "honey.. there is no one on the roads. I think you can turn those lights off"

Once I got to the hospital, my contractions were way painful, again all in my back and I couldn't help but make bad faces every time they came on. I definitely decided on the epidural and let the nurse know as soon as I got on the labor and delivery unit floor. Shortly, those bad faces turned to uncontrollably moans. I was sooo thankful when the epidural came! I don't remember the actual needle itself, but I do remember when the doctor hit a nerve and my left leg jerked and I screamed. Oh, that hurt!!! Much later in the labor process, I realized that I could feel the contractions again and the only thing numb was my left leg. Ugh.. They made me wait another hour before giving me the epidural..needless to say the moans returned by then. I vividly remember the tape being ripped off of my back to insert a new epidural (got some burn marks for a few weeks from that one). During all of this process, I continued to listen to the monitor that was observing Madelyn's heart rate.. worried everytime it fell below 110 bpm.

Eventually, around 10:30 am Saturday morning on April 3rd, 2010 Madelyn came into the world with a vaginal delivery and help of a vacuum (thank God for that, I was too tired to continue pushing... she had been "so close" to being delivered for so long I had given up hope).

I got to hold her for maybe 30 seconds then she was whisked away to the side to get cleaned up. She wasn't too spunky though and had to be carried to the nursery for further suctioning of her lungs (she had ingested meconium during delivery). Supposedly, she perked up right when they got the nursery and it wasn't until 1:30 pm that I got to hold my baby girl.

Justin and I are so blessed for this precious gift from God. She is such a good baby, and we love her so much!!