amberslucky11's Journal

Some of its pretty foggy considering it's been 8 weeks.

I had to be at the hospital by 7 a.m. to be induced. I was so excited that I woke up at 3 a.m. and unpacked and repacked my hospital bag, ate something, and showered. When it was finally time to leave for the hospital I was more than ready. I had only been waiting for 9 months!!!

When I got to the hospital I had my I.V. of pitocin started and eagerly awaited my contractions to start. I was checked to see how dilated I was and found out I was only 2 cm and 10% effaced. I had been 2 cm for about a month now so that was disappointing. I called my mom and my aunt and they made their way up to the hospital and I spent the next couple of hours filling out paperwork and chatting it up. At about 10 a.m. my doctor came in and concluded that I was still only 2 cm and 10% effaced so he decided to break my water and see if we could get some more results. I also had an internal monitor put in to better watch Abram's heart rate. It was at this point that my doctor told me that it was highly probable that I would be getting a C-section because my birth canal was so narrow and because the baby was so big. I was really scared about this but he told me not to worry yet because there would still be some time before he actually knew and that he had seen worse conditions and the woman had delivered vaginally.

At about 12 p.m. my contractions started really picking up and became painful. I had decided while I was pregnant that if I could handle it, I wouldn't get an epidural but it was at this point that I changed my mind. I was only 3 cm dilated and 20% effaced after 5 hours and in this much pain, I was definitely getting an epidural. Usually they don't let you get an epidural until you're 4 cm but my doctor is really nice and let me get mine a little early. The anesthesiologist came and hooked me up and I instantly felt better. It was amazing! But after about an hour I could feel everything again. They called the anesthesiologist again and he came checked everything out and couldn't find anything wrong. He kept putting some drugs into my I.V.  so I could at least maintain but the epidural never did work correctly. My catheter never worked right either. It wasn't draining so I had to have it removed and put back in twice but to no avail. No fun. So I had to pee really, really bad for about 10 hours but couldn't.

For the next 5 hours I contracted a lot and had my pitocin drip turned up often so I could hurry up and get this baby out. At about 5 p.m. my nurse checked me and I was only 4 cm dilated!!!! I was just about in tears. I had been in labor for 10 hours and was only 4 cm! You have to be kidding me! The good news was I was 80% effaced so at least there was some progress occurring. Up until this point I was having a pretty good time. Laughing, taking pictures, making bets about how big Abram would be and talking excitedly to my mom, my aunt, & Richard. Now I was just frustrated and in really bad pain. The anesthesiologist would come in every now and then and top me off with some drugs but it was rather random since he doesn't stay at the hospital all day. He would just come and check on me whenever he had been called to the hospital for somebody else. Thank the Lord! He was my new best friend. The good thing about being in labor though is that it's a huge adrenaline rush so it felt like I had only been at the hospital for about 4 hours. I was so super excited to meet Abram so knew that I could keep going.

At about 8 p.m. there was a shift change and I got a new nurse, her name was Anna. She checked me and guess what? I was still only 4 cm! I could not believe it! That means I had only dilated 2 cm in 13 hours! I was 100% effaced but that meant nothing to me at this point. I couldn't believe that I was in this much pain and absolutely nothing was happening. Then Anna looks at me and says "You know that you are going to have a C-section right?" Stunned I said "Uhhh, no." She told me that my birth canal was just too narrow and since I wasn't progressing I was going to have to have a C-section and that she was going to go call my doctor to see how he wanted to proceed from here.

Richard became a nut at this point. He was so worried for me that he started crying. This really stressed me out because on top of being really scared myself I had to calm him down too. I think it actually helped though because with me trying to calm him down and tell him everything was going to be okay I didn't really have time to freak out myself. But I was really, really scared. I hate having surgery. The last 2 surgeries I had I didn't handle well. The thing that I was most worried about was that I didn't even know if Richard could go with me when I was getting the C-section. He had almost passed out when I got my I.V. so how could he handle seeing me get cut open?!? On top of that he was freaking out really bad and I would need somebody there that could help keep me calm. It broke my heart to think that he may not be able to see his son being born.

Anna came back and told me that my doctor was going to give me one more hour to see if I would progress any farther and if I hadn't he would come in and I would have a C-section. Richard and I prayed so hard during this hour. When Anna came back in I didn't hold out much hope that anything had happened. My contractions were the same and I didn't feel any different but to my & everybody else's surprise I was 9 cm!!! Woo hoo!! I couldn't believe my ears. Anna then had be turn on my left side and said she would come back in a half hour and see how everything was going. When she came back this time I was 10 cm and she said that it was time to push. Whoa! Just an hour and a half ago I was only 4 cm and now it's time to push??? I was so excited and ready to meet Abram that those were the best words I had ever heard. I asked Anna if this meant that I wouldn't have to get a C-section and she said "We won't know that you won't need a C-section until this baby is out." Another nurse then called my doctor and told him that I was going to begin pushing. He said that he was on his way to the hospital. Only about 5 minuets after this my epidural ran out. Oh well, it never really worked anyways!

They hurried up and set up the room and it was on. When pushing your nurse counts to 10 and then you take a deep breath and start pushing again, you do this three times and then you can take a break. After the first couple of pushes I looked at the clock and remember it being 9:25. I was thinking "Man, I really hope Abram gets here before midnight!" I continued to push with all my might. I always pushed all the way to 10, took a huge breath and immediately started on my next push. I never, not even once, stopped pushing before 10. I am really proud of this because it is really a hard thing to do! I was even trying to convince my nurse to let me push when I wasn't having contractions but she wouldn't let me. After awhile my mom exclaimed "I can see his head!!!" and my immediate reply was "Does he have hair?!?!?" My mom said that he did but she couldn't tell what color it was. I was really glad to hear that because I had the worst heartburn ever throughout my pregnancy and I was going to be pissed if he didn't have hair! Things started progressing very rapidly at this point. Abram moved down very quickly. Anna asked me if I wanted to feel his head and at first I said no but almost immediately changed my mind. I didn't want to regret not feeling it later. When I reached down and felt him it didn't feel like a head at all. I could tell there was hair but it actually just felt like a flesh covered grapefruit. Gross, I know.

Then Anna then told me I had to stop pushing. What?!? I want this baby out! Why would I want to stop pushing now after everything had been going so well?? She explained that my doctor was not at the hospital yet and she couldn't deliver the baby by herself. You might be thinking that this isn't a big deal. That I get to take a break now but that is not the case. At this point I am in the worst pain you could ever imagine. I sat there for about 10 minuets doing breathing exercises and trying not to push but finally I told her that I had to push! I couldn't help it but I had to push!! You get this urge/feeling that comes over you and it just isn't in your hands anymore. Your body is going to get this baby out right now whether you like it or not! Anna kept calling the front desk seeing if my doctor was on his way yet but he lives out of town so he still wasn't at the hospital. She realized at this point she WAS going to be delivering this baby by herself. Thank God my mom was there because she is also a nurse and was a huge help.

Anna then told me I could start pushing again and suddenly guess who walks in??? My doctor!!! He put gloves on and then his gown which he didn't even have time to tie because Abram was coming so quickly. Within 30 seconds of my doctor entering the room Abram's head was out. My memory gets really fuzzy right here because so much was going on and I had such a huge adrenaline rush. I do remember Richard and my mom getting really excited saying that Abram was beautiful. I was so exhausted that I kind of gave up at this point. It didn't hurt nearly as bad anymore because his head was out, so I wasn't pushing as hard as I should have been. I just needed to take a little break but was unable to. Richard tells me now that the doctor was pulling on Abram's head so hard that he thought he was going to pull it right off. My mom tells me that she thought for sure that the doctor was going to have to break Abram's collar bone to get him out. Miraculously the doctor was able to get one shoulder out and I gave one more really good push and Abram was in this world. He was born at 10:13 p.m. after only 53 minutes of pushing. (Really only 43 minutes of pushing since I had to stop pushing for 10 minutes hoping my doctor would hurry up and get there.)

The first thing I asked was "Is it really a boy?" Everybody said yes. Richard was crying hysterically saying "We have our little boy! He's finally here! He's so perfect! and He's beautiful!" among other things. My mom started crying which really caught me off guard. Abram didn't start crying immediately though and it really scared me. I asked if he was okay and everybody assured me that he was. It had felt like minutes had passed but really it was only seconds and he did start crying. It was the most beautiful noise I have ever heard. Richard cut the umbilical cord (I don't remember this at all!) and then the doctor laid Abram on my chest. I remember thinking that he looked just like I thought he would and he was the most beautiful thing I had ever laid my eyes on. He just laid there, completely silent, content to be cuddling his mommy. When I was pregnant I used to watch all of those pregnancy shows and was kind of disgusted when the mothers would kiss their slimy little baby's, but suddenly I didn't care what he was covered in. He was finally here and he was okay so I gave him a huge kiss right on his forehead and it wasn't gross at all. I then told everybody in the room "Oh I could definitely do that again (meaning give birth), it wasn't nearly as bad as everybody makes it out to be." Everybody there laughed. The nurses took him to measure and weigh him and he was 9 pounds 6.1 ounces and 20.5 inches long. I was flabbergasted. When we were all betting I said that he was going to be 8 lbs 8 ounces and 20 inches long. So he was quite a bit bigger than I expected.

Richard and the nurse gave him his first bath and it was amazing to watch. Richard was so in love with Abram immediately and it made my heart grow so big. I was so tired and it was wonderful just to be able to lay back and watch my amazing husband take care of our son. After his bath a nurse informed me that Abram needed to go to the NICU. I was really taken aback by this. My son seemed completely perfect why would he ever need to go there? She explained that they were worried because he wasn't crying only grunting and this could mean that either his lungs were not mature yet or that they may be filled with fluid. I was so scared!!! It made me feel much better that Richard was able to go to the NICU with Abram though. They came back about a half hour later and Abram had checked out just fine. I look back and think it is kind of funny actually because he still never cries. When he's hungry or angry, or whatever he grunts. It's just how he is.

So that's Abram's birth story. April 8th, 2008 is the absolute best day of my life and no other day will ever be able to compare. My only regret? That I didn't film it. There is so much that I don't remember and I wish I could. When I think about that day I still cry because it makes me so happy. If I had to do it over again everyday for the rest of my life to have Abram here with me, I would without ever thinking twice.

The moment we met

See that line across his forehead? That's from internal monitor. He still has a little scar from it today.

Abram today