Hellobee

Disclaimer: I’ve been told by NUMEROUS medical professionals, including several different anesthesiologists, that my experience should be considered extremely unusual. So please read this for the information and try not to get scared!!!

In the last month of my pregnancy, I had been experiencing lots of Braxton-Hicks contractions, and the few days before our due date, I had been going through night after night of constant contractions. We reached the day before our due date and I was really wishing that I would go into labor. Mrs. Bee had the same due date as us, and she had gone into labor that night at 5pm, so I knew she would probably deliver on our due date. I had been saying all along that if she went into labor before I did, I would be so jealous! And indeed, I was.

As I laid awake in discomfort on the morning of our due date, some more contractions started up at 5:15am and I thought, not again! I hadn’t even gone to sleep yet! And I had gone through such agony the night before that Wagon Sr. and I said that if it happened again, we’d start to time the contractions to at least practice for the real thing. After I felt three contractions come and go at relatively regular intervals, I woke Wagon Sr. up and we started timing using Contraction Master. My contractions were feeling like menstrual cramps, and they were lasting anywhere between a minute and two minutes long. But they were completely erratic and not regular at all… some were 20 minutes apart, some were 10, some were 4. Finally I had a contraction so severe that I was convinced that it had to be the real thing. I also had never seen any kind of blood spotting during my pregnancy, so my way of deciding whether or not my contractions were really labor was to look for blood. That morning I found the tiniest little dot of bright red blood, only it wasn’t a spot of blood; it was a clot. I said, this has got to mean at least something, right??

We showered and finished packing our hospital bag as we continued to time the irregular contractions. They were pretty strong by then and I was having trouble walking during them. Finally it was 8:30am and my OBGYN practice was open, so we called and told them what was going on. They told me to come on in and get examined, and just in case to bring our hospital bag with us.

We got in the car and drove to the OBGYN’s office, and by now my contractions were pretty strong. They were still irregular– some 10 mins apart, but most 4, 5, or 6 mins apart. They were getting to the point that I was starting to holler during them. We got to the doctor’s office and I was examined. Just three days before that, I was not dilated at all, so I was completely prepared to hear that this was just a false alarm and to be sent back home. Instead, the doctor told me I was 2 1/2 centimeters dilated and 70% effaced, and if I wanted, I could head over to the hospital which was right down the street. So off we went!

We checked in to the hospital and I was wheeled in a wheelchair to the Labor and Delivery floor where I was triaged. At that point they would have examined me to see how far along I was, but since I had been examined at the OBGYN just a few minutes earlier, they went ahead and moved me into a labor and delivery room right away.

Monitor time.

Once we were settled into the labor and delivery room, I was hooked up to several things: two monitors across my belly — one to monitor the baby’s heartrate and the other to monitor my contractions (they were just plastic sensor-like things that were held to my belly with long cloth elastic bands all the way around me), an IV in the back of my hand (yuck), a blood pressure cuff on my arm, and one of those little pinchy things on my finger to take my temperature.  The anesthesiologist came in and spoke with us about the epidural and I pretty quickly agreed that I wanted one, so he began prepping everything he needed to do it. I regretted not eating any breakfast since once the epidural is in, you can’t eat or drink anything other than clear fluids. Then again, I hadn’t had too much of an appetite all morning with the contractions coming and going!

The anesthesiologist administered the epidural, which was difficult but not really that painful. I had to stay in a very specific curled up sitting position long enough for him to get the catheter into the spine area, which was hard because my contractions were coming. He then taped down the catheter and plastered my back with tape so that it wouldn’t budge. There went another wire into my body… and soon after, yet another with a catheter into my bladder to keep it empty during labor. I had been dreading that, but by then the epidural had taken effect and I didn’t feel a thing. In fact, once the drugs started flowing, about 15 minutes later I stopped feeling the contractions altogether. Wagon Sr. would watch the printout of the contraction monitor on my belly and tell me that I was having one, but thanks to the blessed drugs, I didn’t feel a thing. My legs were also super heavy and felt like they were falling asleep. It was a weird feeling at first… like they were on the verge of pins and needles, and as if I was wearing thick, heavy lead pants. Touching my own thighs felt like touching a stuffed animal next to me… it felt spongy and soft but not like my own body.

My plethora of assorted drinks, the only thing I was allowed to consume during labor… thankfully, they were all my favorites: apple juice, ginger ale, and water, all with crushed ice.

After the epidural, labor was relatively easy. The doctor came in and broke my water to get labor to progress more quickly, and since the epidural had taken effect, I didn’t feel a thing other than the liquid soak the pad underneath me. They started me on some pitocin in my IV to keep my labor going and to try and get me dilated enough to start pushing the baby out. The epidural came with a button you could push if you felt like you needed more drugs. It was regulated so that you couldn’t overdose yourself– if you had gotten the max amount already, pushing the button just did nothing. I didn’t push it at all at first, since I was feeling so good and relaxed and really didn’t need it. Wagon Sr. and I both tried to get some sleep since he had only gotten a couple of hours the night before, and I had gotten none. He also rushed out and ate a sandwich, and kept me hydrated with lots of beverages which was kept on supply in the kitchenette next door. We watched some tv, mostly ESPN (yes, Wagon Jr. was born to Sportscenter on mute, would it really be any other way?) and tried to rest.

Wagon Sr. trying to keep me entertained during our long labor.

If that epidural had done its job and kept going, I think the rest of my labor and delivery story would be nice and pleasant. Unfortunately, that was not the case. A few hours after my epidural, I started feeling the contractions again. This is pretty normal so they upped my dosage. That didn’t seem to do anything so they added a different drug into the mix, and that also didn’t seem to do anything. At this point I was 4-5 centimeters dilated and eventually started feeling every contraction to its max strength. This was not pleasant and after pumping me with everything they could think of, the anesthesiology team (by this time we’d been seen by at least five different doctors) decided that they needed to take my epidural out and re-do it. They asked me if that’s what I wanted, and since I didn’t really have any alternative to get rid of the pain, I agreed. So through the contractions they took the epidural out and I got another one. They spoke of wanting to give me a spinal column or block ,but apparently something didn’t work out because that didn’t end up happening. 15 minutes later, the blessed numbness was back and I was once again in heaven. I think I said, “I’ve never felt this comfortable before in my life” at one point because I was so glad.

Happy little epidural machine, working hard to pump the blessed drugs directly into my spine.

Pretty soon though, I started feeling contractions yet again. The anesthesiologists were pretty much blasting me with the strongest stuff they had at this point, and nothing was giving me any relief. Before I knew it, I was feeling the full strength of contractions at 8 centimeters dilated. Wagon Sr. later asked me what the contractions felt like, and I can only explain it in two ways: one is that they are like menstrual cramps times a thousand. The other was through an illustration. Imagine a fragile, yet solid and sturdy paper bag perfectly filled with air and tied at the end like a balloon. Now imagine a giant’s hand encircling the paper bag, easily making the size of the bag seem like a tiny marble, and then the hand crushing the bag as the giant makes a powerful fist and squeezes over and over again. Then the giant opens his hand and the paper bag, now a tiny, solid, crumpled ball, slowly reinflates to its original state, only to be crushed yet again 2 minutes later.

Each time I felt one coming, I started to say “here comes another one” with one hand clutching the bedrail and the other clutching at whatever part of Wagon Sr. I could reach (hand, shirt, face, whatever), I tried to breathe my way through the contraction. Our nurse was amazing and coaching me through my breathing, trying to get me to breathe shallow breaths so I wouldn’t pass out and to slow down my breathing towards the end of the contraction. But pretty soon I was screaming at the top of my lungs and pretty hysterical. At one point I told Wagon Sr. that I just couldn’t handle another one, and it was torture because I knew another one would come in 2-3 minutes. I just kept saying “I can’t, I can’t, I can’t.” I think I also said, “can’t they just knock me out and cut the baby out of me?”

With each contraction I was getting more and more hysterical, and if it weren’t for our nurse sternly coaching me through each one and then encouraging me after each one was done with “you are doing so great, so perfectly,” I would probably have really lost it. It also didn’t help that I had been suffering from a cold and my nose was constantly running. So with tears mixing with snot and sweat running and dripping down my face, I went through probably 15-20 contractions before the entire anesthesiology team was gathered in my room.

The attending was extremely distressed that I was in that much pain and TWO epidurals had failed me. She told me that less than 5% of the time, an epidural has to be taken out and redone, and almost never did it have to be done twice. I was freaking out at the idea of having to go through the rest of labor and deliver the baby without any help of drugs, so when she said she was going to redo the epidural herself, I readily agreed. I had to sit up again to get it done and when I did, another substance was added to the tears/snot/sweat mixture running down my face: vomit. Unfortunately, since I hadn’t eaten anything since dinner the night before (and by this time it was well into the afternoon) I was mostly dry-heaving.

I didn’t know how I was going to handle getting this third epidural, having to stay completely still and bearing the unbelievable pain of the contractions every 2 minutes. But then an amazing thing happened: I pretty much passed out. I don’t know if I was going in and out of consciousness because of my brain shutting down, or powerful sleep was overtaking me because of the incredible fatigue, or it was just plain God helping me get through this crazy moment. I don’t really care what it was… all I know is that they were asking me questions and I wasn’t responding, and Wagon Sr. and our nurse kept repeating things to me and I was barely even looking at them. Eventually it was over (by this time the pain of the needle and catheter of the epidural was nothing to me) and 15 minutes later, I was finally feeling relief yet again. The doctor explained that she had put me on very weak drugs since I already had so much powerful stuff flowing in the epidural space from before. Basically this epidural was in the right place and the drugs flowing into it were just pushing the old drugs into my spine where they needed to be. This relief fortunately took me all the way to the end until delivery began, and that’s when they usually cut back on the epidural so that you can feel the contractions and push with them.

Finally feeling comfortable again.

At this point, believe it or not, things continued to go wrong. The OBGYN who was to deliver us started mentioning the possibility of a c-section to me because of several things happening at this point in my labor. One, I had developed a fever during labor. The doctor explained that this wasn’t uncommon, and that there was probably an infection in my uterine wall somewhere. (I now know that it was probably Group B strep, which I just tested positive for during my appointments with this second pregnancy!)

They started me on antibiotics and they had to take a ton of blood from me, and they’d have to do the same to the baby once it was born, which meant that no matter how he was delivered, he would have to be rushed to the NICU right away after delivery. Also, if my fever didn’t go down and the baby’s heart rate was rising, I’d have to have an emergency c-section to get the baby out quickly. The other factors that the doctor was worried about was that I seemed to be stuck dilated at 8 centimeters (you can’t start pushing until you reach 10), and the baby’s head seemed to be a little tilted (if the baby’s head is not straight, it can’t fit through your pelvis). At this point they were basically preparing me mentally to go into the operating room. When they left, Wagon Sr. and I cried a little. I couldn’t believe we had gone through all of this only to end up in a c-section. But we agreed that the most important thing was to get the baby out safely and quickly.

As if that wasn’t enough, I was beginning to feel contractions yet again. I met another anesthesiologist (I think we met them all) who ended up pulling my epidural out a little and I think that helped. I couldn’t really tell because by the time it should have taken effect, the OBGYN came in and gave us the greatest news. Every single issue that was pointing to a c-section had resolved itself: my fever was down, I was fully dilated, and the baby’s head had fallen into place. We could begin to push!

To be continued…