Ian's birth story

This took a little longer to get down than I intended, but we've been a little busy around here. :)
On Tuesday August 8, I had a doctors appointment for 10:15. Hazen had outprocessing to do, so we got up pretty early (around 6) and took him to do his stuff. He came back home around 9, we had breakfast, and headed to my appointment.
In the waiting room, I started to feel pretty goofy. My head was really foggy and I just felt funny. When I was with the nurse, my blood pressure was extremely high both times. The doctor came in and checked my cervix--I was 2cm dilated and 60% effaced. She stripped my membranes for me, then asked about my blood pressure. She decided we should go to the lab to get some blood and urine taken, and that we should go up for some monitoring at labor and delivery. I told her that we were wanting an induction, but I was told I had to wait until my cervix was favorable. She said "Oh, it's favorable. I'll let them know when I call up there".
We had to wait a while at the lab because there were inspections and everything at the hospital was a little stressed. Finally, a little after 11, we got up to labor and delivery. They had me hooked up to the blood pressure monitor and also had me hooked up to a fetal heartrate monitor and contraction monitor. It turned out I was in early labor and was contracting every 5-8 minutes, but I couldn't feel it. I had a fear I would go into labor and not know, and it kind of ended up happening. While we were there, one of the nurses said something about me going into labor that night or the next morning and I said "Should I be expecting to have this baby in the next couple of days?" and she said "That's why we're watching your contractions, to see if they get more regular". She then asked if a doctor had been in to see us yet, and when we told her no, she said she would send someone in. At that time, we had no idea why we were still there--it was after 2 and my blood pressure had finally gone down.
The doctor came in and decided to do an ultrasound. She said that I had low fluid. I also had low blood sugar which was causing me to shake, but that was probably because all I'd had to eat that day was a bowl of cereal. At that point she said "You're 39 weeks. With the blood pressure and low fluid, I think it's time to get this baby out". We were then admitted for an induction. We had no idea we wouldn't be leaving the hospital that day without a baby.
At 4:30, my pitocin was started. I was 2-3cm dilated and 50ffaced according to one nurse (but she mentioned that her "50 was most people's 75 My contractions started to come every 3-8 minutes, and I still couldn't really feel them. They then upped the pitocin to get the contractions more regular. I STILL couldn't really feel them, and the baby was tolerating them well, so we stuck with the higher dose.
At 7:30, Dr. Scherm (who delivered the baby--I just love her) checked me again. I had not made any progress--she called me 2-3cm , 70ffaced, and the baby was at a -2 station. 3 hours of a high dose of pitocin, fairly regular contractions and no progress--I was so depressed. At that point they broke my water and inserted an internal contraction monitor--I was bedridden from that point.
The water breaking was what I needed. Almost instantly I started to contract very painfully. The worst part was that they were only a minute or two apart, so one would end and the next would start. I was in such agony. At 9:30 I asked for my epidural. That came at around 10--such a relief!! I couldn't feel anything from the waist down. BUT...the baby's heartrate had dropped with the epidural. I didn't realize anything was wrong for awhile, but then I realized all the nurses and the doctor were staring at the monitors. I caught a glimpse and saw that the baby's heartbeat was in the 80's! I about panicked--it had been around the 130's until then. They put me on oxygen and I had to breathe deeply for awhile. I had to keep the mask on for the rest of the labor and delivery.
After the epidural, Hazen ran home to get something to eat. I told him we would be there for awhile, that he could take his time and maybe take a nap since that's what I was going to do now that I had some relief.
Around 10:30, Dr. Scherm checked me. I was now 4cm, 80ffaced, and the baby was now at a 1. I figured since it had taken that long for me to progress one cm, we would really be there for awhile. The nurses mentioned the baby coming early in the morning--I thought they meant like 8 or 9. I had no idea...
At 11, I got the rest of my epidural. They had stopped it when the baby's heartrate dropped, but I didn't know that. It didn't make any difference--I felt the same (nothing). At that point, I tried to go to sleep, but I couldn't. Everytime I would get close, an alarm would go off either because my pitocin or fluids were out, my blood pressure was too low (it started to go way down, go figure) or the baby's heartrate was too low. After watching the heartrate jump all over, I couldn't sleep. I sat and watched the monitor the entire time with my thumb on the nurses call button. It freaked me out.
Hazen came back around 12:30. A little after he came back, a nurse came in and said that I would be getting another check soon, and that they may start setting up for the delivery. I thought she was nuts--there was no way I was close to pushing. She told me to make sure to let her know if I was feeling any pressure. Again, I thought she was nuts and it would be hours.
At 1:15 the nurse came in again. This time I told her I was actually starting to feel some pressure, so she decided to go ahead and check me. I couldn't believe it when she said "Well, that's because you're ready to have this baby". Wow. No I wasn't...
They got everything set up and I started to push. The baby's heartrate kept dropping when I would push, so I could only do it on every other contraction. It was so hard to not push when I felt that pressure. At some point, the nurse went to grab the doctor who was taking a nap. The doctor came in and we continued to do the pushing every other contraction. The baby's heartrate kept dropping. They had me switching from side to side (not an easy thing when you can't feel your legs) to find which side Ian tolerated better. His head would come down so far, but refused to crown. Eventually, they had me set up so I was basically sitting straight up with the hopes that gravity would help. The had me just sit there for 20 minutes while they all left to do something. I think they were discussing options for me--the baby's heartrate was a huge concern.
They came back and I was told that they may have to use forceps or the vacuum. I so did not want that. I'm sure they had also discussed a c-section, but they weren't bringing it up with me yet. She had me push in the sitting up position and I could feel his head really come down. Shortly after that, Ian was delivered at 2:52am on Wednesday August 9th. He was screaming and had a head full of dark hair--such a surprise! It's so crazy--they put this bloody, purple, squirmy mess on you and you can't stop thinking of how adorable it is. He was the cutest baby ever, even with all that gook. He weighed exactly 8 pounds and is 21 1/4 inches long.
The funniest part of the whole thing was that they had to ask Hazen constantly if he was okay. He was counting to 10 for me, and when they would have me take a breath, he would take a breath, and while I pushed, he would count, but he WOULDN'T BREATHE. I think they were worried he would pass out. They had to ask if he was okay during my epidural also. Here I am in labor, trying to push out this baby, and everyone is asking my poor husband if HE'S okay. Nice. :)
Ian gets cuter and cuter everyday. He's been holding his head up since birth, which is amazing to me--I didn't think they could do that so early. But he'll hold his head up and look around. He has a bad habit of headbutting things when he sets his head back down, but he's just so cute when he does it. He leaves his eyes open more and more everyday, and it's so much fun to watch him looking at things. I thought he was sleeping earlier because he was so quiet and when I went to check on him, he was just looking around, taking in everything. I think he's going to be very smart. He also makes this fantastic little expressions where he'll have his eyebrows all raised up--it's the cutest look. And it's pretty funny when he's hungry--he's gone after both my dad and Hazen's nipples--he's a little confused. He also likes to suck on shoulders, arms, cheeks and his fingers. We're working on it. He's a little Daddy's boy, too. He'll scream when I'm holding him, and I'll hand him to Hazen and he just turns into the most content little baby.
We're both very in love and I'm so thankful Hazen was here when he was born. He'll be a week old when Hazen goes which SUCKS but I'm sooooo happy he got at least that week. And now I have a baby to keep me busy for the deployment, so I'm hoping it will speed it up a little for me. I do feel really badly for Hazen though--it's going to be so much longer for him.