Born:
Dec. 28, 2003
6 lbs. 7 oz.
20 inches

The Birth Story

On Friday 12/26/03 at 10:15am I went in to my OB’s office for my 38-week checkup appointment. Due to my grade 3 placenta they again did a biophysical profile ultrasound and non-stress test. The baby looked good. Still had plenty of fluid around him and the tech said he probably weighed about 6 lbs 13 oz. I had a really stupid nurse who said my blood pressure was high (but I didn’t think much of it, cause its never been high before). She left me hooked up to the monitor (non-stress test) for over an hour without telling my dr. that I was there. While hooked up to the monitor, the baby’s heart rate was really good, and I was having contractions, but there was no regularity to them. Finally saw the dr. and she said I was about 70% effaced and about a fingertip dilated. She also took my blood pressure about 3 times and it came up super high. I think the highest was 138/100. This got me sent over to labor and delivery at the hospital at around 12:30.

They hooked me back up to the monitor and started taking my blood pressure at regular intervals. Also drew some blood and made me leave another urine sample. My blood pressure was back to normal so the concern there was gone. My dr. came in and said she was concerned about my platelet count. She said at the beginning of my pregnancy it was 267 and when I had it done again in the middle it had dropped a little to 218. Now in the hospital it was 112, which really concerned her. So I had to stay in the hospital overnight and do a 24 hour urine test and have my blood pressure checked all night and my platelets checked again in the morning. On Saturday 12/27/03 I had my blood drawn at 6am, platelets were 108. The dr. came in and decided to go ahead and induce me the following morning after they had put cervidil cream on to soften up my cervix overnight. She felt with my falling platelets, a bunch of my blood pressures being high, and the grade 3 placenta that it was time to go ahead and deliver and I was already full term. At 4pm they took more blood and my platelets had dropped even more to 98. The dr. decided to not bother with the cervidil and went ahead and started the pitocin at 6:10pm, she was worried about my falling platelet count and said there was no reason to delay the birth by 12 hours. I lasted until 11:00pm before I asked for the epidural. After that I was a much happier camper. Dr. came in and checked me at 11:30 and I was still only 1 cm dilated and 70% effaced. Sunday 12/28/03 at 2:00am the dr. broke my water and I was about 2 cm dilated. At 2:45am I was 3 cm dilated and 100% effaced. The dr. tickled the top of the baby’s head and as numb as I was from the epidural I could feel him moving around. They put in a catheter since I couldn’t feel my legs enough to get up to pee. Somewhere between 4-6:30, I lost my mucus plug. I started to feel a couple of slight contractions. Nothing painful, just some tightening and very slight crampy feeling on my lower right abdomen. At 7:10am the nurse checked me and I was fully dilated to 10 cm and I was at 0 station. By 8:00am I started pushing. We stopped a few times, they said to give me and the baby a little break, but I think it was because the baby’s heart rate was dropping to low when I was having contractions. After 2 hours of pushing, the dr. decided to use the vacuum. The baby wasn’t coming down, even with all the hard pushing, and his heart rate was dropping, so she said it was time to get the baby out. At 10:04am with the help of the suction little Alex made his first appearance into the world. He weighed 6 lbs 7 oz and was 20 inches long. Jamie got to cut the cord, but we didn’t get to hold him right away. He was completely white like snow, so they took him over to the baby table and rubbed him and gave him oxygen. He still hadn’t cried and doctors from the NICU came in. They said he wasn’t pinking up and they wanted to take him to the NICU. They put him on my chest for about a split second and then took him away. It was extremely scary, there was about 10 people in the room working on him and myself. The hospital staff were initially concerned about his circulation, heart rate, and breathing. However, after a few hours in the NICU he had gotten a nice healthy color to him and his heart rate was perfect. They decided to keep him there though just for observation. We were able to visit with him and hold him. Overnight his oxygen level and heart rate had dipped below the acceptable level and the doctors were worried about apnea, acidosis, and anemia. They kept him in the NICU for 3 days but he never had another episode. I was discharged on Tuesday 12/30/03 and Alex was finally released on Wednesday 12/31/03. During the time he was in the NICU we were able to visit with him and hold him and feed him. We now have a perfect healthy beautiful baby boy!