When I was pregnant (wow, it feels surreal to say WHEN I was pregnant) anyways, I loved to read the birth stories from friends and I always wondered what ours would be. Ours all started on Tuesday Sept. 23rd when Brent and I went into our 2nd to last "birth class" and appointment. That weekend we went to Shelley Spud days and I think every person we talked to told me how small I looked for being 38 weeks. I knew I wasn't huge but I thought people were just being nice because when your pregnant it feels good to hear things like "oh you look tiny!" rather than "wow girl, you are exploding!" I brought my concern up about my belly not growing that much with my midwife and she said she would take a measurement to check on things. Sure enough I was a few cm behind and measuring only 35 weeks. When they do this it doesn't really conclude anything but it can help them to know what to do next, so the next step was to set up an appt. for a fetal monitoring and ultrasound to check on baby. I went to the fetal monitoring that morning and then went home and tried to get dinner in the crock pot. I remember telling my mom on the phone- I am so exhausted and I don't even know why I am making dinner because for some reason I feel like I am going to have a baby today. My mom said that this is kind of what the last stretch feels like. Then I went to pick Brent up for the ultrasound. I am so glad he decided to come with me because I don't think I could have handled it on my own. During the ultrasound they did a few measurements like head circumference and the femur and abdomen measurements. I remember thinking- wow she looks so big in there- and I wasn't worried at all. The ultrasound tech then told us some bad news. She said your baby is only measuring 33 weeks and about 3 1/2 pounds. I couldn't believe it. It was one of those things where you think "this only happens to other people". At the time I didn't really understand everything and so I thought that for the last 6 weeks my baby had just been sitting there not growing or developing and that maybe there was a chance she would be really sickly when she was born. I felt so much dread and hopelessness. Then our midwife came in to talk to us and told us that there were two options- 1 was to induce right away and the other was to come in every day for strict monitoring and tests. I asked what she recommended and she said "definitely I would be induced". Our little girl had been experiencing something they call Inter Uterine Growth Restriction or IUGR
(here is a link if you want to read more about it)
http://www.babycenter.com/0_intrauterine-growth-restriction-iugr_1427406.bc
So we decided that is what we would do and we went home and packed our bags. On the way to the hospital I felt a lot of peace and felt that everything would be ok. At this point I was still under the impression that I was giving birth to a pre-mature 33 week old baby. When we got to the hospital I remember asking one of the nurses- "can you just be straight with me and tell me what is going to happen with my baby? Everyone is being so nice but I just really want to know what I can expect." The nurses told me that everything was going to be just fine! They were so awesome and reassuring. They told me that my baby may be the size of a 33 weeker but all her organs had continued developing and she was going to be just like any other baby but pretty tiny. One of the nurses felt my stomach and she said "oh, I bet you have at least a 5 1/2 pounder in there). We were really hoping she would be 5 lbs. or over so that we could go home from the hospital and not have to stay extra in the NICU. The nurse then came in to start my induction- she checked me and said I was about 75% effaced already and 1 cm dilated so things should go pretty smoothly. They put the little pill inside me and told me that they would probably have to do 3 pills, one every 4 hours to get things going. I remember Brent and I thinking that it was kind of boring and we didn't know what to do. My family came over and entertained us for a while and then the bishop and his wife stopped by to say hello as well. It wasn't really until the end of the 4th hour on pill number 1 that I started to feel anything. At this point I was about at 2 1/2 cm and 85% effacement. After they put the second pill in I started to feel some cramps but nothing too bad. Brent was asleep and I wasn't going to wake him for such a small pain. I walked around a little, tried to sleep (ya right), and then took a bath. By the end of the fourth hour pill number 2 I was starting to feel really consisted contractions and I woke Brent up to help me. The nurse came in and checked again and I was at a 4 so she went to go get the anesthesiologist to give me the epidural. This was definitely the worst part of my labor, but probably wouldn't have been even close to the worst if I hadn't gotten it. However, for me, this was the worst. I hated having to hold so still through contractions and the way it sent shocks through my body. It also was unpleasant because I didn't get numb all the way through. I still had feeling in one area (my birth canal), but everything else from stomach to legs were dead dead dead. I couldn't move around but I was still having contractions and feeling them! I got really scared at this point because in no way did I plan on having a natural birth and I didn't think I could handle it. I started to cry a little bit and the nurse told me she would go get the anesthesiologist to see what he could do. He came back in and started barking at me "stop crying, why are you crying" "labor is supposed to be painful and an epidural wont make everything go away" "you have unrealistic expectations" I just remember that all I was doing was sitting there silently crying and holding Brent's hand. Who was this guy and how exactly did he know what labor was supposed to feel like. He gave me an additional dose and almost immediately I started to feel so much better. I was pain free and ready to go. Side note: later on the boss lady for Labor and Delivery came by and said 3 of the nurses had complained that the nurse anesthetist had been totally rude and they would like me to write a formal complaint. It felt good to be validated that what happened to us was out of the ordinary. On to the good parts. From here I progressed really fast and within 2 hours I was ready to push. It couldn't have been more that 20 minutes before she popped out. I had wanted to see with a mirror but my midwife had to snip me and said that it would probably be better if we put the mirror away haha. 2 seconds and 1 push later our sweet baby June was born. She was so precious and cried just like I had always hoped she would (I had this irrational fear in pregnancy that my baby wasn't going to holler after coming out.) I could see that Brent was kind of emotional and it was so sweet to see how much he loved the both of us at that moment. They took her to be weighed and when they told us 5 lbs. 6 oz 18 inches we were so happy! We are so grateful for all those who have supported us in having this little baby and are excited that our eternal family has added a new member. Welcome to the world!
