Major rewind: Gray's birth story (and the weeks prior)

It's funny to me that I am just now writing about this and Gray is now one and a half. For weeks after giving birth I had no desire to recall the events enough to write about them. Then we had a colicky baby and life was nuts for several months. And then I forgot. And then I got pregnant with baby number two and decided I'd better get this down before I forgot everything and/or the new baby was here making life even crazier. I can't imagine many of you would be interested in reading this but it's something I realized I never wrote about and is a must have for my own memory's sake.

Other than some minor complications causing me to be extremely uncomfortable the last 8 weeks or so, I'd had a healthy and easy pregnancy. At 36 weeks I started going to the doctor weekly. At my 37 week appointment my blood pressure was very high. So high in fact, that the nurse took it four times because she felt something couldn't be right. She even got another nurse to come in a take it. They immediately expected preeclampsia but no protein was showing up in my urine. They hooked me up to a fetal monitor to make sure everything was ok with Gray. They asked me if I could feel the contractions I was having, which I didn't even notice until I could see the monitor and concentrate on the feeling as the lines went up on the screen. Gray's heart rate was showing up normal and after a while I was sent home and they thought everything was ok. I was getting pretty swollen by then so they said the high BP could be a result of the extra fluid I was carrying around. I had to get a BP monitor and check it several times over the weekend to make sure it didn't get any higher. They didn't put me on bed rest but strongly advised for me to take it easy and lay on my left side as much as possible.

I went back the following Friday and my blood pressure was still very high. They wanted me to do a 24 hour urine test to double check for protein. The lady handed me a gallon size bucket as I was leaving and told me that every single time I went to the bathroom, I had to collect it in this bucket. I laughed at her and told her she'd better give me two then. I was going to the bathroom (no lie) every 20-30 minutes during the day and every 45 minutes at night. Gray was extremely low and was putting a lot of pressure on my bladder. So much that when the doctor checked me for dilation for the first time, she said she could feel his head and not to be surprised if I started peeing in my pants. Nice! Thank GOD I had been written out of work by this point (from the other minor complications mentioned earlier). So I headed home, not very excited that we wouldn't be able to go anywhere the next day (which was Saturday) since I'd have two bright orange gallon pee buckets with me.

I turned in the urine test Monday and still no protein, which we were so thankful about! I went back again on Thursday and although there didn't seem to be any signs of preeclampsia, the doctor was pretty concerned about my BP. He wanted to me to do another 24 urine test starting Sunday morning, turn it in Monday morning and come back Monday afternoon. If my BP was still high Monday afternoon regardless of the urine test results, he was going to schedule an induction, most likely for the following day, June 12th or possibly even that night. Since I was dilated a little, there was a procedure he could do that had a chance of helping me go into labor. I'll spare the details of that because I certainly won't forget it! He said if I had not gone into labor by Saturday morning, it didn't work and he would do it again Monday in hopes that I'd go into labor before having to be induced.

The procedure left me very uncomfortable for the rest of the afternoon and evening. Paul and I went out to eat before heading to the hospital for a breast feeding class we'd signed up for several weeks before. I couldn't even make it through the class because I was so uncomfortable and also very swollen by this point. We left early and I tried to get some good sleep that night (kind of hard when you're waking up to pee every 45 minutes). Saturday I was feeling a little better and we decided to get out as much as possible since I'd be being induced and we knew our time together was about to change drastically. I was so miserable though and you can imagine the stares I was getting by this point (in case you forgot, I was HUGE). We tried going to the mall to walk but I had to stop at every department store to pee which was more annoying than it was worth. We'd eaten a late breakfast and skipped lunch. We headed home about 4:00 and picked up East Coast Wings on the way home. I had a buffalo shrimp wrap. I remember not feeling quite right, especially by this time in the day. I kind of had a weird feeling but didn't even say anything to Paul because I didn't want to talk about it and get my hopes up that I might go into labor soon.

I woke up about 2:00 a.m. and something felt weird. I was wet. I thought, "dang it, I finally peed myself! I guess the doctor was right about that." But I really didn't think I would pee my pants in my sleep, especially since I'd just gotten up a little after 1:00 to pee! I went to the bathroom and was certain by that time that my water had broken. I woke Paul up and told him it was go time. I took my time packing my bag and getting ready, be pretty certain he wasn't just going to pop right out. Within about 30 minutes of my water breaking, I started having some pretty decent contractions. Not the kind that took my breath away yet, but very noticeable and about 5 minutes apart. By the time we got to the hospital (3:30 or so), I was having to stop talking or walking when a contraction would come. We lucked out and the labor and delivery floor was dead so within just a minute of them confirming that my water had broken, we were in a room. I was only 1.5 centimeters dilated, although my contractions were pretty intense by this point. We found out my favorite doctor, Dr. Scherer, was on call and would be delivering Gray.

I got up to take a walk around 4:00 or 5:00 ish but didn't make it very far because something started burning in my arm like nothing I had ever felt before. My potassium levels were low and they had me getting some through an IV. The regular IV fluids ran out so there was nothing to dilute the potassium. I am not even kidding when I say that was one of the most painful parts of my entire labor! I wanted to wait as long as possible before getting an epidural. We knew there was no need to call our family so early so we waited until about 7:30. I called my mom first, and then my Gram, who I almost missed because she was walking out of the door to go to church. I told them I was pretty certain we had a long time to go, but of course they were excited and headed over shortly. While we were waiting on them, I decided to go for another walk, thinking it wouldn't be long before I gave in to the epidural. My good friend Renna was down the hall in antepartum because she'd been in pre-term labor. It was going to be a long walk but I wanted to surprise her and tell her I was there to have our baby! I didn't make it far before I had to turn around because I couldn't take the pain anymore. I called for the juice and they were there within a few minutes. I really didn't think the epidural was bad at all and within minutes I felt NOTHING!!! It was glorious!

Shortly after that my mom, Gram and brother were there and Paul's parents were on the way. I was feeling great and pain free and enjoyed talking and hanging out with family. Pretty soon my doctor decided I wasn't making much progress (I'd been stuck at 4 or 5 centimeters for a while) and started me on Pitocin. It made my contractions even stronger but I didn't feel a thing. I can remember Paul looking at the monitor and cringing when he'd see the contraction start but I felt nothing. I was so hungry by this point but wasn't allowed to eat anything. We had not eaten since about 4:30 the day before so that shrimp wrap seemed like days ago. Paul was so sweet and refused to eat since I couldn't. But this big mama put her foot down and made him because if nothing else, I needed him to have strength so he could get me through labor! Paul's parents got there sometime after lunch and we continued hanging out and talking. I was finally progressing and around 5:00 I started feeling a lot of pressure. The kind that everyone had told me would feel like I was about to poop my pants. That was such an accurate description too, sorry if that's too much info but it is what it is. I was so uncomfortable that I asked everyone to go ahead and leave the room. I started pushing around 6:00. By this time the epidural was wearing off and even though the contractions weren't too bad, I could feel every square inch of our baby boy pushing his way through. It was the hardest physical thing I'd ever done in my life, not to mention I was beyond exhausted from being up since 2 a.m. and not sleeping much for weeks leading up to that. And did I mention that I was about to starve by this point?! It was so hard that I remember at times telling my doctor I couldn't do it anymore. She and Paul were so encouraging and after about an hour and a half, our sweet boy was out!

Those first moments were so amazing and made every second of the last almost 39 weeks worth it. I had never felt exhaustion like that before though. It wasn't long after that I was already thinking about food. My first post-partum meal was a Jimmy John's Beach Club and I felt better after I' finally eaten, which was about 10:00. The rest of the night was spent with our immediate family and our first miracle, Gray Christopher.

Right before we were supposed to be discharged on that Tuesday, I had some pretty scary complications from delivery. Again, I can skip these details because they aren't something I will ever forget and certainly nothing you'd want to read about. I ended up having to stay an extra night but we were thankful I was going to be ok. My BP was also very high-even higher than before labor and there was talk of me staying a FOURTH night! I promised the doctors that if I could just be left alone and go home that it would get better. It made going home on Wednesday even more sweet. But about an hour or two after being home I started not feeling very good. Of course we didn't get much sleep that night and by the next morning I was very sick. I'd gotten a shot the day we left the hospital to help with the complications I'd had so we called to see if I could have been having a reaction to the shot. They were pretty certain I'd picked up some 24 hour stomach bug in the hospital. I was so sick I remember barely being able to wake up to nurse Gray and poor Paul was doing everything by himself and worrying sick about me at the same time. I tried taking a shower thinking that would definitely make me feel better. But I came out with shampoo still in my hair because I was so close to passing out in the shower. Paul later admitted that he'd never seen anyone look like I did being that sick and he had been very scared. I almost missed Gray's first doctor's appointment but managed to crawl out of bed and get in the car as Paul was about to leave. I remember the pediatrician taking one look at me and saying, "Are you OK?!" Thankfully by the next morning I was a new person, healed from the stomach bug and starting to feel better from the issues I had in the hospital.

I think I'll wrap up here since I did a pretty good job blogging about our first days at home with Gray.

I'm so glad I'll have this to read back on one day and I'm sure Gray will too ;) I can't wait to see how my second labor compares to my first. Everyone has told me it's way faster and easier the second time around so I'm banking on that!