BabyP's Birth Saga-- It's a...

BOY! John David (JD) arrived via emergency C-section on Wednesday November 15th at 3:13 pm, after only 21 hours of labor. So much for my natural birth... I started having contractions around 6pm on Tuesday night, and Dave and I went to the hospital around 9pm. The doctors said I was 5 cm dilated, and the baby was far enough dropped that if they went ahead and broke my water, I would probably meet my baby in a few hours. Or I could walk around for a while and try to get my water to break naturally. I chose to walk around (bc/ I wanted a natural birth at this point), and after a few hours the contractions were pretty horrible, so I went back to Labor and Delivery and asked for the epidural.

They hooked me up and broke my water around 2am, saying I'd be meeting my baby in a few hours. Dave and I slept till about 5am, when the pain started getting pretty horrible again. I felt like I was ready to push, but when they checked me, I was fully dilated, but there was a "lip" of cervix that was still in the way. They said if I pushed, I could tear my cervix, so they wouldn't let me push. Let me tell you about how much it hurt. Turns out, the epidural was blocked. By the time they got this all figured out and fixed, it was 10am. I was still in awful pain, and I was still not allowed to push. I was also having back labor since BabyPep was going to come out "sunny side up". Pretty sucky five hours.

So around 10 the epidural was fixed and the lip was gone, and I was ready to push. So I pushed, and I pushed, and I pushed, and I pushed. Then I changed positions and pushed some more. Then I pushed and pushed some more. And it went on like that till about 1pm, when they told me that no matter how hard or how well I pushed, BabyPep just was not going to be pushed out. They got me ready for the C-section and we went off to the operating room. The bright side of the story is that the C-section was a piece of cake, and JD was born healthy and looking beautiful. He was 9 pounds, 9 ounces, and 21 inches long. When they held him up to show me, I almost choked when I saw him- a little linebacker! I have no idea where that meatloaf was hiding, because honestly, I wasn't that big! I will send pictures as soon as I get them uploaded.

I was feeling great in the hospital and we went home late on Friday afternoon. This is where the saga really begins. As most of you know, I was having some serious vomiting problems during the third trimester, which I assumed were related to the pregnancy... I stopped vomiting while I was in the hospital, but when I returned home, I was violently vomiting again by noon on Saturday. The visiting nurse came by on Sunday to remove my staples, and she advised me to go to the emergency room to get evaluated and hydrated. I went in on Sunday afternoon, and they made the connection between the vomiting and the problems I was having with my esophagus prior to being pregnant. (I suspended treatment when I got pregnant and was waiting until the baby was born before I went back. At that point they still had not diagnosed anything.) The ER doctors said I could either be admitted to GI service then, or I could get some fluids, go home and come in on Monday to be seen in the GI clinic. Wanting to go home with JD and Dave, I chose the fluids.

By seven pm I was back to vomiting so violently that I scared Dave, my mom, and myself. My mom (THANK GOD SHE WAS THERE) took me back to the ER, where I was admitted to the hospital at around 2am. They took me up to the room and I was getting settled in when... the incision from the C-section popped open in a terrifying gush of blood and fluid. Oh dear God, I have never been so scared in my life. They had to re-open the entire slice, clean it out, and pack it with guaze. Then they told me that it would have to stay open and packed with gauze until it healed- about 4 to 6 weeks. I was freaking out. It was so horrible- by far one of the worst experiences of the whole saga.

They did some tests that week and diagnosed me with Achalasia (meaning in a nutshell that my esophagus doesn't contract correctly when I swallow, so food and liquids get stuck in it). Apparently, there was a whole trimester's worth of food, liquids, pills and crap festering away in there and it was pretty gross and infected. Who knew. How I ever gave birth to such a happy, healthy chunker is beyond me! Being in the hospital away from him was the worst- far worse than anything else. I would not let Daddy or Grammy bring him in to see me, I just didn't want to bring him in to that germy, horrible place. By Wednesday, they were ready to let me go home the following morning assuming I got through the night without vomiting, which I did, and I went home on Thanksgiving.

They also re-stitched my C-section before I left, which I was so happy about! I have just been taking it easy at home since then, letting my mom, Dave, and my parents-in-law take care of me and JD. I still am not able to eat solids, and I will most likely be having surgery in February for the Achalasia. I am feeling better every day, and today I was so excited to log onto the email and tell the whole crazy story-- so everyone will understand that I was not just being lazy or disinterested about sharing the happy news... I was in a pretty sorry state and I am still recovering slowly and taking it very, very, very slowly. I am VERY gun shy about popping open again, and also about eating, but I am trying to take care of myself so I don't end up back where I was. I am just so incredibly blessed and lucky to have such wonderful family helping me out.

AND, most importantly, I am so, so, so incredibly blessed and lucky to have the world's most beautiful, happy, healthy, good natured, loving little baby boy. JD is quite honestly the best baby ever. He sleeps well, eats well, rarely cries, and is a basically just a little perfect snuggly sweetheart. I love him more than I could ever have imagined, and I love him more every day.