Beau's Birth Story!!!

Well, as you would have guessed, life is definitely busy! This little man is a full time job! One that I love so much already!!! So onward with the good stuff, the details of Beau's birth! We went to our appointment on Monday afternoon, and of course Dr. K had been called to the hospital for a delivery, so I had to see a nurse practioner. My exam went well, she said that I was a solid 2 cm dialated and still about 50% effaced. So a week of walking, walking, walking, and I had 1 cm of change. Not very encouarging, I thought. But she said that I looked favorable enough to not have to go into the hospital that night...so home we went!

We had a nice night at the house, my mom fixed us chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes and gravy, and macaroni and cheese. So good!!! We had to be back up at the hospital at 6am, so we tried to go to bed early. Kolby went right to bed, me, not so much! I wasn't openly nervous, but I just wasn't going to sleep! I think I finally went to sleep at about midnight and had to be back up at 5am! I slept okay that night and tried to get the most rest I can.

Our last picture as a family of 4

When the alarm went off, we got all packed up and got on the road to the hospital to get this party started. We went and grabbed Kolby some coffee on the way and got to the hospital right on time. We went to Labor and Delivery and got all checked in! Once we got all of the paperwork done, the nurse came to start my IV. First rattle out of the bag, I tried to pass out while she was starting my IV!!! But I didn't!!! I just got really woozy and pale and had to lay down for a second. I'm proud to say that was the only time I got woozy out of this entire journey!!!

They got me started on the pitocin at about 7:30am. The nurse would come in and crank it up by 2 units about every 20-30 minutes. My OB, Dr. K, came in at about 8 to check on me and she said that we could go ahead and break my water if I wanted them to. I didn't see why not, and she told me the sooner they break my water, the sooner the baby would be here! So that's just what we did! It didn't hurt at all, just felt like lots of gushing warm fluid. It would kinda come in waves, everytime I would have a contraction, there would be more! She also checked me and that time and said that I was a solid 3 almost a 4! Progress!!! I was having an easy time with the contractions, I would watch them on the monitor, and see when they were peaking and when they were going away! Every once in a while, I would have one that I wasn't able to talk through and it actually hurt.

Getting all hooked up and ready to go!

We decided to get a photo while I was still able to smile!

I just watched TV in the room for the majority of the morning since my contractions weren't really painful. Our friend Kim came up to the hospital at about 8:30am for the day because she wasn't going to miss the birth of Mr. Beau. My mom came up to the hospital at about 9am from the house, and Kolby's dad got there midmorning too. By 10am the contractions were picking up a little, but I was still making it medicine free. My goal was to hold off on my epidural as long as I could so I wouldn't slow down my labor! the nurse checked me again, and I was at 5cm and about 70% effaced and baby was a -2 station. More progress!! At this point, I was going about a cm an hour, which was really, really good!

By about noon, the contractions were starting to get more frequent and some were really getting strong! I was still okay through most of them, but figured, I would go ahead and request my epidural at this time. Getting the epidural wasn't as bad as I had feared it would be really. It took about 20 minutes to get the anesthesiologist there, and by that time the contractions were really kicking in. At that point, they had my pitocin level at about 14, I think. The worst part of the whole epidural process was sitting up on the edge of the bed with my chin tucked to my chest. It hurt my hips to sit up like that and it hurt my neck really bad to bend it down and hold it down! Kolby did so good helping me, he was holding my shoulders and helping support my neck. All I felt from the epidural was the initial numbing shot, and it felt like a little bee sting. The anesthesiologist had kind of a hard time placing the epidural because I was so skinny. He didn't want to place it too deep because that can cause a major headache, but also didn't think he was placing it deep enough. he finally decided to he would rather do it too shallow and be able to readjust it if need be than to place it too deep and give me the headache.

After my epidural I got really sleepy and had to have some oxygen

Well, he must have placed it perfectly because it worked like a charm! I'm talking FABULOUS!!!! Within minutes, the contractions already felt better! Once the epidural had fully kicked in, they checked me again, and I was still measuring 5cm and about 80% effaced. My nurse was worried about my labor stalling because I hadn't had measurable progress in the last 2-3 hours. So, she put in a call to Dr. K who was down in surgery. We had no choice but to wait to hear back from Dr. K on what she wanted to do, and keep upping my pitocin to see if we couldn't get me progressing again. I could still feel the tightness from the contractions, so I knew I was having them, but no pain whatsoever!

My nurse asked me if we were expecting a big baby, and as far as we knew we were. So she started rolling me from one side to the other every 20 min or so to see if we couldn't get Beau to move on down the birth canal. That was a fun experience considering I couldn't move at all from the waist down by now! I was like a limp noodle! It was so weird, my legs were so heavy! After rolling me a couple of times, my nurse said that we were going to roll me over and put one of my legs up in the stirrup to try to further open my pelvis and get him moving.

At about 3pm, Dr. k came to check in on me again. They had my pitocin up to 20 by now, and she did another check on me. I was at 6 cm and 95-100% effaced, and Beau had moved to 0 station! So we had things moving again! She told the nurse to just continue going up on the pitocin every 15-20 min as that seemed to be working. The highest Dr. K said she was willing to go was to 36! Thank goodness I couldn't feel anything! So we kept doing what we were doing now because it was working. The nurse kept asking me if I could feel any pressure down there. And I could feel a little, but nothing earth shattering. It just felt like my butt was really heavy. I couldn't really even tell if it was pressure or just the epidural...LOL! I had no urge to push or anything!

Finally, I could tell that there was a slight increase in whatever it was that I was feeling when I was having a contraction (or so the monitor was telling me I was having one!) At about 4pm, my nurse checked me again. And at this point she said that she could feel Beau's head!!!! She told me "Don't do anything! I'm going to call your Dr., it's time to have this baby!!! You're ready to push!" That's when everything started moving fast. We brought all of our family back in to let them know we were getting the Dr. so we could start pushing!

We've got the thumbs up to start pushing!

Everyone told us good luck, and we kicked them out! LOL! The nurse was getting everything ready for the Dr. to arrive, and at that point I decided that I might want to try using the mirror and watching the birth! The nurse said we could always put it away if I decided I didn't want it after all! Once Dr. K got there, they gave us all the instructions of what they were going to do, and Kolby grabbed one of my legs and my nurse grabbed the other and we got to pushing. By the time everything was going, we could already see his head!!! It was so exciting! Kolby was so excited and just had the biggest smile on his face the whole time! We could see that he had alot of hair, which we expected that he would!

The nurse would tell me when I was having a contraction, and I was instructed to try to give at least 3 pushes per contraction. The whole pushing experience was fabulous! I was feeling no pain, so I was able to fully be in the moment and know what was going on and watch everything and take it all in! The nurse was counting to herself (not at me), and they would just tell me when to start and stop pushing to let everything down there move the way it should! I don't know how many sets of pushes I did, but it wasn't many! By the time Dr. K showed up and everything was in place to start pushing it was about 4:30, and Beau made his arrival at 4:44pm on November 30, 2010! He was so good to his Momma!

Daddy cutting the cord!

Laying him on my chest for the first time!

A very proud Daddy

Giving our sweet boy kisses

He was absolutely perfect!!!! He head was a little coned, but not bad at all! It must have been since he came out so fast! I did tear a little bitty bit (1st degree) and have a couple of stitches, but Dr. K said it was not bad at all! They put him on my chest first thing and I got to love all over him! Then Daddy went with him to the warmer to watch the nurse do her assessment and get his weight and everything.
He wasn't nearly as big and we thought he was going to be. He weighed in at 6lb 15 oz! He was doing the nurses called grunting, which is where there is a little fluid in his lungs and it makes him take kinda shallow cries/breaths. They said lots of babies do it, and he just needed to have a good cry to get all the fluid out of his lungs.
Once he was done with the initial assessments, they brought him back to me to try to breastfeed him. He latched on and did so good for his first time! It was very encouraging and made me want to try that much harder to breastfeed him exclusively! After he had fed, Kolby went with him to take him to the nursery where they would measure his length and give him his first bath and get him all cleaned up! I got situated and taken to my post partum room, and pretty soon after that, he was able to come back to our room with us! The whole experience was just perfect, and I could honestly say I would do it again tomorrow!

His first bath in the nursery
Getting his assessment in the nursery
I will update about our first week with him very soon! And of course there will be lots more pictures to come!!!