The birth of Daniel Allen:
We got up at 5:30am on Friday, June 20. We arrived at the hospital around
6:30am. By this point I had already thrown up twice that morning, even on the day I was giving birth no break from the unending morning sickness. By 7:30am they had me in bed monitoring me. I was already having contractions every 4-8 minutes without even being induced. Apparently this was going to be the day no matter what. At 8:30am my doctor finally got there. She checked me and I was at a 3 1/2 cm, and 75% effaced. She started the pitocin, and broke my water. There was meconium in the water.
For the next two hours I went to 5cm. They upped the petocin to 6. and they got my contractions going to every minute to minute and a half. They were coming in groups of three and it was very hard to handle. I got my epidural and it was wonderful. I could still feel my legs and move them around. I was not in pain, but could feel the contractions. At 1:00 they checked me again. I was at 8 cm. About 15 minutes later I was feeling some discomfort. I called the nurse and said "you'd better check me". I was at 10cm. For the next 15 minutes I was told to breathe throught the contractions while the doctor was paiged. Then the nurse had me do a test push. She only got to the count of two before saying "stop pushing". Apparently the head was right there. No sooner did I think I was not going to be able to "breathe" through another one, and the doctor was there. In less than 15 minutes of pushing (I pushed through 3 contractions, doing three sets of pushes to the count of 10 for each contraction) Daniel was born. He gave a small yelp and they wisked him off to the other side of the room.
A respiratory specialist and NICU nurse were in the room while I was pushing waiting for the baby as soon as he was born. They checked him out and no signs of meconium, he didn't swallow any!!! So withing 20 minutes he was in my arms. We were skin to skin for the next hour. They waited to do the drops in his eyes and vitamin K to let him have time with me. He latched on for a few minutes. They let me hold him while they did the shot and drops. Then they took him for a few minutes to weigh him and measure him in the room and immediately returned him to my arms. We were taken to my room where I held him skin to skin for the next few hours. At this hospital they don't bathe the baby till 5+ hours after birth to let them regulate. So he didn't have his first bathe (which was done on the bed with me there) till he was almost 6 hours old.
I had a small tear that did not require any stitches, and felt very well. The total labor lasted 5 hours and 15 minutes. We only stayed one night in the hopsital. And now I have my beautiful baby boy. Oh, and the stork bite in the middle of his forehead, I had the exact same one in my three month old pictures!
Daniel and me at home when he was 2 days old.
Daniel Allen!
Daniel's birthdate
