it was a typical sunday for us. the only thing we had planned was meeting up for a breakfast taco at Cherrywood and the usual sunday grocery shop. the day before we were able to go out to sibby's to swim, so we were pretty relaxed. it was a nice day, somewhat overcast for the first time. amy and i even had the whole pool to ourselves.
so we met john, lee, melanie and amo for a quick breakfast. i make fun and blame her early arrival on the chorizo taco and latte that i had. maybe i really didn't have a decaf? some of the conversation at the table is funny, thinking back. i commented that i was wondering that if she decided to come the next day, what was she doing inside of me? just hanging out? melanie even said that i was quite lopsided that morning. her butt was definitely sticking out during the 2 weeks prior to arrival. anyway, we went on our way to central market and made sure we stuck to our list of planned meals and snacks for the week. at checkout i felt a little more tired than usual telling amy that i was going to sit in the car and wait for her. usually, i will pay and she would go get the car and pick me up. that day, my legs were tired! unpacked the car and at noon, amy and i decided to take a nap.
i stayed downstairs and amy went upstairs with the dogs. i woke up around 1:30 feeling rested and started channel surfing. found a bad movie with kevin costner and ashton kutcher. at some point i got up to go to the restroom and felt the usual braxton hicks contraction, feeling pressure that goes away with moving around, then sat back down on the couch. about maybe 15 mins later, i felt a different kind of twinge of pain that i haven't had before. of course i continued to watch t.v., but it happened again. not sure how long it lasted. around 2:15 i went upstairs to let amy know that i felt funny. that is really what i said to her because i didn't know if i should be concerned or not. she went back to sleep. then, the hard hitting contractions came out of nowhere. the worst pain i have ever felt. i told amy that we should pack a bag just in case, but i basically thought that if this were false labor, real labor must suck. we tried to time them, but they were coming every 2 minutes! we were so confused. where did the stages of labor go? why didn't my water break? aren't i supposed to go through hours of labor? nope. not us. we called the number that contacts a nurse in our practice. she called back and basically told me to give it an hour and walk it out. no way! after a few more massive contractions, i told amy we needed to go NOW! she called jean and we headed to the hospital.
the ride over was painful and i hope no one looked over at us at the stoplights because i'm sure it was a site to see. we pulled into the hospital about 8 mins later and amy dropped me off at the door and put me in a wheelchair. she had to go park and it seemed like forever before she was back. made it to the second floor and the admissions person clearly saw that i was in pain as she was asking us a few questions. they knew that we were on our way since we called the nurse back and told her that i couldn't wait any longer. as we turned the corner a nurse wheeled us into a room filled with at least 5 nurses. they were awesome. they were asking me tons of questions and i could only talk in between contractions. which were still coming every 2 minutes. they even had to undress me, put the iv in, etc between them since they were so strong. one nurse in particular made sure i made it through each contraction, coaching me and making me listen and focus on what she was saying. i finally made it into the bed and they began hooking me up to the monitors. we were super shocked to find out that i was dilated already to a 7! a freakin 7 only after about 1 hour and 1/2. then i heard the word epidural. my new best friend. as soon as they administered it the pain magically went away. completely! i could feel a little pressure every time a contraction came, but the drugs were wonderful. all of the nurses were running around taking such good care of us. they talked us through everything step by step. after a few hours (which didn't seem like long, thanks to the epidural), they told me it was time to push. this was around 6pm. 2 of the nurses commented that i will probably only have to push 1 or 2 times since i progressed so quickly in a short amount of time. well, they were wrong. i tried a few positions to get little girl out. i wasn't in pain so it was strange to push as hard has i could because i couldn't feel what i was doing. they told me i was doing a good job and continued to check me and baby. the only scary part was when harper's heart tones started to slow down. next thing i knew, i was on my hands and knees. the nurse also inserted a different monitor on pip's head. they finally told me what was going on and i realized that i could hear her heart slowing in the monitors. it came back up quickly and we were then back to pushing. she still wasn't progressing like she was supposed to. the doctor on call finally came in, sat on the corner of my bed and explained what was happening. she told us that i could probably sit here and push for several more hours, but she is most likely not going to come out. with her heart tones decreasing early, the slow progression and the fact that she is facing down (called sunny side up), i would need to have a c-section. she was very confident in her explanation and all i could do was look at amy and jean. their expressions were clear in that i needed to do this.
i didn't realize that the procedure only takes about 20 mins with an additional 30 mins or so to put me back together. amy suited up and jean went to tell the gang the news. speaking of gang, we had quite a few people in the waiting room. team pip waited patiently of her arrival. amo, mel, kerry, john and lee were the first to show up. mel was in charge of the phone tree and kept others informed. steph and milissa show up later as well. i was taken to the operating room and given additional medication that completely numbed me from chest down. couldn't even feel my arms. the room seemed extra bright with people prepping me for surgery. the conversation was very odd during my time in there. can't really repeat what was said, but let's just say that everyone was in a good mood joking around. they went to get amy and she sat by my head behind the curtain. amy said that there was a lot of movement and jerking of my body. not really something that i wanted to hear. they asked amy if she wanted to peak over and see pip before they cut the cord. seconds later we heard her cry. amy went over with the nurse and watched them clean her off. they even did her footprint immediately as well. i could only lay there and watched from far away. i began to cry so hard that i could hardly see what they were doing. amy looked over at me with the biggest smile on her face. they then wheeled her away as amy followed. they strangest thing began to happen as they were sewing me back together. my jaw started quivering. not the kind of quivering that you get when you watch a girly movie, it was shaking violently to the point that it gave me a headache. i tried everything to stop it, but it just took over. the anesthesiologist said it was due to the drugs and eventually gave me another one to stop the movement.
i was moved to recovery and a nurse monitored me closely. while i was there amy was with harper while they weighed, measured and cleaned her. there was even a picture of her holding her in the nursery as team pip watched through the window. during recovery i had slightly elevated blood pressure readings and moderate bleeding that eventually subsided. i was moved into the room where i would spend the next 4 days. i didn't even leave the room until day 3 when amy took me for a walk in the hallway. amy was so awesome during that time. i was unable to get up for the first few days since i was hooked up to the iv and had a catheter. amy changed every diaper and had to get up every 3 hours with me to hand pip to me. she was forced to learn quickly and now she is a pro and diaper changes and swaddling. there was lots of action in the hospital whether it was the nurses coming in to the room to assess me or harper or someone taking my meal order for the day or bringing the food or housekeeping or someone bringing my meds. they took excellent care of us, don't get me wrong. this part of the hospital was new, so the room was pretty big with a nice big bathroom, pullout couch for amy and a flat screen t.v. it was nice to finally leave on thursday though. we loaded her up in the car seat and headed home. auntie jean and grandma jan made the transition easy. we really appreciated everything they did and continue to do for us. now it's just one day at a time...
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