Carson's Birth Story

I found out at my 36w appointment (April 27^th) that I was dilated 3cm and 50% effaced.  2 weeks prior on April 11^th at my 34w appointment, I wasn’t dilated or effaced at all.  My doctor acted as if I could go ANY day.  I went right home and nested like crazy.  I hadn’t gotten any contractions (that I knew of) and I went about my daily routine as usual.  At my 37w appointment (May 4^th) I mentioned that I hadn’t feel Carson moving as much as usual.  When Dr. G did the Doppler, Carson’s heart rate was lower than usual (120bpm was the highest we got and he had always been 135-145 throughout my pregnancy).  Because of the lower heart rate and less movement, she sent me over to do a NST (non-stress test).  For those who don’t know, a NST measures the baby’s heart rate and also picks up on any contractions you may be having.  They had me sit on the monitor for close to an hour making sure that Carson’s heart rate would “spike” up at least 2 times within a 10 minute period.  After we finally passed the test, we were sent home with orders to do kick counts.  I needed to get at least 6 kicks every hour.  I went home with a pad of paper and counted away.  I was only getting 4-5 so of course, I worried.  When I originally did kick counts back at 32w, I would get 6 within about 3-4 minutes!  I called my doctor and got the after-hours line.  They had the on-call doctor return my call and she told me to go into labor and delivery to get another NST to check Carson’s heart rate.  We started to panic a bit and took everything with us just in case we got admitted.  Luckily as soon as we got there, our stubborn little boy started to kick and his heart rate went up to 130-135bpm.  We were only on the machine for about 20 minutes and they let us go home. 

At my 38w appointment (May 9^th), I filled Dr. G in on the trip to L&D.  She did the Doppler again and Carson’s heart rate was once again, lower than normal.  She said sometimes it’s a sign the placenta is “done” and sometimes it’s just because baby is running out of room.  Whatever the case, she offered to schedule an induction since I had been 3cm and 50% for a while anyway.  We went ahead and scheduled induction for Friday May 18^th.  She reminded us (yet again) that I could really go ANY day so be prepared.  We made it one more week and had our 39w appointment on May 16^th.  Dr. G went over all of the procedures for induction and predicted that I would have a quick, easy labor. 

May 18^th finally came and we made it to the hospital by 8am for our appointment.  The hospital was overly crowded so we were sent to the waiting room until a room opened up for us.  I was pretty disappointed but tried to relax.  We waited for a little over an hour before getting a room.  Once we got a room, we met our nurse.  She had been a nurse at our hospital for quite some time but was new to L&D so she was “in training” with a mentor nurse.  It took quite a while to get anything started…it even took her about 5 minutes to take my blood pressure!  (I was a little nervous at this point, but glad the “mentor” nurse was there as well.)  She got me set up on the fetal monitor to watch Carson’s heart rate and any contractions I might be having.  Once she got everything set up, something happened in the room next door so she had to leave for a while.  She finally came back around 10:30 and got me set up with an IV for fluids.  Once I was getting fluids to stay hydrated, they kept me on the monitor and didn’t come back until about 11:15.  At that point they broke my water and said when they came back they would start my Pitocin (finally)!  They also checked me and I was 3+ cm and 80% effaced.  My Pitocin was started at 11:30am.  It took a little bit, but I finally started to feel my contractions (I had been having them all morning but couldn’t feel them).  Around 12:30 I started timing my contractions just out of curiosity.  They were about 2 minutes apart and lasted almost a minute.  I was only getting about a minute and a half break between contractions and they were getting STRONG.  I got on the ball and it helped to relieve some of the pain.  My nurse had mentioned that since the hospital was so buy, let her know in advance when/if I wanted an epidural.  At about 1pm I decided I wanted the epidural and let her know.  The anesthesiologist came SO fast I didn’t even have time to go to the restroom before my epidural.  He came in around 1:20pm and I was still on the ball.  I was rushed into bed and prepped very quickly.  Luckily he was really nice and silly which kept my mind off of what he was doing because I was a little nervous.  By 1:40pm I was feeling MUCH better and couldn’t feel my contractions anymore.  The epidural was perfect for me because I wasn’t totally numb, I could still move my legs around, they just felt very heavy!  At 2pm the nurse came in to check me and I was 5cm and 90% effaced.  I was so glad that I was progressing!  Carson’s heart rate started to drop a bit so they decided to get an internal monitor set up.  At 2:20pm they put the internal monitor in and decided to check me again since they were down there.  I had already progressed to 6-7cm and I was 100% effaced!  They said they would be back in about an hour to check again.  They came in almost an hour later at 3:15pm and I was 10cm and Carson’s head was at 0 station!  They said they wanted him to drop a bit further down so they were going to let me “labor down” for a bit.  It was so weird to hear I was at 10cm and then be told just to hang out for a bit.  They said to call the nurse’s station if I felt the urge to push.  So far, I still couldn’t really feel my contractions, it just felt like a tiny bit of pressure.  The nurse even mentioned “First time babies don’t come this fast!”  They came back to check me again at 3:40pm and said I was +2 station.  They told me that they were going to give me about another 30 minutes to labor down and try to get my contractions to move Carson’s head down.  My doctor had been called and she would be arriving in about 10 minutes.  The nurse came back in around 4:30 and I told her I was pretty sure I felt the urge to push (I honestly just wanted to meet Carson)!  For the first few contractions she would tell me when to push and eventually I really felt the urge and I knew exactly when to push.  My nurse was AMAZING and so helpful and so was Nick!  I pushed for almost an hour and Carson arrived at 5:29pm on Friday, May 18^th!  He weighed 7lbs 2.9oz and was 19.75” long with lots of dark hair! 

So in love...right after he was born!

7lbs 2.9oz!

Our family of 3 <3

Our cheerleaders from the waiting room (Aunt Shannon, Grammy & Memaw)