Finally, the birth

My last post was April 8th when I implied that our baby would soon be entering the world. I didn't follow up with that post right away because I was angry. Our baby did not come on Monday the 8th or Tuesday the 9th or Wednesday the 10th or even Thursday the 11th. In fact, once contractions stalled out on Monday afternoon, I didn't even have any inkling of labor signs for the rest of the week. I felt great and was incredibly frustrated that I wasn't feeling horrible (as in labor horrible). Nana and Papa came up on Tuesday and thank goodness they did. The distraction of having someone else care for June and Ruben and cook meals gave me a little opportunity to relax and come to terms with the idea of induction. The doctor was by no means forcing us into induction, but we had scheduled it for Friday and quite frankly I was ready for induction even though I knew it meant not having the kind of birth experience I wanted. Pitocin means epidural after all. But as long as I ended up with a VBAC, I was fine with whatever. Plus I knew from pictures that my belly was getting pretty darn enormous and that meant the baby inside was getting that much bigger each day as well.

Thursday night we had an amazing get together with 30+ Schmidt Family cousins. Miriam and Jeremy were in town from Bratislava, Slovakia which had encouraged Tom and Kathy to come in from New York. A party's not a party without Gretty, Gogo, and Pootie, and Dad had decided the week before, baby or no baby, he was going to be there too. The people that actually live in the Chicagoland area were also there (Lehmann's and Niermann's) so Rachael and Chris have officially won the award as the best party throwers for the year. It was so much fun to see Vera, Ursula, and June playing together as if they've always been best friends and to catch up with all my aunts and uncles at a locale that was not Lake James. I was actually happy to still be pregnant just so I didn't have to miss such an amazing opportunity. But by 6 the next morning I was ready to sign the eviction papers for this little bundle of joy.

Since Fetal Fay waited so long to be born, she did get the opportunity to be born in a brand new hospital with amazing cavernous rooms and nice fresh equipment. The only down side to the new hospital was the nurses and doctors were still figuring out where everything was. Any time a supply was needed, the nurse would look in at least two locations before spotting the item she was in search of. It was actually fairly humorous most of the time. By the time we filled out paperwork and stuck me with an IV and took blood samples, it was nearing 9:00 and then Dr. Johnson came in and quickly broke my water. I was still only 3 cm and maybe 60% effaced. I had scheduled the induction with Dr. Peter Johnson but his partner, Dr. Susan Orhan was also on the floor that day so she popped in from time to time. She was less happy that I was so overdue and a VBAC patient and pressed me to get an epidural right away just in case we needed an emergency C-section. Thankfully, the nurse knew my wishes and called Dr. Johnson without my asking and he said "epidural or no epidural, whatever she wants to do." Thank you. So we labored. I was on a low level of pitocin so I knew the contractions were harder and more erratic than they would have been naturally but I was willing to try it for a while. Mostly I was afraid if I got an epidural too soon I'd be too numb to push and wouldn't be able to VBAC. By 1 in the afternoon I was ready for an epidural and only pushing 5 cm. The contractions I felt and my emotional state were comparable to the way I felt during transition when I was laboring with Ruben. The pitocin made it impossible for me to rest fully between contractions and that knowledge made me want to just stand up and leave this whole labor behind. I'd be pregnant forever if someone would just make the contractions stop. The anesthesiologist came in and soon I was able to contemplate rest. There was a strip of my belly that didn't take the epidural so I still felt contractions but only down the left side of my belly (weird sensation by the way). I was still plenty able to move around in bed from side to side and within a half hour or so I was at 8 cm. The nurse called Dr. Johnson and by the time he showed up I was ready to push. This was the part I was nervous about with an epidural because with June I had been so completely numb and unable to move once I had been on an epidural for a while. But this was fine. The first contraction of pushing was learning curve but I managed to get her crowning, the second contraction got most of her head and then the third one popped her out. Wow. that was nearly easy (It wasn't, but it has been a week so I've already forgotten how much it hurt).

It's a girl! Iris Annette! Wow. It felt so good to just hold her and know that I wasn't pregnant anymore. Ahhh. She was caked in vernix, that lovely cold cream like substance that keeps babies from pruning in the womb. Most babies are born with some vernix but by 40 weeks most kids have started to kick the habit. By 41, it's odd to see a baby with it caked on like this. What can I say, she thought she needed to stay in a bit longer.

While I'm holding her and Dr. Johnson is finishing up the clean up, everyone starts guessing her weight. I guessed 8 lbs 12 ounces or something like that because I knew she was big but she looked so small. Dr. Johnson thought there was no way she was that big and guessed 8 lbs 2 ounces. The nurse who took her to clean her off a bit, picked her up and went "whoa, that's a big girl." Once she was wiped down a bit, we all watched in eager anticipation as the scale calibrated her weight. It took a while, but we finally ended up at 9 lbs 7 ounces.

WHAT!!! You have got to be kidding me. That's enormous! There is no way I just pushed out a 9 and a half pound baby. I think I said something to that effect at least 10 times while we were still in the labor and delivery room. I was stunned. I knew she was going to be big but that seemed a bit obscene. And quite frankly it hadn't been that hard. What would it be like to give birth to a 6 lb baby. I guess I'll probably never know.

By 6 in the evening we were settled in our post partum room and June and Ruben and Nana and Papa were visiting. By 8 when they finally left I realized how exhausted I was (and how much I had to pee). Since I had only really had the epidural for an hour and a half or so (not the 6 hours I had with June), I was able to get up and walk around pretty quickly and felt like recovery was going to be fairly easy. My blood pressure had been pretty high the last three weeks of pregnancy and continued to be close to 150/90 throughout my stay at the hospital. If I laid on my left side for a half hour or so before they came to check me it would fall back into the 130/80 range but any activity would send it back up. Friday night was full of heel pricks for Iris (because she was LGA - large for gestational age) to check her blood sugar and the continued removal of tubes and wires from my body. First the epidural and the epidural tape (ouch...that's one way to have a hairless back) monitors and catheter, then the pitocin drip, then finally the next morning the IV. If only I could remove the countless bangles of hospital bands then I would feel like I could move my arms with ease. Saturday had the hearing test (passed), another visit from the kids and grandparents as well as Rachael, Vera, and Nora, PKU blood test for Iris, and quite a few blood pressure checks for me. Every time it was too high, I'd lay down and she'd come back a half hour later to make sure it had gone down. As we're getting ready to leave my blood pressure is still really high and there are implications that this one thing might keep us from being discharged after 24 hours. I can promise you that if I am told I have to stay in the hospital one more night, my blood pressure will NOT go down. Get me out of here!

These are the things we learned about Iris in the hospital. She's easy. She caught onto nursing immediately and rarely ever has latching issues. She takes a binky and sucks it with a cute little squeaking noise. She likes to sleep. Once nurses stop waking her up to test, wash, or take her temperture, I know she'll be a great infant sleeper like Ruben was. Oh, and did I mention she's beautiful. And she's loved by the best dad, big sister, and big brother any little girl could ask for. She looks like Ruben when she grimmaces and screams and she looks like June when she's sleeping peacefully. Her eyes are bright blue and with our genetics have a 50/50 chance of changing to brown in the next couple months. She has more hair than June but less than Ruben's shock of black hair and what hair she does have seems to be fairly light in color. And she's long - long arms, long torso, long toes and fingers. I can't wait to get to know her better.

 


P.S. I realize that this blog entry didn't mention Karl nearly as often as it should have. Karl was my rock through this process. He comforted me through the emotional aftermath of a stalled labor, kept me calm when Dr. Orhan was being pushy, questioned but backed my decision to get an epidural, and kept the outside world up to date on Facebook and by text. I knew he was controlling all the details so I could focus on the main event (if you're not aware, this is a flip flop to our usual relationship roles). He is amazing and I felt bad I didn't mention in the body of the text as much as I should have. He handled the periphery with strength and courage.

P.P.S. Ruben and June truly loved meeting their sister as the pictures show. While Ruben might at some point step on or injure Iris in some way, he loves her dearly and has to be told to stop kissing her. June just gazes in awe at her little sister and asks constantly if she can hold her. What more could we ask for in older siblings.