Things nobody told me before I got pregnant

You knew you’d get morning sickness, but you didn’t expect to WANT to just puke and get it over with. You will actually consider putting your face on the floor of the bathroom at work because it’s cold, and cold would feel good.

You might not get cravings. This will disappoint your husband who just wanted to be able to tell ONE story about how he had to go to the store in the middle of the night to get you Cheetos to dip in your chocolate pudding.

Once you hit month 7, it’s hard to get out of a waterbed at 11pm so that you can run to the bathroom just to pee two tablespoons’ worth. And again at 1am. And again at 3am. And again at 5am. And again at 7am.

Once you hit month 9, it’s hard to get from your desk at work to the bathroom 30 feet down the hall just to pee two tablespoons’ worth. Everyone thinks pregnant women waddle because their center of gravity changed or because the baby is sitting low, but it’s really because we don’t want to pee our pants. If you walk too slowly, you might not make it in time. If you walk too fast, you might shake out some pee. It’s a delicate balance.

You’re gonna swell up like a sausage. You won’t be able to wear your wedding bands. You’ll have to let out the straps on your sandals. This won’t go away immediately after you have the baby, and you may find that out the hard way when you put your rings back on one evening and wake up in the middle of the night because your ring finger is throbbing and you have to run cold water over your hand to get the rings off. But one day you’ll be ridiculously ecstatic that your sandals feel loose on your feet.

In the movies, when a pregnant woman’s water breaks, there seems to be one of two reactions – either she calmly tells her husband and they get the bag that they meticulously packed weeks before and drive to the hospital, or she freaks out and the husband freaks out and they run around like maniacs trying to pack the bag at the last second. You might end up somewhere in between – calmly telling your husband, grabbing your bag and frantically searching for two last-minute items that you were SURE you had set out… and then stopping to post on Facebook that you’re going in.

You might go in to Labor & Delivery at 7pm and be in labor all night long. You will sleep between contractions. You may even sleep during contractions.

The epidural might not take. You know how everyone said, “Oh, just get the drugs, you won’t feel a thing”? Yeah, guess what… you might feel most of it. When the doctor later says in an obviously impressed voice, “Do you realize you basically went through the equivalent of giving birth to a second child naturally?” you know something didn’t go right. But you’ll still be okay.

No matter how many times you read the books and read other people’s stories online, when it comes time to deliver the baby, none of that matters. You just listen to the nurses and do what needs to be done because that’s how it is and you are Superwoman. It will suddenly be over and you will have a precious baby lying on your chest and you’ll wonder where the last 16 hours went.

You might end up getting stitches. Those stitches will chafe and make you feel like your lady bits are on fire. It’s like having an infection, except nothing but time can make it any better.

You will feel like your guts are going to fall out through your lady bits. Every sneeze, every cough, every laugh will make you wonder if that’s actually possible.

You will probably pee yourself at least once because everything down there got demolished and you can barely walk. You will forget you ever had any dignity. People will still treat you like a human being.

You’re not going to want to sit down for a good week. You still have to do it. Suck it up.

You might have spent the last 8 months psyching yourself up to breastfeed, only to have to decide a few days after the birth that you won’t be able to. You’re going to feel like a failure. You’re not.

As self-conscious as you were before, you might actually end up proud of your stretch marks and flabby belly. Battle scars, baby.

It’s going to take time to get used to your baby’s schedule. It doesn’t line up with anything you’re used to, and guess who has to adapt. Here’s a hint: it’s not her.

You’re going to have days where you just want to sit down and cry for an hour. You’re going to have days where you DO just sit down and cry for an hour. Hormones and exhaustion will kick your butt. Quit trying to do everything yourself, and accept help from anyone who offers. On the really bad days, don’t wait for someone to offer, just ask for help.

You will get excited about poop. I’m sorry.

Sisqo’s “Thong Song” is not age-appropriate material, but if it calms your baby down you will sing it anyway. Sisqo – 1; better judgment – 0.

You will make up words to songs because you remember the tune but none of the words. It’s okay, it’ll take years before she realizes that the words aren’t really “And on that farm she had some… uh… water. E-I-E-I-OOOO. With a water water here and a water water there…” Maybe you’ll be singing it right by then.

You will start acting like all those people you swore you wouldn’t act like. You will post pictures and hope people are as excited as you. When they show interest you will start babbling about your child until their eyes glaze over. You will think pastel pink and hair bows and ruffles are SO CUTE. You will say things like “isn’t oo a cutesy wootsy booboobeebeebee?” Seriously, what is wrong with you?

You will write posts like this because you think wow, you have only been a mommy for three weeks and you already have all this amazing wisdom to impart. Other mommies had these revelations too, it just turns out these are things you have to learn on your own sometimes.

 

 

Things people did tell me before I got pregnant:

It’s all worth it.

 

They were SO RIGHT.

Mackenzie Anne’s birth story – part 2

So I had to ask Ryan to fill me in on some of the details of that night because apparently there is a LOT that I don’t remember. Yay for painkillers.

Apparently they didn’t start the Stadol until a few hours in, and each time they administered it, it only lasted about an hour. Early on, my contractions were about 5 minutes apart so I had some time in between to recuperate and get ready for the next one, but once they started coming really close together, I was still clenching my stomach between them and couldn’t relax. The Stadol didn’t get rid of the pain altogether, but it helped me relax in between those close contractions so that I didn’t exhaust myself early on.

The monitor I was hooked up to showed my contractions as they came and went, which was pretty cool to watch. When I first got settled in, my baseline was showing at around 4 and the contractions took it up to a 10. Occasionally there was an 11 or 12 in there and those were hard to get through. At one point I had to move for some reason (must have gone to the bathroom or something) and they had to reposition the monitor on my belly. After that, I was having more trouble with the contractions and we couldn’t figure out why because they were still around a 10 or 11. Then Ryan figured it out – the monitor had moved some and now my baseline was only a 0, which means instead of it going up 6 points, it was going up 10. So when it went up to a 12, I was in some pretty massive pain. He tells me I never even yelled, just whimpered – I don’t know how I managed that because I don’t tolerate pain well, but apparently when I have to, I just do it.

I think the anesthesiologist came in around 6-6:30am to administer the epidural. I was in the middle of a contraction, and he sounded ticked off at me because I was having trouble staying still. Didn’t really care for him much! Ryan and the nurse held me as still as possible and I was finally able to calm myself down enough to sit stock still. The anesthesiologist gave me a numbing shot first, then put the epi in. If I remember correctly, he ended up having to try twice because it didn’t go in correctly the first time. It worked pretty quickly – within probably 15 minutes I was fairly numb from my stomach down. Oddly, I noticed that I could still feel my toes and that my right leg wasn’t as numb as my left. It was a strange sensation – my left leg was completely numb, while my right leg could feel pressure but not pain. More on that later.

The nurse told me at some point that I needed to let her know if I felt the need to push. I’m not sure if that meant she had started the pitocin but I think so – epidurals can cause labor to slow down so I think they push the pitocin to keep it going. She wanted me to definitely start pushing by 8am because I’d been in labor for quite some time at that point, and since my water had broken they didn’t want to wait too long because there’s more risk for infection. I think I started wanting to push before 8:00 because I remember telling her that I felt the need to; they didn’t have to tell me to try, in other words. So by 8:00 they had me up in stirrups and started the pushing process. I think they said I was 9.5cm dilated by that point.

I ended up pushing for about 2.5 hours. It’s pretty much a blur, really. Because of the anesthesia, it was hard to figure out what I was supposed to do; plus it’s kind of counter-intuitive. To put it bluntly, I had to push like I was pooping! For whatever reason, that’s the muscle set that you have to use. It took me a while to get the hang of it because it just seemed so odd, but when I did the nurse said I was finally making progress. The whole process was very “two steps forward, one step back” and felt like it took forever. Each push was three sets of a count of 10. I was supposed to take in a deep breath before starting and hold my breath while I pushed, then let it out and take another one quickly in between each push. The nurse told me not to let the breath out, so no moaning or yelling during the pushing. I did okay with that for a while, but as it progressed it became increasingly difficult not to make noise.

It also HURT. I kept asking if it was supposed to hurt so much because I thought the epidural was supposed to take care of the pain. Turns out the epi didn’t completely take, and it was too late to do anything about it. Oh noooo.

Ryan stayed right by my side the entire time, and when the nurse had to go look at my monitor or go grab something, he took over for her and held my legs and counted for me. He did absolutely amazing – he kept his cool and that helped me keep mine. I wasn’t quite panicked by the amount of pain I was in, but it wasn’t something we were expecting to happen, and we weren’t sure how much worse it would get.

At some point, little Mackenzie’s head finally started to show. The nurse excitedly told Ryan and he got to look and exclaim, “I can see hair!” I asked if there was a mirror so I could see too and he asked if I was sure – he was worried that I’d freak out because of all the blood. I told him that seeing her would help me get through it because I’d know I was getting somewhere. So they called another nurse in to find one for me – they have a tall stand with a mirror on it for just that purpose. It took a little while longer before I could see anything because the angle was weird, but finally I was able to see the head and that gave me a little extra boost. The nurse said we were having trouble with it taking so long because she was getting caught by a lip on my cervix that hadn’t fully dilated, so she was working on getting that out of the way for a long time.

By this point the epidural was actually starting to wear off. They told me I probably had another half-hour of medication left in it, so we were going to have to hurry up. I’m not sure what time the doctor came in. I was utterly exhausted by that point and starting to feel like I couldn’t push for much longer. The pain didn’t help, but my body was still telling me that pushing was better than not pushing. By this point the head was clearly visible and I kept wondering how much farther we had to go. The doctor said she was stuck on my pelvic bone somehow and they were going to have to suction her out. They grabbed the machine for that and hooked it up to her, and the doctor told me I had to push as hard as I possibly could until we got her out. I didn’t realize I had that much strength left in me, but I worked up all of it and pushed HARD, twice. On the second push, I felt and saw Mackenzie’s head come out! It hurt so badly that I completely stopped for a second but the doctor reminded me that I had to push one more time to get the rest out. *push*

To be continued (again)…

Pics!

I’ve been trying to get a hang of Mackenzie’s schedule so I haven’t been able to sit down and finish writing about her birth story, but in the meantime here are pictures!

Mama, Daddy, and Baby, her first day home

Mama, Daddy, and Baby, her first day home

Mama, Daddy, and Baby, her first day home

Daddy is good at this!

Grandma keeps her content!

Grandma keeps her content!

Grandma keeps her content!

Working on her Jedi mind powers

Tummy time! Hrrnggh!

Tummy time!

Mama is getting the hang of it

D’awww

Mackenzie Anne’s birth story

This will definitely take a few posts! I keep meaning to start writing this before I forget everything that happened, then I remember that I was practically asleep or drugged through most of it anyway, so I’ll just have to do the best I can and check with a few people who were there to fill in the rest.

As you will remember, we were in the middle of worrying about my scheduled induction for the 24th. Neither of us really wanted that because there can be so many complications. My mom suggested that we go out shopping and walking on the 18th in hopes that it would help move things along, so we spent the day out and about and got home around 5:30. Half an hour later I was sitting at my computer eating dinner and just browsing the internet when I heard and felt a *POP*. In the split second that followed I remember thinking, “Was that my water breaking?” and a split second after that I realized that yes, it was – luckily I had thought to put a towel on my computer chair several days before because everything was getting soaked pretty quickly. For whatever reason I took the event pretty well, and I calmly (I think – he might remember differently) turned around and told Ryan, “Honey? My water just broke.” It took him a second to realize what I was saying so I told him, “Towels would be great right about now.” He ran to get those and I hollered to my mom that my water had broken so she came in to help. I went into the bathroom to clean up and change clothes while Mom and Ryan grabbed all the things we were going to take. We got me in the car and headed over to the hospital within about half an hour and I think we got to the hospital around 7:00pm.

Once we got to L&D we went to the nurses’ station and told them that my water had broken. They took a look at us and said, “Usually we want to do tests to make sure it was your water breaking, but you guys look pretty certain.” I joked that there was no way I could hold my bladder long enough for there to be THAT much if I just peed my pants, and she said, “Okay then, let’s go ahead and get you into a room!”

To be honest, this is the point where I only remember bits and pieces of what happened that night. The nurses got me hooked up to a blood pressure monitor and got the heplock put in the back of my hand so they could get the saline started. I know at some point they put me on Stadol for the pain but I’m not sure when that was or how well it worked.

My contractions started pretty soon after I was admitted and I realized, “Oh, so I guess I *was* feeling contractions here and there for the last few days.” I’m slightly embarrassed to admit that I thought they were gas pains! I think I was expecting to feel them higher up on my belly but they were really low, below my belly button. Once they started for real, though, it was hard to mistake them for anything but contractions. I don’t know how long it took for them to get regular but it seemed to me that they were coming fast and strong not long after we got into the room. I had to breathe through most of them – at first they weren’t really painful, just very uncomfortable, but once they started coming every 3-4 minutes I felt like I didn’t have time to rest after one in order to recoup my energy for the next one. I’m pretty sure there were a few that were one right after the other.

Everyone tells me I handled the contractions really well but at the time I didn’t feel like I was. I didn’t realize they’d be so painful so quickly so I thought I was being a big wimp, but apparently the nurses were surprised that I was doing so well. One of them asked if we had gone to the birth classes and we said no, and she said, “But you know how to do the breathing!”

I think we got the night shift nurse at around 11:00. I wasn’t sure about her at first because when she came in she was really brusque, asking me questions during my contractions and telling me I had to answer her. I was getting pretty mad about that, but looking back I realize I’ve read that they’re supposed to do that because that’s how they tell how strong your contractions are – by seeing how well you can talk during one. After that initial frustration, she ended up being absolutely awesome – she was joking around with us and making sure I had everything I needed.

I was burning up and asked Ryan to turn the AC temp down, and everyone in the room said, “Becky, we’re freezing. It’s like 68 in here.” I had asked the nurses if I was allowed to have any water because I’d heard that some hospitals don’t allow it, and they told me I could have all the water I wanted. Ryan was so good about getting it for me every time I pitifully looked over and croaked, “Waaaterrrr.” He sat by my side almost all night and held my hand during every contraction. I remember he asked me why I wasn’t actually squeezing his hand, just holding it, and I really didn’t have a good answer for that. I think I needed more comforting than anything – the breathing seemed to be getting me through the pain as best as it could, but I just liked knowing he was there with me.

I have no idea how long my contractions lasted that night. It felt like forever. Ryan says he’s pretty sure I slept through some of them – I still did my breathing, but was fairly unconscious. We had 3-5 other people in the room at any given time, and everyone was making do with trying to sleep sitting up on the couch or chairs. I would have been the most comfortable since I had a bed, except I was in pain! I don’t think anyone slept well, but everyone got a little bit here and there at least.

To be continued…

Water broke!

We’re goin’ in! Holy cow!

Week 40, Friday – part deux

Where was I…

After the doc appt Ryan and I headed over to L&D at about 4:00 for the testing. They needed to run an NST (nonstress test) and BPP (biophysical profile) on me – routine procedure for anyone overdue, and it’s just to check and make sure the baby is still thriving.

Every nurse we met there was so sweet! I hope all the other shifts are just as nice – I don’t want a cranky nurse when the time comes to deliver (I’m sure they’re all saying they don’t want a cranky patient haha)! They also had a bunch of nursing students there who just seemed so excited – they were all standing around in their white nurses’ uniforms, holding their little clipboards and just grinning as we came through. I had to refrain from saying, “Awww honey aren’t they cute?”

So the NST was just me lying in a bed with a few monitors strapped to me – one to monitor PB’s heartbeat, one to monitor my stomach for contractions, and a blood pressure cuff. The nurse also handed me a little push-button and said, “Just push the button whenever you feel her move. That’s it, we’ll check on you  later!” Hmmm, okay, sounds easy enough, but are we hoping she moves a lot or a little? Oh well, don’t want to be skewed either way, let’s go. So I laid there for about 20 minutes before she came back the first time, and she said, “Looks like she’s not moving much, is she usually pretty inactive?” I told her that PB tends to really get moving in the late evening but not so much in the afternoon, and she said, “Maybe I’ll run and get you a Coke and try to wake her up a bit.” So she left and in the meantime PB decided that since Mama doesn’t like Coke, she doesn’t either, so she started moving around so Mama wouldn’t have to drink it. Isn’t she thoughtful!

I’m not sure how long they are normally supposed to run the NST, but the nurse came in around maybe 5:30 or so to let us know that Ultrasound was backed up because a lot of ER patients had come in. I told her that was fine, if I was in their situation I’d rather someone else get bumped, too. Luckily there was a TV in the room with us so we watched Family Guy and Seinfeld, and Ryan had his Nook so he was playing Angry Birds. It wasn’t too bad to just lie there and relax, except the nurse had propped up the bed so I could watch TV but also had me on my side, so I was lying there scrunched up like I was doing a side crunch. I was having to balance myself so that I didn’t slide down the bed, so after a while I felt like all my lady bits were going to fall out. I debated calling the nurse but figured maybe it would shift things around a bit. Also I’m a chicken.

I think it was around 6:00 that she finally came back in and sat me up on my back again. She said it wouldn’t be too long before I could go down to U/S but they still had a few more people to finish up, so sit tight. Well, I didn’t have much of a choice because she kept me hooked up to the machine. About 10 minutes later I realized I had to pee VERY BADLY. I called the nurses’ station and they came in and unhooked me and said to call them when I got done. When I called them back in, the nurse that got me hooked back up didn’t put the blood pressure cuff back on, which was great because the thing tests you automatically every 30 minutes or so and it was really starting to hurt after the first 5 times. The only problem was that she didn’t turn off the automatic test, so a little while later the thing starts pressurizing next to my head. And when it realized that it can’t find a pulse, it started going BING BONG… BING BONG… BING BONG… I thought, “Well, it’ll probably realize what’s going on and shut itself off after a certain interval.” Three minutes later I called the nurses’ station again and they said, “Whoops!” and sent two of the students in to hook me back up. They were laughing because neither of them was familiar with that particular machine, but they finally figured it all out and got the cuff back on me… just in time for another nurse to get there with a wheelchair to take me down to U/S! Poor gals haha.

By this point, Ryan had realized he needed a cigarette and went outside to do that and call my mom to let her know that we still had more tests to run. I think he had left the room right after I used the bathroom, so when he got back they were already wheeling me downstairs! They got me into Ultrasound and the gal there was getting me all situated when there was a knock at the door. She said, “Oh, you have a visitor!” I was glad they let him come down, it’s in the Radiology block so I wasn’t positive they would.

For the BPP, they hook you up to a sonogram machine and test for several things – movement, heart rate, breathing, and fluid. It was so fun to get to see her again – it’s been many weeks since the last U/S and it was cool to see how big she’d gotten – she was really packed in there! The nurse pointed out her eyes, nose, mouth, hands, and feet, and showed us how we could watch her make sucking movements which meant she was practicing her breathing. At one point the nurse got excited and said, “Oh! Watch her hand!” and we got to see her bringing her hand up to her mouth to suck on it. So cute!

Everything checked out well as far as movement and size and all that. For the breathing test, they watch her for 30 minutes and try to note 30 continual seconds of breathing motions – as the nurse put it, the chest looks like it’s see-sawing. We watched and watched, and while PB did make those sucking motions with her mouth, her chest only moved a few times – 5 or 10 seconds every 10 minutes or so. The nurse said that wasn’t necessarily a bad thing but it did bring her score down to a 6/8 (they get either a 0 or a 2 for each portion of the test – pass or fail).

I asked the nurse if she could double-check that we’re still having a girl haha. She tried as hard as she could, but she said PB had her legs tucked up pretty tightly and she wasn’t able to tell. So now we are just hoping the first U/S was correct!

Okay, there is actually more to come but this is enough typing for a while. Stay tuned for part 3!

Week 40, Friday

This one’s gonna be a doozy. In fact, I am gonna split this one into two posts so I can take a break from typing!

My doc appt yesterday was at 3:15 and Ryan and I didn’t get home from it til about 8:15. Yep, that’s FIVE hours. Mom had a yummy Moroccan curry and cinnamon chicken dish ready for us so that was really nice, especially since neither of us had eaten lunch.

I had one of the doctors that I hadn’t seen in a little over a month. She said, “Well, it looks like you’ve been stuck at 1cm for about… three weeks now?” I told her yep, no change and hadn’t even had any symptoms of labor – no contractions, no mucus plug, nothing at all. She checked PB’s heart rate – good as usual – and my fundal height was still normal. I let her know that PB has been moving around QUITE a lot in the last few days, to the point where it hurts, and that I was beginning to wonder if she had moved out of her head-down position, so that was the first thing the doctor checked on the internal exam. She told me, “Oh yeah, that’s definitely a noggin, you’re good there. Still at 1cm… hang on a second…” *streeetch* “Okay, now you’re at a 2.” NOT the most comfortable thing in the world but at least it didn’t take long, and good to know that it was receptive to stretching at this point.

Doc said we needed to go over to L&D for routine testing that they start when you go over your due date, and that we needed to talk to the scheduler to schedule an induction date. We are now scheduled to come in at 9pm next Thursday! We will have a baby in our arms by June 24 at the latest! I’m still uncomfortable with the idea of induction but I know there’s a lot of risk to the baby if we go over 42 weeks, too.

Right now my biggest issue is that the gal scheduling it was explaining what the steps are, and mentioned that they’ll start with Cytotec. That was a drug I haven’t heard of before – usually it’s Cervidil to dilate the cervix. So this morning I looked up Cytotec and I really don’t like what I see – it’s used for treating stomach ulcers but has been used to induce labor in recent years. It’s not approved by the FDA for induction, the company who makes it says it’s not safe for pregnant women (for use as a stomach ulcer medication), it’s been linked to a higher risk of uterine rupture, and it puts mama and baby at increased risk of death. WHAT? And then I saw the cost difference – Cervidil is about $150 per insert, while Cytotec is about $0.60 per pill.

Looking further into it, most of the really bad stuff was written back in 2000, and more recent studies are claiming it’s being monitored better and has less risk than they thought, but… I think I’m gonna talk to them about going with Cervidil instead.

More to come later… getting sleepy.