Birth Story

On Labor Day weekend my sister, BiL, and nephew visited. We spent time at the lake and hung out a bunch. We had gone to the store and bought some junk food as that's what my sister and BiL like to eat. My sister also baked chocolate chip zucchini bread which I ate a ton of. On Saturday and Sunday mornings I woke up feeling almost hungover from eating junk. I didn't realize how much it could affect me. 

They left on Sunday afternoon and I spent most of Monday at home relaxing and snoozing, recovering from the weekend. I had a great time, but stayed up late both nights and didn't get as much sleep as I was used to. 

Early Monday morning I woke up because one of the girls was in the ribcage/on my diaphragm. I was completely unable to get comfortable and felt like the wind had been knocked out of the me for about an hour and a half. I was sitting up in bed at 4 AM in pain. When I woke up around 10:15 I said for the first time during my pregnancy that I was ready for the babies to get here.

On Tuesday by lunch time I was ready to get out of the house. I planned to go to the fabric store and the dogs were super excited to come along. When I got in the car I moved the seat forward as W had driven the car last. I remember thinking about how close my belly was to the steering wheel. 

As I was driving I heard a siren. I looked into my rear view mirror to try to locate it as I approached an intersection. When I didn't locate anything behind me I looked back up. When I looked back up the car in front of me had stopped completely. They had seen the ambulance at the intersection going the opposite direction. I had enough time to say "oh shit!" and slam on the brakes. 

When the car came to a stop I felt a huge gush. I reached down and brought back up my soaking wet and shaking hand. I sat there in complete shock until someone came up to the window. He was a first responder EMT and asked me if I was okay. I said I was but that I was pretty sure my water had broken. He asked me if he could call anyone for me and I dialed W and handed him the phone. 

The ambulance was there shortly after and they brought a stretcher over to the side of the car. I never tried to get out of or move the car from the middle of the intersection. I was just so scared and in complete shock. The ambulance drivers spoke to me for a few minutes and we headed to the hospital I was planning to deliver at (as per my request at least 4 times). I called W, my mom, and sister on the way and texted a few other people including my chiropractor to cancel my afternoon appointment. On the drive I really had to pee and told the ambulance driver it probably wouldn't make much of a difference if I did since I was so wet already. I felt a few more gushes along the way.

 I've honestly never been so scared in my life.  I was so worried about the girls despite feeling a little bit of movement from each. 

We arrived at the hospital after probably a half hour or 45 minutes. They took me to the ER department but the doctors took one look at me and insisted they send me up to the L&D floor. When I got up there they transferred me to another bed and the nurses came in. My mom arrived shortly after. During that time there they hooked both girls up to the monitors, did an ultrasound, and an internal exam. I have no idea how long this took. I asked to go to the bathroom and with each step I took fluid leaked onto the floor. When I peed I noticed there was blood in my underwear. 

The nurses didn't want me to sit too upright in the bed. The babies were stable, but I was having a few contractions. I wasn't dialated at all. The ultrasound revealed that baby A was still breech. The nurses told me they were going to call the on-call ob at my practice and let me know the plan. Since I was on blood thinners, a spinal was not an option for at least 12 hours. Multiple people came into the room, but it's all a little blurry. My ob showed up shortly after and told me she wanted to deliver immediately since I was bleeding. I guess the blood meant the placenta could have ruptured so she wanted to get the babies out while everyone was still doing well. 

Before I knew it they were prepping me for the c-section. The anesthesiologist came in and talked to me and they started a different IV. I sat there in complete denial of the fact that they were going to deliver the babies so soon. They told me W was not able to be in the room as there's no point in him being there with me under general anesthesia. 

They wheeled me down the hallway to the OR. I gave W one last hug and kiss and the nurse took my camera into the delivery room. The room was so cold and I was so nervous so shaking like crazy. There were so many people in the room and I was so scared. 

My accident occurred around 1:00 and the girls arrived at 4:28 and 4:29. 

Next I knew I woke up in the recovery room with W and my mom at my bedside. W told me the weights of the girls and showed me pictures on the camera. The nurses would come every 15 minutes or so and push on my uterus to be sure it was contracting. Because I had general anesthesia I was able to feel everything so quickly. The nurses said that made things much more painful. 

A few hours later they wheeled me up to the NICU to see the girls. We first saw our baby B. She was so beautiful and they even let me hold her. After that we saw baby A. They had a really hard time getting an IV in her so she had one in her umbilical cord. Because of that I was unable to hold her. I couldn't believe how tiny she was. Baby A was 3 lbs 15 oz and baby B was 4 lbs 11 oz. 

We went back downstairs to my room. I was in a double room and W was able to stay with me since the other bed was empty. That night I slept horribly because I was in so much pain. They had me on pitocin which made me so crampy. I think the IV finally ran out of that around 1 AM. I was also bleeding really heavily. Since I had the catheter still in I didn't have to get up to use the bathroom so that was good.

The next morning we went up to see the girls again. W pushed me in a wheelchair. 

I'll try to update tomorrow as the girls will be a week old! That way I can write about their first week here and more about them.

Their arrival was so dramatic and unexpected, but I am already so in love with those little girls it's unbelievable. I feel so lucky to be their mommy.

Clara

Lucy

Clara

Lucy

Clara

Lucy