Sadie is here!
The Story of Her Birth
On Saturday, January 31st, I started to have my first “contractions.” I was at the movies with my mom to see Bride Wars and I began to have pretty painful cramps accompanied by the complete hardening of my uterus. When I got home, Nate and I began to time the contractions, and they were about 5 minutes apart. We started to worry that perhaps it would be time to call the doctor soon. I was only 34 weeks and three days pregnant. Luckily, two hours later, the contractions slowed down.
Over the next week, I continued to have frequent, uncomfortable contractions. Finally, on Friday, I decided to call the doctor. The nurse I spoke with moved my next appointment, which was scheduled for Friday, February 13th, up to Monday, February 9th to make sure that the contractions weren’t leading to early labor.
When I went to the doctor on Monday with my mom, I was examined by Dr. Kaufman, who determined that I had no signs of labor. I was not dilated and not effaced at all. My baby’s head was very low and he attributed the pressure I was feeling to that. The doctor assured me that the contractions I was feeling were normal and told me he expected to be seeing me for several weeks before I went into labor. He did joke that if I was to go early, to make sure my body hangs on until at least Wednesday, when I’d officially be 36 weeks pregnant, which meant that I could deliver at Jupiter Medical Center instead of having to go south to St. Mary’s, which has an NICU and handles premature deliveries.
Wednesday morning, I woke up and realized that I had lost my mucus plug during the night. I was excited to see that progress was being made and was not concerned that it meant anything because I had heard you can lose your mucus plug up to four weeks before labor. Throughout that day, however, the mucus plug continued coming out with a lot of what looked like water. I thought this was just part of my plug, until it continued through to the next morning. At that point, I decided to call the doctor to see if maybe my water had broken. The nurse at the office told me to come in at 2:30pm to have the doctor check me out.
At my doctor visit, Dr. Shaya examined me and found that I was not at all dilated or effaced. He said the baby’s head was still low, but there was no indication that my water had broken. However, when he listened to the baby’s heartbeat, he became concerned about how fast it was beating. He feared fetal distress and immediately sent me to another room to have an ultrasound done. The ultrasound did indicate a very fast-paced heart rate, but nothing to worry over. It also indicated that I had an excessive amount of amniotic fluid, something that had never been discovered before. The doctor released me with instructions to call the following day if I was still concerned that I was leaking.
From the doctor’s office, I drove directly to Jupiter Medical Center to visit my friend Amy who had delivered her daughter Lola that morning via c-section. My mom met me at the hospital to visit Amy, and we stayed for about a half hour while I held Lola and chatted with Amy, her husband, and her parents. Amy had overheard from a nurse earlier that day that only one birthing suite was left available and I joked with her that maybe I’d be back later to claim it.
I drove straight home, and my mom drove to the mall to shop for coming home clothes for the baby and for a baby book. When I got home, Nate was there and we sat on the couch where I filled him in on my doctor’s visit and my visit with Amy and Lola. When I told him the doctor thought the fluid I was seeing was normal discharge, he started telling me how a woman who worked for him was telling him how common it is for the baby to press on the bladder and for urine to release without the mother realizing it. Before I could respond to that, I blurted out, “Here we go again.” Nate’s eyes widened as he began to see a wet spot appear on my jean shorts and then proceed to expand. We freaked out and ran to the bathroom to see what was happening. I pulled my pants down and water was gushing all down me onto the floor. We just kept laughing because it was so surreal.
Through my laughter, I then started to panic because I was still four weeks early. As I stood there in shock with my pants around my ankles, Nate called the doctor and left a message on their emergency line. I then called my mom, who bought the baby book she had in her hands, and then headed over to meet us. At this point, it was around 6:20pm.
While we waited for the doctor to call, we frantically started to pack up things we would need for the hospital. Luckily, the night before, my mom, who has always had “psychic” feelings when it comes to me, came to the house to help me get a suitcase started. As Nate and I ran around the house in shock, gathering more things to throw in our bag, Dr. Litt called us back and told us we could either labor at home for a while or head directly to the hospital. Because of the incident earlier with the baby’s high heartbeat, I told him I’d prefer to go directly in so that we could be monitored. I then called Amy and told her, “You’re not going to believe this, but I’m headed right back.”
When we got to the hospital, the nurses at the front desk of the birthing floor immediately recognized me from my earlier visit. After musing about the irony, I was brought to a room and hooked up to monitors so they could confirm if my water had broken. They used a small strip of paper that changes color when it touches amniotic fluid. The paper did not change color. They ran the test again; it still did not change color. At this point, the nurses began telling me how often urine is mistaken by pregnant women for their water breaking. Nate began to tease me that I had peed myself, and that we’d have to call everyone we knew to tell them it was a false alarm and that I had peed my pants.
The nurses decided to run one more test which is more accurate and takes about 15 minutes in the lab to determine the results. While we waited, Dr. Litt arrived to perform an ultrasound on me. He determined that my amniotic fluid had decreased from 25 to 20 since my ultrasound earlier that day. As he was telling me that this information was enough to admit me, a technician came back to tell us the test results were positive for amniotic fluid. I had not peed myself!!
Dr. Litt then examined me and said I was 1cm dilated and 100% effaced. He said we’d be having a baby within the next 12 hours! The plan was to walk the halls over the next 4-6 hours and then induce me with pitocin if no progress was made. My mom was there with us, and my dad and brother soon joined us in the birthing suite. Around midnight, the nurses and doctor decided to go ahead with pitocin without examining me again. Up to this point, my contractions felt only slightly more painful than they had been the previous week and a half. I was more bothered by the IV in my arm, which stung pretty badly all night. Once the pitocin drip began, after almost fainting and vomiting during its insertion, I finally adjusted and my contractions slowly began to increase.
Around 4am, our nurse Nicole examined me and found me to be 3-4cm dilated. The contractions were getting pretty painful, so she called for doctor approval to begin my epidural. During the insertion of the epidural, both my mom and Nate had to leave the room. I hated being alone, but the worst part of the epidural injection was that at this point in the labor, I had begun having the worst shakes and twitches. I was practically twitching right off the table as they tried to insert the needle.
Around 6am, Dr. Litt came in to examine me again, and found me to only be 2cm dilated. We were all bewildered and discouraged that I had become less dilated. At this point, I was sleeping a lot because the shaking had gotten so out of control. Around 7:40am, while I was sleeping, I overheard my mom asking the nurse when I would be examined again for progress. The nurse wasn’t sure, but assured my mom that she had plenty of time to go home and walk the dogs. She even jokingly suggested she take time to “have some breakfast, take a shower, get some rest, etc.”
Twenty minutes later, around 8am, I woke up feeling like I had to push. I woke Nate up, and through my shaking teeth, asked him to call the nurse. When I told her about the pressure I was feeling, she assured me it was normal to feel that during contractions. She then left the room. About a minute later, I again asked Nate to call the nurse. When she came back, she examined me to satisfy my concerns, and was shocked to realize I was 10cm dilated and ready to push! She left to get the doctor and Nate called my mom at 8:05am and told her to hurry because it was time.
Luckily, Dr. Kaufman happened to be out in the hallway because he was there to discharge another new mom. He changed into scrubs and came in to deliver our baby. My mom had already arrived and the pushing began. This part was much easier than I thought it would be. We pushed in sets of three. After about five sets, Sadie’s head and shoulders were out! Everyone in the room was talking about how much hair she had and how blond it was. The doctor asked me if I wanted to deliver her. It all happened so fast, but I put my hands under her arms and pulled her body out and on to my chest. At this point, I began to cry because she was so beautiful and everything was so surreal.
Nate cut the umbilical cord while the doctor finished up with me. I watched from the bed as they cleaned her up and checked her out. She weighed 5 pounds 11 ounces and measured 18 inches long. She was beautiful!
That day, we had many visitors. Sadie met my dad, Joey, Aunt Cathy, Aunt Isabel, Brianna, Sitty, Pam, Monty, Rebecca, Amy, Mike, Katie, and Andrew. The following day, Saturday, was very low key, and I got to spend a lot of the day alone with Sadie. Sunday, we were released to go home. We were visited at home by most everyone Sadie met on Thursday, plus Aunt Bev, Uncle Frank, Tara, Dave, Uncle Sal, and Sal.
Sadie did great her first night home. It was so amazing to have her there with us and it was such a great surprise to experience it all four weeks early with such a happy and healthy baby!
On Saturday, January 31st, I started to have my first “contractions.” I was at the movies with my mom to see Bride Wars and I began to have pretty painful cramps accompanied by the complete hardening of my uterus. When I got home, Nate and I began to time the contractions, and they were about 5 minutes apart. We started to worry that perhaps it would be time to call the doctor soon. I was only 34 weeks and three days pregnant. Luckily, two hours later, the contractions slowed down.
Over the next week, I continued to have frequent, uncomfortable contractions. Finally, on Friday, I decided to call the doctor. The nurse I spoke with moved my next appointment, which was scheduled for Friday, February 13th, up to Monday, February 9th to make sure that the contractions weren’t leading to early labor.
When I went to the doctor on Monday with my mom, I was examined by Dr. Kaufman, who determined that I had no signs of labor. I was not dilated and not effaced at all. My baby’s head was very low and he attributed the pressure I was feeling to that. The doctor assured me that the contractions I was feeling were normal and told me he expected to be seeing me for several weeks before I went into labor. He did joke that if I was to go early, to make sure my body hangs on until at least Wednesday, when I’d officially be 36 weeks pregnant, which meant that I could deliver at Jupiter Medical Center instead of having to go south to St. Mary’s, which has an NICU and handles premature deliveries.
Wednesday morning, I woke up and realized that I had lost my mucus plug during the night. I was excited to see that progress was being made and was not concerned that it meant anything because I had heard you can lose your mucus plug up to four weeks before labor. Throughout that day, however, the mucus plug continued coming out with a lot of what looked like water. I thought this was just part of my plug, until it continued through to the next morning. At that point, I decided to call the doctor to see if maybe my water had broken. The nurse at the office told me to come in at 2:30pm to have the doctor check me out.
At my doctor visit, Dr. Shaya examined me and found that I was not at all dilated or effaced. He said the baby’s head was still low, but there was no indication that my water had broken. However, when he listened to the baby’s heartbeat, he became concerned about how fast it was beating. He feared fetal distress and immediately sent me to another room to have an ultrasound done. The ultrasound did indicate a very fast-paced heart rate, but nothing to worry over. It also indicated that I had an excessive amount of amniotic fluid, something that had never been discovered before. The doctor released me with instructions to call the following day if I was still concerned that I was leaking.
From the doctor’s office, I drove directly to Jupiter Medical Center to visit my friend Amy who had delivered her daughter Lola that morning via c-section. My mom met me at the hospital to visit Amy, and we stayed for about a half hour while I held Lola and chatted with Amy, her husband, and her parents. Amy had overheard from a nurse earlier that day that only one birthing suite was left available and I joked with her that maybe I’d be back later to claim it.
I drove straight home, and my mom drove to the mall to shop for coming home clothes for the baby and for a baby book. When I got home, Nate was there and we sat on the couch where I filled him in on my doctor’s visit and my visit with Amy and Lola. When I told him the doctor thought the fluid I was seeing was normal discharge, he started telling me how a woman who worked for him was telling him how common it is for the baby to press on the bladder and for urine to release without the mother realizing it. Before I could respond to that, I blurted out, “Here we go again.” Nate’s eyes widened as he began to see a wet spot appear on my jean shorts and then proceed to expand. We freaked out and ran to the bathroom to see what was happening. I pulled my pants down and water was gushing all down me onto the floor. We just kept laughing because it was so surreal.
Through my laughter, I then started to panic because I was still four weeks early. As I stood there in shock with my pants around my ankles, Nate called the doctor and left a message on their emergency line. I then called my mom, who bought the baby book she had in her hands, and then headed over to meet us. At this point, it was around 6:20pm.
While we waited for the doctor to call, we frantically started to pack up things we would need for the hospital. Luckily, the night before, my mom, who has always had “psychic” feelings when it comes to me, came to the house to help me get a suitcase started. As Nate and I ran around the house in shock, gathering more things to throw in our bag, Dr. Litt called us back and told us we could either labor at home for a while or head directly to the hospital. Because of the incident earlier with the baby’s high heartbeat, I told him I’d prefer to go directly in so that we could be monitored. I then called Amy and told her, “You’re not going to believe this, but I’m headed right back.”
When we got to the hospital, the nurses at the front desk of the birthing floor immediately recognized me from my earlier visit. After musing about the irony, I was brought to a room and hooked up to monitors so they could confirm if my water had broken. They used a small strip of paper that changes color when it touches amniotic fluid. The paper did not change color. They ran the test again; it still did not change color. At this point, the nurses began telling me how often urine is mistaken by pregnant women for their water breaking. Nate began to tease me that I had peed myself, and that we’d have to call everyone we knew to tell them it was a false alarm and that I had peed my pants.
The nurses decided to run one more test which is more accurate and takes about 15 minutes in the lab to determine the results. While we waited, Dr. Litt arrived to perform an ultrasound on me. He determined that my amniotic fluid had decreased from 25 to 20 since my ultrasound earlier that day. As he was telling me that this information was enough to admit me, a technician came back to tell us the test results were positive for amniotic fluid. I had not peed myself!!
Dr. Litt then examined me and said I was 1cm dilated and 100% effaced. He said we’d be having a baby within the next 12 hours! The plan was to walk the halls over the next 4-6 hours and then induce me with pitocin if no progress was made. My mom was there with us, and my dad and brother soon joined us in the birthing suite. Around midnight, the nurses and doctor decided to go ahead with pitocin without examining me again. Up to this point, my contractions felt only slightly more painful than they had been the previous week and a half. I was more bothered by the IV in my arm, which stung pretty badly all night. Once the pitocin drip began, after almost fainting and vomiting during its insertion, I finally adjusted and my contractions slowly began to increase.
Around 4am, our nurse Nicole examined me and found me to be 3-4cm dilated. The contractions were getting pretty painful, so she called for doctor approval to begin my epidural. During the insertion of the epidural, both my mom and Nate had to leave the room. I hated being alone, but the worst part of the epidural injection was that at this point in the labor, I had begun having the worst shakes and twitches. I was practically twitching right off the table as they tried to insert the needle.
Around 6am, Dr. Litt came in to examine me again, and found me to only be 2cm dilated. We were all bewildered and discouraged that I had become less dilated. At this point, I was sleeping a lot because the shaking had gotten so out of control. Around 7:40am, while I was sleeping, I overheard my mom asking the nurse when I would be examined again for progress. The nurse wasn’t sure, but assured my mom that she had plenty of time to go home and walk the dogs. She even jokingly suggested she take time to “have some breakfast, take a shower, get some rest, etc.”
Twenty minutes later, around 8am, I woke up feeling like I had to push. I woke Nate up, and through my shaking teeth, asked him to call the nurse. When I told her about the pressure I was feeling, she assured me it was normal to feel that during contractions. She then left the room. About a minute later, I again asked Nate to call the nurse. When she came back, she examined me to satisfy my concerns, and was shocked to realize I was 10cm dilated and ready to push! She left to get the doctor and Nate called my mom at 8:05am and told her to hurry because it was time.
Luckily, Dr. Kaufman happened to be out in the hallway because he was there to discharge another new mom. He changed into scrubs and came in to deliver our baby. My mom had already arrived and the pushing began. This part was much easier than I thought it would be. We pushed in sets of three. After about five sets, Sadie’s head and shoulders were out! Everyone in the room was talking about how much hair she had and how blond it was. The doctor asked me if I wanted to deliver her. It all happened so fast, but I put my hands under her arms and pulled her body out and on to my chest. At this point, I began to cry because she was so beautiful and everything was so surreal.
Nate cut the umbilical cord while the doctor finished up with me. I watched from the bed as they cleaned her up and checked her out. She weighed 5 pounds 11 ounces and measured 18 inches long. She was beautiful!
That day, we had many visitors. Sadie met my dad, Joey, Aunt Cathy, Aunt Isabel, Brianna, Sitty, Pam, Monty, Rebecca, Amy, Mike, Katie, and Andrew. The following day, Saturday, was very low key, and I got to spend a lot of the day alone with Sadie. Sunday, we were released to go home. We were visited at home by most everyone Sadie met on Thursday, plus Aunt Bev, Uncle Frank, Tara, Dave, Uncle Sal, and Sal.
Sadie did great her first night home. It was so amazing to have her there with us and it was such a great surprise to experience it all four weeks early with such a happy and healthy baby!
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