Month: March 2021

Robert was due December 21, 2020 but did not come on that day.

My mother came into town on a Thursday about a week and a half before he was due to hang out and help us finish getting ready. I was having very spread out very slowly increasing contractions for a few weeks before his birth. My last non-stress test the aid asked if I was feeling the contractions because she could see them on the sheet of paper.

The Tuesday after my mom came into town the contractions were continuing to increase and my ankles were a bit swollen. I tired elevating my feet and went to sleep like normal that night to see if the swelling was less in the morning but it was not. I had not had any issues with swelling or high blood pressure up to this point but my Dr. didn’t want me to go past my due date because of the unknown effects of covid. When the swelling hadn’t gone down I emailed my Dr. offices the next day, Wednesday, to ask them what I should do. They called me back pretty quickly and told me to head to labor and delivery to get checked out to be safe.

My husband was in the middle of a virtual meeting so as soon as he was done we headed to the hospital.

They hooked me up to some monitors and started watching the baby. While this was going on my contractions started increasing a bit and my blood pressure was slightly elevated. I was not effaced or dilated but the baby had dropped so with the knowledge that my due date was right around the corner and my Dr. would induce if I went past it anyways and I had mild preeclampsia systems the Dr. on call and I decided to proceed with induction.

They inserted Cerdivil in my to get the process started at about 2pm. Cervidil works for about 12 hours to help dilate the cervix. At just after 8pm, six hours after I had gotten the Cervidil I got up to use the restroom and my water broke.

My contractions had already started picking up and now they started to intensify. Around 10-11pm I started getting IV pain meds just over every hour until about 330-4am when I was 3 or 4 cm dilated and able to get an epidural. Silly me thought, yay I’ll finally be able to sleep. Getting the epidural was cake for me and it was instant relief. I was so ready to sleep but the baby had other ideas. My husband got to sleep while I had to switch sides every 20 mins because the babies heart rate kept dropping. It would drop, we would reposition, it would be fine for a few mins and I would start to drift off then his heartrate would drop again and I would have to move.

Around shift change at 7am they checked me and i had come from 4cm to 8cm and we learned I could have a second support person so we texted my mom to get her butt to the hospital. Around 7:30am the nurse helped me sit up with my feet under me because I was sick of laying down and within a few minutes my 2nd bag of waters started to make its way out which was the weirdest feeling ever.

My mom made it to the room by about 8am. The pain started to make its way through the epidural and the contractions started to come closer and closer and become more intense. There was a point where even my mom commented that I had like a 10 min contraction. A little before 11am I was fully effaced but had a small cervical lip that wasn’t disappearing so I couldn’t push just yet. It didn’t take long before my body was starting to push on it’s own, my mom called the nurse and told her I couldn’t stop my body from pushing, she checked me again and I was ready to push! The Dr. came in and we started pushing! I pushed for just over an hour and Robert was born! He was happy and healthy so they put him right on me……and he proceeded to poop all over both of us hahahahahaha!!! The hospital I gave birth in was very mama baby centered so we had 2 hours of skin to skin contact immediately after birth, delayed cord clamping, encouraged breast feeding. It was wonderful and they were very supportive, aside from the pain it was nothing short of a great experience.

We ordered lunch pretty quickly hahaha and within a few hours we were moved to our post birth room where we were going to stay overnight. We were able to leave the next day around 1pm. From getting to the hospital until we left I think I slept about 2-3 hours total in the 3 days.

Those first few weeks at home were ROUGH!!! I will talk about that in the post partum blog coming up.

Hello!! I have been gone for quite some time and this is why!!!

I am a mom!

I did not enjoy pregnancy for the most part. I was pretty sick until about week 20. I threw up enough to need to get anti-nausea meds from the Dr. I had a lot of bloating through most of the pregnancy so I never felt super great. I did love feeling him kick and seeing him on the ultrasound but I will definitely never be someone who says they love being pregnant.

I also got Covid in my 3rd trimester which complicated things. Thankfully it wasn’t serious enough for me to need to be hospitalized but it did turn my pregnancy into a higher risk since there were so many unknows. After I had recovered and passed the contagious period they did an extra ultrasound to check on him and I went in for weekly non-stress tests to check on his heartbeat and movement until he was born.

I will do a whole blog on my birth story here shortly so I will skip that for now.

After we came home with him I suffered from severe post partum anxiety and depression. I will also do a separate blog post on this so look for that soon.

All that being said my little nugget is going to be 14 weeks old on Thursday and I am going to try and get back to blogging more normally. I have done a few runs since birth, am starting a Beachbody Barre Blend workout program, spring planting is starting and I am now a stay at home mom!!! Well mostly, I will occasionally pick up some shifts at my old job on the weekends when they need a fill in but generally I will be home raising my son….oh and we got chickens!!!!

May I formally introduce my son. Robert!