Thursday, April 20, 2017

Charlotte Dawn- Birth Story

Oh, where to begin, On Sunday March 12th we went to church & i had been having contractions for the past few days just nothing closer than 15 minutes apart, if that. We had done our regular routine walking around the block for the kids to see the horses the past week and a half but I decided I was tired of feeling crappy so we were going to walk from our house in La Verkin to my mom’s house in Hurricane (4 miles) instead of driving for lunch to see if we could speed anything up. My contractions were getting closer together & more extreme/intense but still not super close. I had a few pretty intense contractions on the walk over that I had to stop walking & breathe until it was over. After we ate I was feeling super sick so I told Adam we should just go over & get checked to see where I was. (At my last appt 4 days earlier I was at a 4 & almost 100% effaced) We arrived at the hospital around 5:30 & got checked/got registered. I was at a 5 & the contraction monitor was picking up contractions about every 5 minutes apart. They decided to admit me! After we got into the room they checked me again &I was at a 6 & my contractions were getting a lot more intense & were about 3-4 minutes apart. We called Shauni to come over & get ready to take pictures at the birth. They called the anesthesiologist to come give me my epidural. He was super quick & had me feeling great before I knew it! The nurses & Adam joked with him that they bet that was his record for fastest epidural ever, he was in & out in about 4 minutes! (It was nice to not feel those horrible contractions anymore that were every 3 minutes) After getting checked I had stayed about a 6 for an hour so they called the midwife & she had them start me on Pitocin. (My normal OB had left town for spring break Saturday for a week long vacation, so I missed him delivering our baby by 1 day) After starting the Pitocin things started progressing pretty quickly. The nurse came to check me about an hour after starting the Pitocin & I was at a 9. The nurse said she would call Katie the midwife & have her come over & that she would come back in 20 minutes to check me again. About 5 minutes later I started feeling pressure every 3 minutes (I felt like the head was coming out) so had Adam call for my nurse to come back & check me. She walked it, lifted my blanket to check me & said yup, you are at a 10 & babies head is right there! They started to get the room ready for delivery & said Katie would be there any minute. Once Katie was there she started to get her gown & gloves on. The nurses wasn’t joking when she said she could see the baby’s head because I coughed & Katie said "Hey, no more coughing or laughing because I am not ready to catch the baby yet!" Her head was pretty much coming out on its own. It was time to start pushing. One & a half pushes later our baby girl was here!!  This was by far my easiest & fastest delivery yet! I am worried the next one will come before I can get to the hospital because with each baby labor has been cut in half. Starting with a 12hr labor with Berkley to a 6hr labor with Ryker to a 3hr labor with Charlotte.

Side story about naming our little girl:
We had 2 names picked out for our little girl when we got to the hospital but couldn't narrow it down until we saw her. I have always loved the name Charlotte & from about age 12 I wanted to use it when I had a little girl. When we saw her for the first time she looked just like a Charlotte to us.  Adam lived with his Aunt Charlotte during his high school years & from the first time I met her she after we started dating & got married she became so special to me. She was one literally one of the greatest blessings for me while I was away from home in the beginning of our marriage. If my Charlotte grows up to be anything like her Great Aunt Charlotte then she will be a wonderful lady! Charlotte's middle name Dawn, comes from another wonderful woman in our lives. Adams grandma Orrock. She was another lady who welcomed me into the family with open arms. She is such a special lady &  I hope Charlotte Dawn gets to know her! 

Hopefully my next post is sooner than another birth story! haha