And below is me on induction night! (Who has two thumbs and can't wait to have her baby? This girl!)
Seriously, I was sooo ready not to be pregnant anymore. The ligaments in my (ahem) groin area got stretched in some weird way around 37 weeks and I was soooo sore. Forget Body Pump and Zumba. Even walking hurt. (My friends all chuckled and said that's why they hated me during my other pregnancies where I would go to Zumba class the day of my induction...at 41 weeks.) Ugh. So, I was definitely ready to bring Britta into this world!
So...I went into the hospital Thursday evening and got settled. My nurse, Devyn, turned out to be LDS and was really great. My mom and Harvey were at the house, wrestling the other kiddos into bed and Cubby stayed with me for a bit before heading home.
It was a long(ish) night. I always take an Ambien, but, for whatever reason, it didn't seem to do much and I don't think I slept for more than 3 hrs. Around 5 a.m. they started me on Pitocin and that started some contractions. Britta kept moving around and they were having a tough time keeping a monitor on her so around 6:30 they told me they needed to put a internal heart monitor on her and to do that they needed to break my water. So, I called Cubby bright and early and he called my mom to come back to the house so he could hurry down to the hospital since my labors usually progress pretty quickly once my water gets broken.
This time, however, my labor went more gradually. Britta refused to drop. Like, at all. Like, I was fully dilated before she finally dropped. Knowing how hard and fast the contractions come once the pitocin is going and my water gets broken, I had gotten my epidural shortly after 6:30 and I was soooo numb. My nurses were wonderful and pretty much did all of the work trying to get Britta to drop down. They had me lay on my right side, then my left. They sat me up super straight. They had me use a peanut-shaped exercise ball that often helps babies to drop. None of that worked. We then repeated the process (with these sweet nurses hefting me and arranging pillows since I couldn't feel anything from the waist down). I was also SUPER tired. As in, I was almost falling asleep a midst all of this. They finally gave me some oxygen which helped to wake me up some.
Finally, around 10:15, the resident doctor came in to check and low and behold, Britta had dropped! (And, she had dropped so much that I was told not to push at all before my doctor arrived!) Well, Dr. Schropp got caught up in traffic and so it took him a little bit longer to arrive. When he got there he pretty much said hello and told me to push with the next contraction. I pushed once and out she came! Yup, easy-peasy for this girl :-). Oh, and as an added bonus, because she was so high up right up until she was born, Britta's head was perfectly shaped! (I've never had a cone-headed baby, but hers was extra perfect just the same :-).)
Well, that's my labor and delivery story for little Miss Britta-bear. I've never been so tired after a birth, but, I healed very quickly and the cramping wasn't as bad this time around (which is weird bc usually it gets worse with each baby). I was just so happy that she was here and safe and healthy. I definitely count my blessings each day and am thankful that she is one of them.
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