After 4 births, whether by a sense of nostalgia, maturity, or appreciation, I feel it is finally time to write my birth stories. I feel like the poster child for methods of delivery having had an emergency c-section, a planned c-section, a vaginal birth after cesarean (VBAC) and a miscarriage. I hope my experiences will enrich yours be it past or present.
Birth Story #1 Part 1
I lay in the quiet darkness of the cavernous ultrasound room at the regional hospital. I listened to my deliberately slow breaths to ease the beating of my heart. The ultrasound technician hadn't said much, but I watched the calculated measurements flash on the screen: gestation 37.5 wks, head 37 wks, abdomen 32 wks, total weight 5 lbs 7 oz.
7 1/2 weeks earlier I stopped by the community hospital for a quick amniotic fluid leak test. The nurses routinely hooked my "fluffy" abdomen up to the monitors. My "angry" cervix contaminated the samples, but the nurses were reassuring: that fluid is likely not amniotic. Embarrassed and starving I was eager to leave. But my intuition manifested in the form of hypochondria had brought me here for a reason: the baby's heart showed intermittent patterns of non-reassuring fetal distress. Dinner would have to wait.
Hour by hour we waited for a reassuring heart beat, unable to leave and unable to eat in the event the baby should need to be delivered shortly. By the next morning the community hospital had done all they could and ambulanced me to the regional hospital for ultrasounds, more monitoring and in the unfortunate event, the NICU. In the end, the only thing that was determined was that the baby should be monitored indefinitely. And so 24 hours later I sat in a tiny triage room making love to my cafeteria food.
After that week in the hospital (with 2 steroid shots), followed by non-stress tests twice a week for 7 weeks, plus another afternoon in the hospital, this ultrasound shouldn't have been different. But the perinatologist came into my quiet cave, tall, thin and gray. He spoke closely, as if the rims of his round spectacles were my own. The baby has stopped growing. Shown by it's disproportionate head to body ratio, it's called Intrauterine Growth Restriction (IUGR). He wants to do an amniocentesis, but I'm almost 38 weeks I say. My doctor orders an induction at his community hospital, so I order Arby's 5 for $5 on the way.
Birth Story #1 Part 1
I lay in the quiet darkness of the cavernous ultrasound room at the regional hospital. I listened to my deliberately slow breaths to ease the beating of my heart. The ultrasound technician hadn't said much, but I watched the calculated measurements flash on the screen: gestation 37.5 wks, head 37 wks, abdomen 32 wks, total weight 5 lbs 7 oz.
7 1/2 weeks earlier I stopped by the community hospital for a quick amniotic fluid leak test. The nurses routinely hooked my "fluffy" abdomen up to the monitors. My "angry" cervix contaminated the samples, but the nurses were reassuring: that fluid is likely not amniotic. Embarrassed and starving I was eager to leave. But my intuition manifested in the form of hypochondria had brought me here for a reason: the baby's heart showed intermittent patterns of non-reassuring fetal distress. Dinner would have to wait.
Hour by hour we waited for a reassuring heart beat, unable to leave and unable to eat in the event the baby should need to be delivered shortly. By the next morning the community hospital had done all they could and ambulanced me to the regional hospital for ultrasounds, more monitoring and in the unfortunate event, the NICU. In the end, the only thing that was determined was that the baby should be monitored indefinitely. And so 24 hours later I sat in a tiny triage room making love to my cafeteria food.
After that week in the hospital (with 2 steroid shots), followed by non-stress tests twice a week for 7 weeks, plus another afternoon in the hospital, this ultrasound shouldn't have been different. But the perinatologist came into my quiet cave, tall, thin and gray. He spoke closely, as if the rims of his round spectacles were my own. The baby has stopped growing. Shown by it's disproportionate head to body ratio, it's called Intrauterine Growth Restriction (IUGR). He wants to do an amniocentesis, but I'm almost 38 weeks I say. My doctor orders an induction at his community hospital, so I order Arby's 5 for $5 on the way.
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