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Hi, I'm Brenna, welcome to my adventures.

Birth Intentions Plan B

9/29/2018

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Baby Fredrik is here! And almost a month old now.  Lets just say his entrance into this world did not go quite as we had intended.  Notice I say intended, not planned.  Our pastor told us that she used the word "intention" not "plan" several months before her baby was born, as a way to prevent herself from getting disappointed or frustrated if things did not go as 'planned.' We followed suit, and the gist of our intentions was to avoid as many medical interventions as necessary but to have a healthy baby and mom at the end of it all.
Here's what actually happened:
11:30pm - contractions started or at least that's when they woke me up.  I labored by myself through the night, letting Ryan sleep so he would be rested when I really needed him.
5am - Woke Ryan up.  Contractions getting too intense to deal with by myself.
9am - Went to hospital, and was dilated 5cm.  Wooo! Totally thought we'd have baby by the afternoon.  Unfortunately, Baby Ts heart rated dropped a few times, so I ended up having to be hooked up to a monitor the entire time (except to to pee). This was rather annoying. 
11am - Rachel our doula arrived. She was amazing and both Ryan and I believe she was the reason I was able to stay so committed to our non intervention intentions. I labored all afternoon and only progressed to about 6cm.
6pm - Broke my water since we hadn't made any real progress.
10pm - Started Pitocin since my contractions were getting weaker, and I had only made it to about 7cm.  I asked for the narcotic pain medications Phentanyl since I was super tired and hoped it would give me a chance to rest a bit before having to push.  I was so wrong... It made me incredibly dizzy and I actually passed out for a moment. Within about 60 min of starting the pitocin Baby T's heart rate dropped again which resulted in 5 nurses rushing into the room and rolling me back and forth trying to get into a position where he was stable. Both the phentanyl and pitocin had to be stopped.
11:30pm - Ob said we could try pitocin again. There is no way I'm doing that without some kind of pain management at this point.  Pitocin takes your normal contractions and ramps them all the way to level 10 in about 15 minutes.  Hello Epidural!!! That thing is magical and it allowed me, Ryan, and Rachel to get some rest. However, baby's heart rate really dropped and 5 nurses came running into the room AGAIN and made me get onto my hands and knees which is quite difficult when you really can't feel your legs. But this was the only position where his heart rate was stable.
1:15am - Discussed options with ob and decided it was best if we proceeded with a C-section.
2:01am - Fredrik enters the world! Turns out he was trying to come through the birth canal with the side of his head...sorry buddy it doesn't work that way.
I am not disappointed that Fredrik's birth became exactly what I had hoped it wouldn't.  At the end of the day we reached our goal, healthy baby and mom. I am, or was, just a little disappointed that I didn't even get to try and push. Oh well.
I feel so blessed to have had an amazing medical team and have recovered from the surgery very quickly.  I'm also no longer afraid of getting an epidural in the future if I ever needed one.  The entire experience has made me much more empathetic to moms everywhere, and less judgmental of their birth choices. 

1 Comment
Gran-E
9/30/2018 11:14:30 am

Empathy for others is good and many times comes after one’s own struggle.

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    Brenna

    I'm a dietitian with a passion for good nutrition, bold flavors, playing in the dirt, and being with my family.

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