Welcome Sarah Margaret!!!

Wow!!! What an amazing experience! I never could have imagined that things would have turned out the way they did, and how I would feel about the happenings of the past several days! I would not trade any of it for the world, nor would I change anything.

5 hours after our last Bradley class, Karen awoke in a puddle at 3:15 AM. Her water had broken, and the process of birthing our child had begun. I woke up, and stayed up with her at that point. Her contractions started about 30 minutes later, while she was cleaning off. We had a regularly scheduled appointment scheduled for 8:00 Tues morning, which we decided to keep and just wait until then to see where things were. We took advantage of the relatively easy contractions and the time to finish packing the things we would need for the hospital, played some cards, and just hung out. Her contractions were consistently around 5 minutes apart, lasting about 45 seconds on average, the signs of early first stage labor.

We got to her appointment, and got checked. She was 2-3cm dialated, 90% efaced, and -3 station at about 8:20 AM. Because of her positive result for Group B Strep, and her being borderline hypertensive, we were sent over the triage at the hospital and admitted. We got over to triage at about 9:00, had an initial strip, and we were moved to our Labor and Delivery room at about 11:15.

Once we got over to our room, we used some of the techniques learned from our Bradley classes to help speed her labor and make her more comfortable. She was really loving the exercise ball, and we went on a few walks. At about 1:20 PM, the CNM decided that she did not like the look of the crontractions on the Fetal Heart Monitor (which she had to be on because of the hypertension). She thought they should have been stronger and they she was not progressing. Karen was still at the same stage in her labor, and very little progress had been made. Now, this is not normally an issue, because we woul d have been laboring at home during all this time, but since her water had broken, she was placed on a 24 hour time limit due to an increased risk of infection. Interventions were suggested in the form of Pitocin, but we refused. The CNM suggested that Karen take a warm shower and see if that would stimulate the contractions. This worked, as the contractions got much more intense.

She continued to labor, while being monitored, until about 5:30 PM, when the OB on call decided to do an internal to see if the contractions were doing what they needed to do. Unfortunately, they were not at this point, so she was really pusing Pitocin, mentioning the 24 hour clock and the risk of infection. Out of curiosity, I asked if she had read our birthplan, which specifically said we did not want any intervetions, and she said that she did not. This really made me mad. Karen and I decided to discuss the options at that point, and after a decent discussion, we decided to allow them to start a Pitocin drip under the condition that we were informed of everything that was happening. They agreed, and the drip started.

Her contractions became extremely intense with the Pitocin, and Karen asked about a little something to help take the edge off. She ended up on a pain med that would last 2-3 hours and help her out again, after the two of us discussed our options and came to our own decision.

She went through some intense labor, even with the drug, for another 6 1/2 hours until she felt ready to push at about 1:00 AM. We called for a consult and internal, and found that she was 9 1/2 cm dialated, 100% efaced, and -1 station. The CNM suggested that we hold off on pushing for a bit longer so the cervix could finish dialiting, and the baby could drop to where it should be. We agreed, and she labored for another 1 1/2 hours, (3:00 AM) before she entered Second Stage Labor, and began the pushing.

Karen pushed for about 2 hours, and at 5:00 AM, I saw the babies head! Another half hour later, and Sarah Margaret was born.She was placed immediately on mom's belly, and attempted to crawl up and begin feeding, but her cord was too short to let her rutch her way up there.

To make a long and wonderful story a bit shorter, at least for this posting, I cut the cord, looked at the placenta after it was birthed, and had absolutely no issues with the blood or anything else that I figured I would. I think it was the adrenaline kicking in, but I made it.

Ok, the important part, Sarah is perfect, Karen is doing really well, and now we are home. More details will be posted later about her stay and other fun.

Sarah Margaret Hilton
Born: 06/16/2004 @ 05:31 AM
Weight: 6lbs 13.5 oz
Length: 17 1/2"
Head: 12 1/2"
Chest: 12 3/4"

In short, perfect!