Birth Story {Part Three}

In case you missed them:  Part One // Part Two

At 5:15 P.M. the doctor was back for another check. I was genuinely excited for this check (as uncomfortable as they are- ugh!) because I was so sure we'd be getting close to go time. So when the doctor announced that I hadn't made ANY progress in the past 4 hours I immediately wanted to cry. She said she was going to go look at my other numbers and stats and think about our next plan of action and she'd be back. When she left the room I just remember looking at Jared and fearing the worst.

Sure enough, the doctor was back in about 15 minutes and she said, "I've looked at everything... Even though your contractions look great, what we have at this point is failure to progress. I think the best thing to do now is get this baby out of there. I'm recommending we go ahead with a c-section."

I instantly started shaking my head and pretty much freaking out, there's not really a better way to describe it. I looked at Jared and I think we both just felt completely helpless in that moment. I wanted him to tell me this wasn't happening, and he wanted to fix everything and it just wasn't possible. Jared asked the doctor to give us a couple minutes of privacy which I was so grateful for. When it was just the two of us I clung to him and cried. "I don't want surgery! I should have never been induced!"

Jared prayed over me and just held onto me until I gathered myself a little bit. We were both a wreck at that point; having a major surgery just wasn't on our radar. We already had an induction sprung on us the day before, and now we're headed into a c-section? It just felt like nothing was going right but what other option did we have? We wanted our baby here safe and sound and although it pained me to do so, I knew we just had to trust that this was the right decision.

Suddenly our room was a flurry of activity. Prepping someone for a c-section takes a huge team of people. Jared ran down the hall to let our parents know what was going on while multiple nurses prepped me for surgery. I was still emotional and I remember one nurse in particular wiping my tears for me after she put my surgical hairnet on. She was sweet and tried to comfort me by reminding me that we were getting close to meeting our son. I couldn't wait to meet him, but it was also hard to feel excited in that moment when I was also terrified out of my mind. I didn't know it at the time, but one of the nurses snapped this photo and while terribly unflattering, it sums up how I was feeling in those moments.

Before I knew it I was being wheeled back into surgery. Jared had to wait outside the operating room for a few minutes which definitely felt like forever. The bright lights and the harsh contrast of this room compared to our labor room was almost too much to handle. I was feeling nervous, anxious, a little loopy from whatever medicine they were pumping into me and starting to feel sick to my stomach as well. After they got me on the operating table I remember asking, in practically a whisper, for someone to get me something because I thought I was going to be sick. Without anything in my stomach it wasn't really possible but dry heaving was almost just as bad.

Jared finally joined me and started talking to me immediately. He sat right by my head and held my hand as the team continued to get ready for surgery. I had a minor fever right before surgery so they stuck this weird thermometer sticker on my forehead to keep track of my temperature throughout the process. I was feeling so out of it by the time they started surgery. People were talking to me and I couldn't really focus on what they were saying or asking me. When they did the prick test to make sure I was numb I remember just staring into this woman's face and not knowing what in the world she wanted me to say. I think I just said "what?" over and over again before closing my eyes and fading out for a minute.

The surgery started and I continued to fade in and out, trying to respond to Jared as he talked to me but barely being able to focus. My fever was climbing rapidly which was making me burn through the painkillers much faster than normal. It's normal and even expected that you're going to feel a lot of pressure during a c-section, but at times the pain and pressure was so much that it felt like I was going to come up off the table! Once the doctors realized this, they continually upped the morphine throughout the surgery. If I wasn't loopy to begin with, I certainly was now.

Finally- the doctors just about had him out and they were telling me he was almost here. One of them hollered, "Any final weight guesses, mom and dad?" Somehow I was with it enough to say, "Seven pounds" and before I knew it Tyler was born on Thursday, May 26th at 6:45 P.M. and Jared was telling me, "He's here! He's here!" The nurses took him to be weighed and lo and behold, he weighed seven pounds exactly.

I was still fading in and out but I heard a cry and I heard everyone saying he was perfect. I turned to Jared and randomly said, "Does he have hair?" I'm pretty sure that made Jared chuckle ;) Somehow my camera came into the operating room with us (Zero recollection of how that happened) and a couple nurses did a great job taking photos for us, which I will cherish forever. Everything was such a whirlwind, I'm glad there are photos of the first few moments of our son's life.

Jared got to hold him while they finished surgery and finished putting me back together. I was having some double vision and it was breaking my heart that I couldn't really tell what my baby looked like yet. I kept trying to focus on him but the room was still feeling like one big blur to me. It took a pretty long time to finish up surgery and finally at 7:54 P.M. I got to hold my son for the first time.

It was instant love. All the craziness, all the trauma, all the pain- it was worth it. It truly was. He was here, he was healthy and he was perfect. Thank you God for this blessing! Jared and I just cried happy tears and smiled that our little family was together and everyone was okay. Our hospital stay was longer due to the c-section and the concern about my fever leading to an infection to me and/or Tyler, but thankfully it didn't. We were so excited to leave finally on Sunday and start our new life together.