Lydia Rae

Our little Miss is an angel and we are so glad she's here! I've been working on this post for the past two weeks, and I think it's about time I got it posted. So here it is, the beginning of Lydia's story:

 I was really excited when at my 36 week appointment I was already dilated to 1 cm, and about 50% effaced. That was more progress than 12 hours before Thayne was born and guaranteed ineligibility for drugs like Cervadil. The next 2 weeks I was at 2 cm.  At about 38 weeks, the Braxton Hicks contractions really started picking up. They would be light-medium in intensity and continue for about 3 hours every day and fade away. By my 39 week appointment, I was at 3 cm and about 60% effaced. I was certain real labor would come any day. Thankfully it did not.

Thayne was feverish and quite sick the week before, and both Tyler and I caught his stomach bug that week. It was awful. It started on Monday with all the aches and pains of fever, without an actual rise in temperature. We were constantly nauseous and in and out of the bathroom all day and night, had absolutely no energy, and the mixed in contractions were not very fun. By Thursday I was feeling quite a bit better. My Mom drove in that afternoon, and Scott, and Jana came that afternoon/evening for a work conference Scott had the next day.

Friday I felt awesome and was mentally and physically back on board the I-want-to-have-this-baby wagon. I had a baby shower with some ladies from church Friday evening and came home even more eager to meet my little girl. That night I was sure I was in labor. I woke up with contractions and tried to sleep through them, but they were pretty intense. I didn't want to get too excited so I didn't let my self look at the clock until I was sure they weren't going away. At that point, contractions were 7-8 minutes apart, with good intensity.  I was about to wake Tyler up and had my mental list of last minute things to grab, but it was not to be. They lasted for 45 minutes after I started timing them. Then they were gone.

Saturday morning, we had breakfast with all our Southwick family (minus Jason and Leah, and plus my Mom). It was an amazing breakfast at a restaurant just minutes away from our house. I was really grateful everyone was willing to come out to us. I wasn't particularly eager to venture far from home after the night I'd had. Chris and Siri headed back to their place so Chris could study, and everyone else came back to our place for the afternoon. I was starting to have regular contractions when Scott and Jana headed back for Spokane around 3:00ish. These contractions didn't die out.

We started timing contractions around 4:30, and they were pretty consistent at 5 minutes apart with lots of good downward pressure. Taylor and Martha had been talking about heading home, but decided to stick around our place for a bit longer at this point. We called the Midwife around 5:30, and she said we should come on in to the hospital just to see where things were at. I was really skeptical about the whole thing. The contractions were good ones, but not super intense and to think that my body could just go into labor on it's own after my experience with Thayne was hard to believe. Tyler and my Mom scurried around to gather things up and I just kept bouncing on my exercise ball praying that this could really be it. The contractions seemed to slow down in the excitement of getting ready to go, and I was terrified (that's the closest word I can think of) that they were going to go away, just like they had so many times before. Tyler and my Mom convinced me they were real, and we got in the car and Thayne stayed at our house with Taylor, Martha, and Nelli. The contractions were back to 5 minutes apart during the drive to the hospital, and continued through being weighed and getting changed, and then stopped the second I was hooked up to the monitors.

I was really trying to will the contractions back

My Midwife showed up, and I was dilated to 4 cm, and she was confident the contractions would return and I could be admitted with a little walking. So walk we did! The three of us walked the halls for an hour. I would stop and squat through the contractions hanging onto either the hand rail along the wall or onto Tyler (when I would use the handrail Ty would squat right with me. It was really cute) and I'd hold the squat after the contraction, just to help open things up and encourage Little Miss to stay Anterior. At the end of my hour, the contractions were regular, strong, and I was dilated to 6 cm. We were admitted and moved from the triage room/hallways to our luxurious birthing suite. The labor and delivery room was beautiful. There was ample space to walk around, an oversize Jacuzzi tub that was part of the room with an optional curtain instead of crammed into the bathroom, a fold out bench in the shower, and a super nice nurse. The tub was being filled and they were just going to get an emergency IV Port in my arm before I got lost in the soothing jets and warm water. My veins had a different plan.

 I sat on the peanut shaped exercise ball (which was actually quite nice) and the nurse prepared to get the IV in between contractions. Contraction. Attempt #1 in left arm. Fail. Contraction. Attempt #2 in left arm. Fail. Contraction. Attempt #1 in right arm. Fail. Contraction. Now these were good ole contractions coming in and out at this point and they were good ole needle jabs too. Baby and my body were doing a great job getting ready to deliver little Miss. I was doing great, just relaxing through every contraction and doing my best to ignore the needles digging into my arms. Another nurse was called and came in, she put the tourniquets back on, and looked for a potential vein for my port. Apparently there was little to see and she called the anesthesiologist in. I broke down. Tears were flowing and I felt so overwhelmed and helpless. For my mom, most of my sisters, and myself during Thayne's birth, 6 or 7 cm to Transition is a matter of a few contractions. So there I was; intense contractions with the most intense potentially right around the corner, and my arms feeling more like pin cushions than appendages. Tyler came over and started stroking my hair telling me it was going to be ok and I was doing great and my Mom rubbed my back and shoulders. The anesthesiologist came in and started flicking my arms to find a good vein and then numbed my left arm. Thank goodness! I couldn't watch what he was actually doing, but I did watch his head as he attempted to get the catheter in and kept shaking it with each failed attempt. He prepped and numbed my right arm. There were a couple head shakes, and then success as the catheter slipped into a vein on my hand. Done.

10 days after the birth, and the bruises were almost gone

We put a lovely plastic arm glove on my right arm to protect the port and I finally got to slip into the lovely Jacuzzi tub. The plastic glove was short lived with a promise to keep my hand out of the water.

This is the best smile I could muster after the IV ordeal

 I absolutely felt like Little Miss was working with me and my body as contractions eased up in the midst of the IV fiasco and stayed that way as I sat in the tub and recouped. That was wonderful. We had just a few lights on and the Josh Groban Pandora station playing on Tyler's phone. The nurse would periodically come and kneel next to the tub and hold a monitor on my belly to check Little Miss's heart rate, which was leaps and bounds better than having monitors continuously strapped to me. I talked to Jill for a bit on the phone. My midwife sat and talked with us. My mom rubbed lavender on the pillow I was leaning on and I just enjoyed my little spa time as I let the contractions come and my body prepared to deliver Little Miss. I enjoyed laying back for a while and then switched to more of a kneeling squat while leaning over the side of the tub to help open things up. After about an hour and a half or so in the tub, I felt ready to get things moving again. My body and Little Miss were right on board with me.

The contractions hadn't escalated much during my soaking time and gradually increased as I got out and started leaning against Tyler with my arms around his neck, swaying and breathing through contractions. My Mom joked that we just looked like we were slow dancing with our Josh Groban music and she and the nurse were just watching. My Midwife came and I got on the bed to check where I was at. As she was checking me, I heard her say, "Oh, I think her water just broke" and sure enough the fluids came a gushing. I think this is when transition started. Lori, the midwife, helped drain the fluid by pushing on different areas of my belly in order to help keep an even pressure on Little Miss during contractions without pockets of water cushioning some areas and not others. That was surprisingly intense. I think Tyler and my Mom's hands have almost recovered from how hard I was squeezing them at that point.

We raised the head of the bed and I got up and kneeled as I leaned against the top of the bed. That was definitely transition. It was intense. I remember Lori asked me if I wanted to try a different position, and I did, but it was just so intense I didn't really know how to move into another position. I asked for a squatting bar, and Lori and the nurse got that set up at the bottom of the bed. As I started holding the bar and squatting, I could feel a lot of pressure, and I was fighting it. I felt what I would call half-pushing contractions. I felt like I had to do something, but they weren't full blown, I-can't-control-it, pushing contractions. I started saying, "I'm kind of pushing," and then after a couple of those I let everything relax and all the sudden it turned into, "I"M PUSHING!" After about two pushing contractions, I remember hearing the Midwife very calmly saying, "Alison, listen to me. You need to sit back a little, or your baby is going to be born into the bed." I leaned back into a semi-reclined position and pushed as another contraction came. I remember someone saying, "She has hair!" There was another contraction and then I felt a release of pressure and I emphatically asked, "Was that a head?!" The response sounded just as surprised as I felt and someone said, "Yup, that's a head!" Another small push, and I felt her body slip out and she was immediately placed on my chest. I couldn't stop saying, "Oh my gosh! My baby!" I honestly couldn't believe that that was it. I was done! We did it!

I was in shock and couldn't believe she was actually ON me and not IN me. Also a little concerned about her blue and purpleness

Tyler looked at the clock as soon as she came out and it was 11:59 and 30 seconds. She was officially born March 2, 2013. She was on me. She was perfect and bluish purple with her bright blue cord still pulsing.  The placenta came out soon after, and we waited until the cord stopped pulsing before Tyler cut it. Her hair was so thick and long! Her feet, fingers, and toes were so long compared to her little skinny body. We waited for her to start breathing, and after what felt like forever, she took her first breath. She needed a little bit of suctioning to get fluid out since she didn't really cough or cry (a trait that took about 10 days to overcome) but was breathing well on her own. She was so calm and peaceful. We had come to the hospital with two names in mind, and when we looked at her she was unquestionably our little Lydia Rae. I snuggled and held her close for about 15 minutes and then nursed her. After all of that, Tyler finally got a chance to hold her.

 It was about an hour after she was born before she was measured and weighed. She was 8 lbs 1 oz and 20 1/2 inches long.

 

 

Everything was so calm the peaceful through labor and after she was born. My Mom snuggled and held Lydia before she headed back to our house for the night.

The nurse used my IV port to give me a syringe full of pitocin to help my uterus contract down and I started on the Ibprophen soon after. I like post-partum pain relief. We didn't get a whole lot of sleep that night, but got lots of Lydia snuggles.

This is how Tyler slept the first half of the night even though there was a bed, just so he could hold her. 

They moved us to the post-partum room around 7 the next morning and Thayne, my Mom, Taylor, Martha, and Nelli came around 10. Thayne looked at Lydia for a second and then got really excited about the rocks outside the window. Nelli, on the other-hand, adored Lydia and wanted nothing but to hold her. Every once in a while Thayne would see Nelli with Lydia, and say, "No! My baby sis-er!"

 Taylor, Martha, and Nelli left and Lydia still hadn't had a bath. She really wasn't too gunky, but the long hair under her hat looked like it recently went through a birthing. We weren't sure why the nurses were taking so long to get her bathed, so my Mom gave her a mini bath and washed her hair. About an hour later she had her real bath in the nursery. 

So much hair to wash!

Siri came by around noon and took some gorgeous pictures (I'll have to get those put in here later, it's getting late) and brought some excellent treats and presents for Thayne and Lydia. Thayne loves his new airplane. 

We had to stay at in the hospital for least 24 hours after her birth, but since that was midnight, we didn't leave until Monday morning when we could get the clear from her pediatrician and my midwife.

I absolutely love everything about her birth. The hospital was fantastic, the nurses were beyond wonderful, and my midwife was an angel. I loved that the hospital's main objective during labor was to provide the resources I needed to wiggle and sway that baby down, and then allow the skin-on-skin bonding and nursing once she was out. There was no rush to weigh and measure her, and she never left our room until Tyler went with her for her bath in the nursery the next day.

I didn't need the support of Husband, Mom, and Sisters in the room as much as I expected. I mostly just needed Tyler, and he was absolutely perfect. As the nurses told us, we were a great team. I would tell him the affirmations I needed, and he would repeat them back to me. There were lots of times where I would say, "Tell me I'm strong," "Ali, you're strong," "And I can do this?" "Ali, you can do this and you're doing amazing!" And to my Mom, the nurse, and the midwife he'd say, "Isn't she doing great?"

My Midwife was completely there to support my birth, and not there making a birth experience for me.  She was so calm through everything. She was in the room more than she was gone, even with another patient delivering that night. She was adapting to my movements and positions to check me from transition on and was making sure Lydia's head was in just the right position as she came out. I had no episiotomy and no tearing. I really couldn't have asked for a better Midwife.

My Mom is wonderful. I am so glad she was there. I felt like I needed her to be able to get through labor and delivery, but she let me see for myself that Tyler and I pretty much had things under control. She gave us our space and only stepped in here and there to offer needed support and nice Lavender smells.

I feel like I absolutely had the perfect balance. I feel like I had just as much freedom as a home birth with the security of being in a setting that could respond to an emergency if needed. And let's be honest, the hospital had far better amenities than my house and they were far better equipped to clean up the mess that naturally comes with birthing. Labor was really only about an hour to an hour and a half of feeling super intense and I think I prolonged that feeling by fighting those half-pushing contractions. Next time I won't fight it. And that hour to an hour and a half was SO worth it. I would not classify any of labor and delivery as painful, just very intense. Lydia has been an unbelievably calm baby, and I feel like a big part of that is due to the calm and peaceful experience we had in getting her here.

Lydia is perfect, and we couldn't be happier with our family of four!