Brynlee's Birth Story (Long Overdue!)

I have been meaning to post this for about 2 months (Wow, time flies!) but haven't gotten around to it till now! It's way too long and graphic

I had been having Braxton hicks contractions for several weeks, but since it wasn’t painful, just an uncomfortable tightening. Occasionally I would have some cramping in my back, like how it felt when I was in labor with Brooklyn, so I was hoping when I went to the Dr. on July 5^th that I would have progressed a little bit. He didn’t check me at the appt so I didn’t really know where I stood at that point. 

I worked the 10^th and 11^th, and then Wednesday night (the 11^th) went up to Lucy’s to watch So You Think You can Dance. I thought I kinda felt a weird sensation of fluid, but didn’t think much of it because I knew it wasn’t my water breaking. When I got home and went to the bathroom, there was some blood I figured I lost my mucus plug. The night went on mostly as normal, although I wondered if something might be up with the weird discharge. I took my heparin shot as normal at 11pm, thinking if anything were going on, it would be longer than 12 hours before it would be anything really serious. Curt and I were about to go to bed, I had brushed my teeth and had my PJ’s on, and then I realized that although we had talked about getting Slurpee’s since it was 7/11, we hadn’t done it. So at about 11:15, I popped up, went upstairs and told everyone we needed to go to Zip Trip and get Icee’s (that was the best we could do without a 7/11). In the process, I started having what felt like some contractions. There were in my back and were painful, but tolerable. Sam downloaded an App on her I-phone and we started tracking the contractions. They were 5-7 minutes apart while we went to get Icee’s and for a while afterwards, lasting about 45 seconds.

 I didn’t want to call the hospital prematurely, so I waited a while but they weren’t going away. After almost an hour, I called and the nurse told me to take a long, warm bath and drink a big glass of ice water and then time the contractions for 30 minutes afterwards and give her a call back, and if we didn’t call her back, she would assume they went away and we went to bed. The contractions continued in the bath. Afterwards, we timed them for about 20 minutes before calling and letting the nurse know they were 2-3 minutes apart lasting 45-50 seconds. She told us to come in. Even though we had talked about packing a hospital bag for weeks, I only had a few things put together so Curt ran through the house putting all the stuff we still needed together and Curt, my mom and I headed out the door at about 1am.

We got to the hospital about 1:30am. They checked me, I was dilated to 3.5-4 cm and almost fully effaced and they admitted me in active labor. They hooked up the monitors, put in an IV and Curt helped me focus on breathing through contractions. We asked about an epidural, but because I had had the heparin at 11pm, the anesthesiologist wouldn’t even consider doing an epidural for 12 hours after that, which would have been 11am. So, I figured that for at most the next 10 hours would be very painful and I would have to get through it pretty much medication free. At about 3am, the nurse offered me some IV fentanyl. The contractions were coming about 2 minutes apart and lasting about 60 seconds so I decided to have some to at least take a little edge off. 

I had been awake since 5:30am the day before since I had worked and I was exhausted (actually we all were!). The meds may have helped a little. I had them check me again a bit later and I was 6 cm dilated. I was hoping it was further since I was in so much pain, but just kept trying to breathe and get through the contractions one at a time. At 3:30am they gave me a dose of ampicillin, since I was group B strep positive. It is all a bit of a blur in here but around 5am, I was having so much pain. The contractions were so terrible. My mom said I was transitioning and I hoped that meant I was very close to having a baby. Brynlee’s heart rate dropped at this point (as it had a few other times and they would come in and reposition me), and the nurse was trying to get me to lay on my side, but both of my hips had a sudden terrible burning feeling. I couldn’t really stay on my side because of the pain and I said to Curt, “I can’t do this.” Obviously I didn’t really have much choice at this point. I thought I was getting the urge to push, but then I’m not sure if I was just trying to push hoping to get it over with faster. My water broke on it’s own at some point and would leak out with each contraction. At about 5:30, they checked me and I was almost fully dilated and was fully effaced and they said I could start pushing. The nurse, Ashley, that was coaching me during pushing was awesome. I pushed for 3 cycles during each contraction for about 20-25 minutes (skipping a couple contractions because I needed a break). They told me they could see Brynlee’s head with each pushing, but then it would go back up after I stopped pushing. That was frustrating, but also gave me the motivation to push harder to keep her from going back in. The doctor came in at about 5:50am and I pushed a few more times and even though it was super painful, I knew we were so close.

 I gave it everything I had and out came little Brynlee Ann at 6:03 am. We heard her cry soon after she was out and they put her on my chest to clean her up. The first thing we all noticed was how much dark hair she had! Someone asked “Has anyone check to make sure she is  a girl?” Curt lifted up the blanket and said, “Looks like a girl to me!” She weighed 7 lbz 7 oz and was 20 inches long. The doctor took over 30 minutes stitching me up which wasn’t a very fun process (3rd degree tear=No fun!), but Brynlee stayed in the room the whole time getting weighed, measured, etc so I tried to focus on her, even though it was hard. I was so worn out after everything that I could barely stay awake. I felt like I was in a total haze and after he took pictures of her and held her, Curt fell asleep. She laid on me for a while and it felt surreal.

 It all happened so fast I am still in awe at how our lives forever changed in such a short period of time. We are so blessed to have Brynlee Ann! She came out with a good set of lungs and used them frequently her first day of life outside the womb. But afterwards, she mostly just whimpered when she was being bothered. She slept most of the time in the hospital and didn’t eat as much as she should, so her bilirubin levels went up and she had to have it checked the day after getting out of the hospital. The first night, we were both so tired and I want to let Curt get some good sleep so I undressed Bryn down to her diaper and laid her directly and on chest (like the lactation nurse had told me to do for safety so I wouldn’t drop her when sleeping), and her and I slept like this for about 2 and a half hours. I don’t even think she made more than a peep. She is so sweet and snuggly and is such a special blessing in our lives! Brooklyn got to meet her the afternoon she was born. She wasn’t really sure what to think at first, but was very sweet with her. Brynlee also got to meet Sam and Trent, Troy, Tate, Grandpa, Nana, Madi, Papa and Lucy in the hospital. We are loving life with baby Brynlee and think she is just the sweetest, cutest little thing!