On Tuesday March 10, 2009 at 2:00 A.M. I awoke to the exclamations of my wife “Gushing! Gushing! My water broke.” My first thought? “Crap. I haven’t packed my hospital bag yet.” We spent the next 45 min getting our stuff together, not in a panic but with expidiant purpose. We rolled into the hospital emergency room enterance at 3:00 A.M.
After getting processed, tagged and in the labor delivery room we watched the monitor as Marisa’s contractions came every 1-2 minutes. By 6:00 A.M. she was dialated to 4cm and we were informed that the anestisiologist was on the floor with another delivery and could administer the epidural. At this point Marisa decided that the pain was about at the max of her ability to handle, and increasing, and the 22 contaractions an hour was a getting to be a bit much. The epidural was a saving grace and would later be the key to avoiding a C-Section.
Once the epidural was working Marisa, and I, could get some rest. She continued to dilate to 8 cm fairly quickly but seemed to hold there. At around 9:00 A.M. we watched Water Boy to take our minds off things as the progesterone was administered to “help things along.” Shortly after 11:00 A.M. the delivery nurse called the doctor and had Marisa start to push, push, push.
At around 11:40 another nurse came in and the discussion centered around Jeffrey’s heart rate dropping after each push. In a normal delivery the heart rate drops during the contraction but Jeffrey’s was dropping after when it should be coming up. When the doctor arrived a few minutes after the the nurses had Marisa stop pushing things really stepped up.
Shortly after resuming pushing the doctor decided that some assistance was needed. So out came the sucker. The vacuum helped but not enough. Jeffrey would slip back in and never quite cross the threshold. At around 1:00 P.M. our doctor told us that if Marisa was unsuccessful in pushing Jeffrey out in the next contraction we would need to move to the OR for a C-Section.
Marisa gives four big pushes and Jeffrey slides back in. Undaunted the doctor and nurses all agree to use the vacuum one last time. As the contraction begins and Marisa pushes her third push the doctor is able to reach her fingers around Jeffrey’s head and pull him out. It happened so fast that Marisa didn’t even realize he was out till she saw him laying on her belly.