I can't believe I just celebrated my daughter's 1st Birthday and that I am just now finishing this! (Today is actually MY birthday haha! How's that for a coincidence?!) It has been and incredible year. I couldn't be more in love with my daughter- she is silly, smart, strong willed (how does that happen so young!?) and she is the most loving little girl I've ever seen. Seriously- she tries to hug and kiss every animal she comes across (real and fake) and loves to give me hugs and wet kisses. To sum up motherhood for me: I love every minute of it! That's not to say that every minute as a mom is pure bliss, but I think because of our son, I
Ok... enough of the sappy self relfection... lets get to her birth story. I actually started putting this post together when Averie was about 2 weeks old. I went through all my facebook and instagram posts and put them into a working draft so I wouldn't forget any details. I was also smart enough the night that I was giving birth to leave notes for myself in my phone. (Ok, I shouted them at my husband and HE put them in my phone... tomato/tomahto.) Going back today and reading all my notes, I'm surprised how much I've already forgotten. I haven't forgotten the pain of childbirth! That part isn't true!!! I guess I'm not that lucky haha, although it IS true that the end result is so worth the pain. (But I'd still like to not have to go through all that pain if there ever was a way!)
March 10th:
You can read the post I wrote before going to the hospital here. My husband and I decided that we wanted to spend the last few hours before heading to the hospital surrounded by family. It was pretty fun, we ate pizza and went around the room talking to the video camera telling Averie how excited we were to meet her. Kevin even gave me a push present! It's something I have always wanted: a Tiffany's heart bracelet! Later I can get it engraved with Averie's birth date but for now, I just pick it up and drool over it from time to time.
8:44 PM: "Heading to the hospital now... Oh Crap"
I was nervous the entire day. I couldn't sit still and i kept re-packing my hospital bag. When we got to the hospital we were the only ones in the entire birthing unit so we had all the nurses fawning over us- not something i hated! I do remember there were a few minutes Kevin left me alone to do some paperwork and I was supposed to be changing into my hospital gown. I had this overwhelming urge to run... I kept thinking "nope, I'm just not going to do this" and I just sat on my bed. When Kevin came back and saw that i was freaking out, he helped calm me down by talking about how excited he was to meet our daughter, asking me what she was going to look like, who was going to win the pool... and before i knew it, i was changed and ready to be hooked up to the monitors and my IV was done! The nurse asked me why my blood pressure was so high, and I told her I was nervous about the pain. She told me not to worry, that was something they could control and even though I knew she wasn't 100% right, it did help me relax. When we were alone, Kevin took this photo and put it on his Instagram account:
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| You can see that I was reluctantly smiling in the bottom right picture... but I'm always camera ready! |
10:00 PM: "They're trying to make me sleep!?"
I had my 1st round of psydotech and ambien to make me sleep. It didn't work. I pretended to sleep because the nurses kept giving me a hard time when they would come in to check on me. Kevin had no trouble sleeping... he never does.
MARCH 11th:
4:34 AM: "This drug is supposed to get this show on the road. Also, Ambien is useless"
I was given my 2nd round of psydotech. I was given this drug every 4 hours to help dilate me. By the 2nd or 3rd time i was aware that things weren't going as quickly as my doctor would have liked. The nurses reassured me that it usually takes a couple rounds of psydotech to get dilated. Again, I didn't sleep even with meds.
8:51 AM: "Never thought I'd be rooting for more pain! Lets do this Averie"
Despite all my dilational thoughts (again, that's a thing) I was only at 1cm. My doctor ordered one more does of psydotech to see if that would help progress things, otherwise I was going to be sent home to progress on my own. This is not something I wanted, but it also meant I could have something I really wanted... COFFEE!!!
10:11 AM: (From Kevin) "12 hours from being Induced and she's feeling some mean contractions"
It was like a switch was suddenly flipped on and I was feeling some pain. It wasn't as bad as he described at first, it felt a lot like when my cysts would burst- but like they were bursting every 10 minutes or so. I wasn't sure how much I was dilated but I could tell something was happening because the contractions wouldn't let up. When our doctor came in to check me, she was happy which meant I wasn't going to be sent home! I was 2cm! There was a moment when I was thinking "that's it!? It hurts this much for 2cm!?" Oh man... silly Cheyenne... I had no idea.
12:39 PM: (From Kevin) "They just broke her water and she's begun labor! Hoping for a speedy process!"
Famous last words! If only labor was something to be so excited about... but he's a man and has no clue how true labor is to it's name. The actual breaking of my water was somewhat of a spectator event... they took what looked like a giant crochet hook and broke my water. The gush of fluid that came out was almost comical. If my labor was a cartoon, breaking my water would have flooded the entire birthing floor and carried my doctor out floating on the door Jumanji style. There was So. Much. Fluid. I literally soaked my doctor's sleeve up past her elbow and heard some fluid fall on the floor. Apparently, that solved the mystery of why i was so big. For whatever reason, I had a crapton (again... that's a real word!) of fluid in there! Averie was super cushioned I guess! Every time someone checked me, they would get an elbow full of fluid... i did try and warn them (for the record!)
Our families spent half the time in the waiting room and half the time filling up our birthing suite. My initial request was to have no one in the room but Kevin and I, (I mean, it was only us when we made the baby!) but he kept inviting them back in. Sometimes it was ok, but others I just didn't want to focus on anything but my contractions. There were a few times where they were all getting loud and I had to stop myself from yelling at them to get out. The next 3 hours were kind of a blur... My pain progressed REALLY quickly...
For the 1st hour I tried to be a trooper and breathe through each contraction (which were only minutes apart). At one point I was experiencing the beginning of the more intense contractions and my mother in law made a comment about it being a big one- she was watching my monitor while I was trying to work my way though it (for some reason, when people are around me I fear making noise when I'm in pain) and I swear I almost hit her. She says I threatened to throw something at her, I don't remember it that way... I just know I wanted everyone OUT! Luckily, I never had to be the bad guy... our nurse would always come check on me at the right time and kick everyone out. She was the best nurse I had. If only Kev had stopped bringing them back in!!! Next time will be different for sure. It's in writing now, so that's official right?
The 2nd hour I asked for IV meds. I don't remember what they were called but right as I was getting them a friend from church stopped by. I love this woman dearly, so I didn't mind her visit at all. She sat with us and talked a bit, and prayed with us. I don't remember much about the visit truthfully, and i probably acted like a drunk person- it was so hard to even keep my eyes open during her visit from the IV meds. They didn't really take away my pain from contractions, but it made me care less about them haha!
The 3rd hour I was in so much pain that I literally lost control of my body. I was shaking from head to toe. I couldn't control my breathing, my limbs... anything. These contractions are still what haunt me... i would get a break for about 2 minutes but then I would feel the burning pain in my stomach as it slowly spread out to the rest of my body. I was shaking so violently that my husband called the nurse and I had no choice but to ask for an epidural. Despite the fact that my goal was to avoid an epidural, the pain was the worst I have ever felt in my entire life. I literally thought I was going to see a creature rip its way out of my belly Alien style.
3:20 PM: "Oh. My.Gosh!!! Everyone get an epidural... Don't even mess around!!!"
I finally cracked at 3pm and begged for the anesthesiologist. It took about 15 minutes for him to come in and it felt like 15 hours. I was shaking so violently that it took 3 nurses and my husband to move me into position to get the epidural. I couldn't talk but the way they were holding me hurt almost as much as the contractions. They basically want you to lean over the side of the bed and hug your belly... something i couldn't do at the time so they held me in position but they were pushing me so far forward it felt like my belly went into my throat and I couldn't breathe. The only plus side to all this pain was I didn't care about the giant needle going into my back. I didn't even feel it.
I was a little down that i got the epidural but one quick memory of how much pain i was in and i get over it pretty quickly. You do what you need to do to get through things sometimes, and there's no shame in an epidural. I had to keep reminding myself that I'm not having a natural labor in the 1st place, so why put myself through unnatural amounts of pain?
4:38 PM: (From Kevin) No baby yet, our job is to nap and progress. G'night"
This time i was able to sleep. Almost right away I could feel a tingling (not the good kind) in my who-ha (that's my term for my lady business and I'm sticking to it!) but I figured it was just the catheter they make you get once you have an epidural. I'd never had one before so I didn't know if that's what it felt like when it was working but I was so tired I summed it up to that and went to sleep.
5:51 PM: "Pitocin is a dirty word"
They checked me again (and got another wave of fluid on my 2nd nurse of the day) and I was only around 3cm so they decided to start me on Pitocin and up my dosage every half hour to an hour depending on how far I progressed. I couldn't believe i was only at 3cm for the amount of paid i had been in only an hour before. Up to that point Averie was doing great, so they wanted to do things gradually. I agreed since i was pretty tired of being in labor. The pain in my lady land was gradually getting stronger but I figured it was normal, and it would eventually stop because of the epidural. My doctor did let me know that this wouldn't be the quick 12 hour procedure I had read about, that we would probably be at this well into the night, but she was still confident that March 11th was going to be Averie's birthday.
6:00 PM: "Thank you to everyone who is following our journey and supporting us!!! I'ts incredible! -with Kevin Protz"
My discomfort had plateaued around this time and stayed that way for about 2 hours. We played the rotating family in and out of my room game for a while. Then I got a lot of sleep (thanks to a note my nurse put on our door to keep unwanted visitors out). Around 7:00 I started to feel the pain growing from my abdomen to the rest of my body again. It didn't feel like contractions, it felt like a constant burning pressure all over my body. By 7:30pm i was in so much pain I couldn't breathe again, all I could do was shake and cry. It never occurred to either of us to check and see what my contractions were doing.
Kevin hit the nurse call button and asked for help but 30 minutes went by and no one came. He hit the button again and we waited another 20 minutes and no one came. While we were waiting he went to get my mom for me who came and sat with me while he tried to find someone to help me. At some point my brother in law came in and i couldn't even open my eyes to see him, all i could do was cry. I could hear him whispering to Kevin and later he told me he was so scared when he saw me in that much pain, that he had his back flat against the wall, like he was scared to get near me.
The last time he hit the call button they could hear me writhing in pain in the background and came rushing in. My poor husband, he looked so worried for me and I know he felt helpless. It was the first time I've ever seen my husband scared. He is always so calm and collected, but I could hear it in his voice that he was mad at them for taking so long.
When the anesthesiologist finally came in, he thought the tube had come out but it turns out my body just processes pain medication really quickly (which i did tell them, but even I wouldn't have guessed an epidural would wear off in 4 hours!) he upped my doseage but that didn't work either. He ended up having to give me the medication women get when they are having a C-section.
When our nurse came in to check me again (and got her title wave of fluid bath) around 9:00 pm she started laughing. I was super confused so I asked what was so funny and she said "No wonder you were in so much pain! You went from 3cm to 6cm in one hour!" My husband and I looked at each other in shock... it never occurred to me that all that pain was because something was actually happening haha! It was one of those ah-ha moments and suddenly i was so proud of my body!
9:48 PM: (From Kevin) "Still no baby yet, HOME STRETCH... hopefully"
I assumed since i progressed 3cm in an hour that I would be having the baby in about an hour and a half. The nurse thought that was funny too. With the help of the mega-epidural I was able to rest but I was still pretty uncomfortable. I could still move my feet and my toes tingled but it was better than the 1st time around. She said she would be back in a few hours to check me again.
Around 10:30pm my husband and I were watching TV and I had the overwhelming urge to throw up. This is not a foreign concept to me or my husband for that matter so he was able to act quickly and gave me a bucket right as I vomited. I knew that was weird since I hadn't had any actual food or water for over 12 hours but I figured it was just my
Kevin called my 3rd nurse of the day in and I told her what happened. She kind of laughed at me for thinking it was happening so soon. My doctor had gone home at this point. There was an on-call doctor but he wasn't at the hospital. I just had this feeling in my gut that it was time and sure enough, when the nurse checked she looked shocked.... and a little unsure of what to do. She told me to keep my knees together tightly and when I did it she looked shocked again "you can move your legs yourself? It shouldn't have worn off yet" Oh... great...
11:19 PM: (From Kevin) "Getting ready to push!"
I guess most first time moms take a while (some times hours) to even be ready to push, so what felt like hours of me holding my knees together fighting the urge to push was probably only 15 minutes. The nurse left to call the doctor and get another nurse to help. When she came back she still wasn't moving as fast as i would have liked (I may have muttered something about the doctor coming in a horse and buggie) but she was definitely aware of what my body was doing. She told me to try a couple "practice" pushes and when I did she had to tell me to stop right away. This baby was coming people, doctor present or not.
It took only a few minutes for them to transform my hospital bed into a birthing station, all while Kev stood next to me and held my hand. It was SO HARD not to push... i was literally fighting against my body's natural instincts. I started pushing at exactly 11:30 and it wasn't until 11:45 that our doctor finally arrived. When he came in he was talking to me like we were old friends grabbing coffee, super causal and he was joking around making fun of some of the things i was yelling. Kevin could tell this part of the story better, all i remember is keeping my eyes shut SO tight while I pushed. It hurt, but not nearly as bad as the contractions did.
The 2nd epidural had completely worn off by this time so i felt everything. I had read that when you finally push the baby's head out it feels like a ring of fire... let's just say its such an accurate description that i said it out loud... and the doctor made fun of me. I was too busy to be mad at the time (but i was plenty mad after!) He kept trying to get Kevin to go look at what was happening and I remember gripping his hand so tight to keep him up with me. I lost in the end, because he really wanted to look and he did right as the head came out.
The funniest part about this is Kevin's narrative of events... he said the back and forth between the doctor and I was pretty entertaining. He said when he decided to look, he could see some of her head and it didn't seem very big and then all the sudden the head popped out and he imagined a "pop" noise going off at the same time (like when you use your finger inside your mouth haha) and all the sudden this HUGE head was out... he said the rest of her kind of slid out... not the most glamorous description I've ever heard, but after watching some birthing videos i know it was the most accurate. The best part? I didn't poop!!!! Wooo hooo!!!
11:50 PM: Averie was born!
That last update didn't happen in real time haha but it was exactly 20 minutes of pushing and then she was here. I didn't even realize she was out... it all just burned the same and all the sudden they were yelling at me to open my eyes and look down. I'll never forget the moment I laid eyes on my beautiful little cheeky girl... and I wish I could think of some poetic way to describe the way that love for this little human you created washes over you. It's so instinctual and so raw... and so beautiful all at the same time. You just know that you would do anything for this little human right away, it's sort of like the end of the Grinch movie... when his heart grows 3 sizes. She didn't even cry, she was such a chill baby from the start, and she still is now. Her Apgar score was 9.
MARCH 12th
12:01 AM: First photo with Mama (via Instagram)
Right after she was born, a lactation consultant came in and helped me to get Averie to latch. It wasn't so easy (something I've talked about in length on here so I'll skip all that). While I was trying to get Averie to eat the Dr and nursing staff were working on getting the placenta to deliver. It was uncomfortable to have them push on my stomach but it wasn't so bad. The strange thing was when it came out and the Dr held it up and said "Huh... I've never seen this before." I had 2 placentas!!!!
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| Here is what my belly looked like the night I went in to be induced. |
That is another reason my pregnant belly was so big! Between my under 5' frame, the TONS of fluid and 2 freakin placentas I never had a chance to have a regular sized belly haha! As strange as this is, no amount of googling has helped me figure out why. The Dr didn't even know, which is slightly disconcerting but he did say that is probably why I had tested positive for GD and needed insulin. Our 1st reaction was to remember the episode of The Office where Dwight talks about absorbing his twin to be doubly awesome...the Dr shot that down right away, there was no twin... just some weird thing that happened.
After the placenta debacle, he had to give me some local anesthetic and sew me up. This part could be TMI for some so feel free to skip it: I had a 2nd degree tear from trying to push her out. I felt everything! Unfortunately my epidural had completely worn off at this point and the local didn't work. Still, it wasn't scream worthy, it was just uncomfortable. No one tells you what it feels like after having the baby- they tell you all about childbirth (which is the lest sexy experience of my life) but when you deliver a baby vaginally it feels like someone took a baseball bat to your junk... it hurts to cough, to sit up, to use the restroom... it's literally the worst pain I've felt in my life, and for me it lasted 2 full weeks post pardum.
After we got about an hour alone with her Kevin went and got all of our family in the waiting room and they all took turns holding her. Here are her first photos:
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| Averie Belle 7lbs 4oz, 18" long |
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| Lovin on daddy |
Once I got settled in I fell right asleep. In fact, the nurses had to come in and wake me up a few times that night to tell me to feed the baby. I was so exhausted it never occurred to me that I would have to feed her again lol I was happy to do it though, and each time we needed some help getting her latched. Kev said it was pretty bizarre to watch someone else's hands all over my chest and me act like it was totally normal. I guess looking back it was, but now after over a year of nursing I just whip them out without thinking. There is a part of me that still feels super un-sexy because my boobs are no longer that sexual thing... they're her "milkies" and that's it... I'm hoping one day they'll feel like a part of my appeal again.
In the morning, Averie was about 12 hours old, the lactation consultant came in to check how I did overnight feeding the baby. When she looked at Averie she said "she looks a little yellow doesn't she?" I had never seen a newborn in person before so I didn't know what color was normal, but she looked fine to me and Kev. The next thing we knew there was a pediatrician in our room saying they wanted to examine our daughter based on a recommendation from the lactation consultant.
Right away he said that she looked really yellow, and he thought it was weird that she kept sleeping through her foot pricks (they had to test both of our blood sugar levels every few hours because of the GD) and he ordered another test to check her bilirubin levels. He was back in less than an hour to tell us that her levels were really high, dangerously high to be exact, and they whisked her away to the NICU... just like that.
I was left alone in our room while Kevin went with them, not knowing or understanding anything that was happening, just that family was on their way to visit a baby that just got taken from my care. I started to freak out but I really didn't know what any of that meant or even where in the hospital this place was that they were taking my baby. Right then my mother in law and brother in law came to see the baby and I had to swallow everything and try to act calm. I told them what was going on but I couldn't answer all their questions and ended up asking them to leave.
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| This is Averie under the bililights and her "sleep mask" |
It was over an hour before I was able to go see Averie in the NICU, they had her in an incubator and had a mask on her face that made her adorable chubby cheeks even more prominent. She looked like she was just sleeping peacefully but I broke down and started sobbing. The Dr came over to explain what was happening to me but I couldn't focus. All I heard was that I couldn't hold her... that she had to stay under those lights because they were somehow making her better. They also told me I couldn't nurse her... we didn't even have a chance to establish a nursing relationship yet, or have enough time to establish my supply. It was 3 whole days before I could hold her...
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| This was day 2 of being in the NICU |
It was insanely hard not to be around my baby every moment of the day while we were in the hospital. The only good thing was our room was very close to the NICU and we had the best nurses. They kept letting me hold her in this bili blanket longer than I was allowed to. I wasn't allowed to spend all my time in there so I would go see her every 2 hours to give her a bottle (we fed her a mixture of what I pumped and formula through the openings in the incubator). I would go back to my room and eat, pump and then get back to the NICU.
On the 3rd day we had to check out of the hospital without our baby. We even got special treatment from our nurses who "hid" me away in an unused room after I was discharged and made sure meals got brought to me. However, it was only for the remainder of that 3rd day so that night we had to pack up and go home without her. I don't know if I can ever really describe what this felt like... I cried the entire way home and then cried myself to sleep. I felt like my heart was being cut out of my chest. I couldn't stay at the hospital and I didn't want to be away from her for too long so we visited as late as we could- around 11pm (they don't allow parents to be present during the night shift change) and then we went back at 6am and then every 2 hours. On the 4th day they let me nurse her for the 1st time since she was 13 hours old. I was so happy she had no problem latching. (We had plenty of other nursing issues since then but she's always been a great latcher.)It lit a fire under me and I was there for every. single. feeding no matter what. I had it in my head that with every feeding, she was getting better.
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| Here I am, so proud after they let me nurse her for the 1st time in 3 days! |
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| She was pretty excited about eating with mommy too! |
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| So in love with my little beauty! |
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| Finally going home! |
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| Totally crying tears of joy in this photo! |
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| Home after her 1st feeding in her own room. We were all so happy! |
Averie has always been a happy baby, she literally came out smiling (everyone said it was gas, but they were wrong!) She has stayed our happy girl a year later. She is so smart! She knows a ton of words, and she knows some ASL signs, she LOVES animals, she likes to sing and talk, and she gives me a kiss every morning. She is literally the best thing that has ever happened to me, even on the hard days I just look at her and feel so grateful that she's even mine. When people ask me how she's doing I always say "she's the best... she's doing amazing" and it's always true!
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