Sawyer's Birth Story

Disclaimer: I will be giving somewhat graphic details, so don't read if you don't like that sort of thing. ;)

On the night of Wednesday, April 13th I wasn't feeling too great. I ended up sleeping on the couch for a couple of hours while Casey was at our youth service, Momentum. When he came home he could tell I wasn't in the best mood and I already wanted to go to bed, even though it was only around 9:30pm. We went to bed eventually and I woke up around 1:30am tossing and turning. I just felt like I couldn't get comfortable. I would roll over and that felt a little painful in my back, which I did think was odd, but I had had some back pain earlier in my pregnancy, so I figured it was just the weight of my belly hurting my back. I fell back asleep several times and would wake up again and again and roll over or get up out of bed to use the restroom. I complained to Casey that I just couldn't get comfortable. I was getting pretty upset about losing so much sleep since I had to work the next day. Around 2:15am Casey told me to stay awake for a little bit and tell him if I had some pain. I kept getting up and going to the bathroom because I felt like I just needed to have a bowel movement. Casey had been timing my pain though and eventually told me that I had been having pain for about 1 minute and that it had come back every 5 to 7 minutes. We decided then to call the doctor that was on-call (he works at the same practice as my own doctor). The on-call doctor asked me a few questions and told me to watch my "contractions" for another 30 minutes or an hour. He didn't seem to sure that I was in labor, so I wasn't sure either. He told me that I could wait until the office opened and come in then if I wasn't sure…I was thinking "that's 6 hours from now…" He did say that he would call my doctor, Dr. Payne, and tell him that I may be coming in later.

Anyway, Casey and I continued to time my contractions which continued to come every 5 minutes and were still lasting about 1 minute. I kept on saying I wasn't sure if they were real contractions because I didn't feel them in my stomach as much as in my back. There was only one contraction where my stomach got really hard. All of the rest of them were mainly in my lower back. As time passed I decided we'd better start packing our bags! I had only a few things in my bag and Casey hadn't packed anything at all yet. I stayed in bed a little longer and told Casey what to put in my bag. He was being great about helping! :) I finally decided to take a shower before going to the hospital. While in the shower I had 2 contractions so powerful that I had to sit down. They had started getting stronger and stronger. After blow drying my hair I did a few dishes (hate coming home to a dirty house!) and put the laundry in the dryer so I would have some clean clothes when we came home from the hospital.

Casey put our bags in the car and told me that we had to drive to Forney first because he left his wallet and bag at the church! By this time it was around 5:15am. The contractions had started getting a lot stronger and I was getting a little nervous since we were about 45 minutes from getting to the hospital! Remember, the doctor had said wait 30 minutes to an hour and I had waited 4 hours before arriving at the hospital.

We got to the hospital and checked in at 6am. I had preregistered online a few days earlier so I wasn't given any paperwork to fill out. They weighed me and took me to my room right away. They gave me a gown to put on and told me that "most women are examined and sent home because they are in just the early stages of labor." The nurse made it clear that I did not look like I was in enough pain to be at the hospital. I went to the restroom and a few minutes later a nurse came back to examine me. She and I both were amazed because I was already dilated to 6 centimeters! I asked "So, I'm staying?" and she gave me an emphatic "yes!"

At this point the nurses and doctors came and checked on me every hour or so and every time I was dilated 1 centimeter more! A lot of progress for having a "first baby." When I got to 8 centimeters they decided to break my water and at the time I opted to finally get the epidural. Before then I had debated on not getting it because the nurses kept telling me that I was doing great and if I could handle the pain at 8 centimeters that I wouldn't need the anesthesia. I talked it over with Casey and eventually decided to go ahead and get it since I hadn't prepared for labor without drugs and I was nervous. Looking back, I know I could have done it, but I was just so nervous about the pain getting really bad. It turns out, that I was only completely numbed on my left side (apparently an epidural is effected by gravity and I was sitting on the bed while it was on an incline to the left). They kept putting me on my right side, but it just wasn't working. I told 5 people before Casey eventually left the room and told them to get an anesthesiologist in the room. He came in and tried to fix it, and it did get a little better, but I ended up feeling every contraction and all of my labor on my right side. Kind of a weird feeling, but it ended up being for the best once I started pushing and Sawyer's heart rate when haywire.

Alright, so after they broke my water I quickly went from an 8, to a 9, to a 10! At that point they told me that I would begin pushing in 30 minutes at 12:45. They didn't come back until 1:00pm and at that point I started pushing with just a nurse in the room. They had paged Dr. Payne and he would make his was from his office to the hospital soon. I was a little nervous about pushing with just the nurse since all of my labor had progressed so quickly. I was worried that we may have the baby without him! I pushed once or twice and then Sawyer's heart rate dropped down to around 60. The nurse had me stop pushing, turned me on my left side and gave me oxygen. At this point I started freaking out inside. I was completely worried and panicked. What was going on?! But then it got worse - her heart rate jumped up to 210! I could see the worry on Casey's face and he finally asked the nurse "is that sustainable?" Apparently the nurse had just been staring at the monitor (I couldn't see her because I was still laying on my side with an oxygen mask on). At that point she started paging the front desk for Dr. Payne. The receptionist said he had been paged and was aware that I was beginning to push. The nurse told her that there was a "dippity do" and that "Dr. Payne needed to get here as soon as he could." I was so annoyed that she kept calling this a "dippity do" and really just wanted her to stop pretending that nothing was wrong. She also paged for a "level 3 NICU" and at that point a bunch of NICU nurses as well as Dr. Payne came into the room.

Dr. Payne quickly got into his scrub gear and leaned down to me and said, "because of baby's heart rate we need to get her out as quickly as possible, so we are going to use forceps to pull her down a bit. When she is born instead of her putting her on your chest so you can see her they are going to take her over there and make sure she is perfect before they bring her back to you" - he pointed to the back of the room. Anyway, I pushed in sets of 3's. So on the first contraction, I pushed 3 times. During that contraction they used the forceps and pulled and pulled. THAT I could feel *shiver*. On the second contraction the baby was crowning and on the third contraction Dr. Payne was saying "harder harder harder" and Casey was telling me what a good job I was doing and I just felt so determined to get her out because I was still so scared for her that I just got a huge adrenaline rush and was able to push her out. I pushed for maybe 5 minutes before she was born at 1:42pm. I was thrilled to hear her cry right away. Casey immediately started crying due to all the relief we both felt. I had been sure that she was going to have a heart attack when I heard her little heart beating at 210, and I knew that Casey had been scared, too. At some point before I started pushing I remember asking Dr. Payne if he was scared. He told me that if he was scared he would be running around like a chicken with his head cut off. I know that's not true - he must get scared sometimes, but he is always as cool and calm as a cucumber. I love that about him! He made me feel much more calm when he came and took control. Casey felt the same way.

Anyway, when Sawyer was born they had Casey cut the cord and then they immediately took her to another part of the room before I was able to see her. All I saw of her where her feet - which were purple. I could hear her cry though and so I really wasn't worried. Casey and my mom both seemed to think she was perfectly fine. I did hear a really loud, repetitive noise and asked Casey if that was the nurses hitting Sawyer on the back. He said they were trying to get the fluid out of her lungs. Apparently, normal birth is supposed to squeeze all the fluid from a baby's lungs as they go through the birth canal, but because I pushed Sawyer out so quickly, much of the fluid remained in her lungs. This is called "wet lungs." Sawyer was also immediately given oxygen because the levels of oxygen in her blood were low. She also had really labored breathing.

After probably 15 minutes or so of them taking care of Sawyer and my doctor taking care of me, a NICU nurse came over to me and told me that Sawyer would be going straight to the NICU, but would probably only be there for 1 to 4 hours. I was very sad, and thinking that I wasn't going to get to see her or hold her I said, "Can you wheel her by me first?" She said of course, but instead Casey brought her over to me and I was able to hold her for about 20 seconds. When he handed her to me her color looked good because she had been on oxygen before, but her immediately started draining from her face and she turned white. The doctor or nurse (I'm not sure which) seemed very concerned and quickly said, "Okay, her color isn't good. We need to take her now." Again, I wasn't all that worried because they had said she'd only be gone for 1 to 4 hours. My nephew Caleb had been in the NICU for about 18 hours when he was first born and I knew from that experience that he was fine, so that helped soothe my fears.

Hours passed and I enjoyed talking with all my visitors, getting moved to my new room, and hearing from my parents and in-laws that Sawyer was super cute! Casey and I were able to write down 6 names of family and friends to go with him one at a time to see Sawyer in NICU (my mom, dad, Casey's mom, dad, and sister, and Lauren Smith - like a sister to me:). I was still numb on my left side and laying in bed and didn't go to see Sawyer until all 6 of these people, plus Casey had been there. They were only allowed to look and touch her, not hold her. I was shown pictures of her when they got back. Eventually, Casey suggested that they try to move me from my bed to a wheel chair so that I could go to see her, too. We were still under the impression that she would be moved into my room soon and that the rest of our visitors could see her then.

When Casey wheeled me down there we were met with some very unwelcome news. The nurse or doctor (again, not sure which) said to me, "Sawyer is a bit of a trouble maker, so she is going to have to stay in here for a couple of days." She was trying to be lighthearted by calling her a trouble maker, but I was very unhappy with how she told me that I was not going to get my baby girl in a couple of hours (like we were told), but instead it would be overnight and dayS - plural. I couldn't believe it. As soon as she finished talking to us and telling me that I could not even hold her, I lost it. I couldn't stop crying. Her bed was waist high and I was confined to a low-riding wheel chair with no way to stand. All I could do was lean really far and barely touch her with my fingertips. She looked so tiny and fragile with what seemed like a million tubes and wires connected to her - an oxygen tube, heart monitors, breathing monitors, oxygen level wires, etc. She was laying on her stomach to help her labored breathing. She had on a diaper and a hospital hat with a giant bow. I wish so bad that I had that hat now! I asked for one before we left, but they gave me the one without the bow instead. We prayed for Sawyer before we left the NICU to go back to our room.

When Casey wheeled me back to my room I cried the entire length of the hallway. I got Casey all upset, too, of course. He was upset for our little girl, but even more upset that her momma couldn't hold her or even see her as much as others were able to do. We eventually asked that our visitors leave because we knew that Sawyer would not be joining us and I was really upset and needed to kind of take it all in alone and with Casey.

We went back and visited Sawyer again and again while she was in NICU over the next 3 days - basically every 3 hours we spent an hour or 2 with her before going back to our room to eat or rest. We even went in the middle of the night to feed her. The NICU has a very rigid schedule for feeding the babies. They eat at 2, 5, 8, and 11am and pm. I was able to breastfeed her all of those time starting the day after she was born. I was also able to hold her the morning after she was born - this was a sweet time that Casey captured on video.

On the evening of April 16th, Sawyer got to "room in" with us and stay the night in our room for the first time. We were overjoyed! We had expected to have to leave the hospital the evening without her, but the awesome doctors discharged me and allowed us to stay another night in our room under Sawyer's name. We had many visitors that night and went home together as a family of 3 the next day, April 17th, when Sawyer was 3 days old. 

Check out the video of me getting to hold Sawyer for the first time in the NICU.