I have been meaning to post Iris’ birth story for awhile, but 45 minutes of sleep a night leaves little motivation for much other than the necessary :) But I got a solid two hour nap today thanks to my mom & dad, so I feel ready to blog all about how things happened for those who don’t know :)
Iris’ birth story begins a week and a half before she arrived. It was a Friday afternoon, and I was at work. Suddenly I had a blurry spot in my vision and was seeing flashing colors & lights. This went on for about 15 minutes, and I finally called Ask a Nurse who transferred me to L&D. They were unconcerned and said it was most likely eye fatigue from looking at my computer screen. I have worked on computers daily for 6 years and never had anything like this happen, so I was skeptical. Then an hour later my right hand swelled up and went numb - now I was definitely concerned as both of these are signs of preeclampsia. Since my dad is an EMT, I called him to ask if I could pop by the house and have him check my blood pressure on my way home from work. He and my mom were not content with that, and insisted on driving me up to the hospital for observation.
My blood pressure was elevated, and I was spilling a small amount of protein in my urine, but neither were severe enough to be considered preeclampsia. So I was sent home and ordered to rest on my left side, as any movement caused my blood pressure to spike. The next day I did as I was told except I got up to take a shower, and afterwards I was dizzy, seeing the flashes again, and my speech was slurred. We returned to the hospital and received the exact same information - despite my symptoms, my tests did not show that I had preeclampsia. The next day, which was Sunday, I was taking my blood pressure regularly. Even my resting BP was high, and I normally have low to normal readings, so I was beginning to get irritated with the diagnosis. All of this was going on while my doctor was out of town, hence all the hospital visits.
After a call to the on-call doctor explaining our fears, I was admitted overnight for observation. We insisted an ultrasound be done to make sure the baby and placenta were ok (the non stress tests showed Iris was oblivious to everything going on with me). I told the nurse that my doctor had told me Iris was head down & that he had felt her head at the last appointment. She said that even though she trusted him, she would check for position as well. There were two nurses doing the ultrasound - one was especially perplexed by the large round object she kept seeing up by my rib cage, since the baby was supposedly head down. She scanned me for quite awhile and it was determined that my doctor was either wrong or Iris had flipped in the last few days. She was now fully breech at 37 and a half weeks, and the large round object in my ribs was her head.
I was released Monday from the hospital and told to see my doctor for further treatment on Tuesday when he returned from his trip. At that appointment he decided to check my urine again (my BP had remained high this entire time), and he seemed shocked when I told him Iris was breech. He did an ultrasound to confirm, and sure enough she was. But she looked good, there was plenty of fluid and the placenta was healthy, so he told me to wait a week and we would try to turn her and induce. He thought 37 weeks was just a bit earlier than he would have liked to deliver. My protein had doubled from my hospital stay a few days earlier, and I now officially had preeclampsia, so she had to come out sooner than later.
I was on bed rest for the next week, and my doctor again had to leave town, so I was on my own. On Monday, March 3, we had an appointment first thing to have Iris turned. My doctor did an ultrasound to confirm she was still breech, and we knew something was wrong when he kept shaking his head. He said there was no fluid around the baby because the placenta had begun to break down due to the PE. There was no way to turn the baby without fluid - my doctor looked at me and asked if I was busy today. He said she couldn’t even wait until morning, without fluid she was in danger and had to come out NOW.
He called the hospital to schedule a c-section for that afternoon. Now, I had said throughout my entire pregnancy that I did not want a c-section. My mom had one with me and told it like a horror story. I had a birth plan and on it, it stated that unless I or the baby was in danger, that I did not want a c-section. I think it was my insistence on not having one that jinxed me. I was white as a sheet as we went to the hospital for pre-op. They got my IV started and Tim, my mom & dad all waited with me for the anesthesiologist. I was to have a spinal and wouldn’t feel anything from the chest down. A few days before all of this I had developed a bad cold, and my head was severely stuffed up. That was the worst part of the entire procedure - my head being stuffed and the anesthesia making it difficult to feel my lungs working had me fighting a panic attack the entire time. The anesthesia made me sick to my stomach, but I had no pain. It just felt like I was being jerked around and tugged on. Tim sat beside me and held my hand the entire time.
It took much longer to deliver Iris than it normally would to deliver by c-section, because she was stuck so good. She was a double footling breech, meaning both her feet were stuck in my crotch and her head was stuck in my ribs. She was born at 1:53 p.m. on March 3. I was sort of out of it during the entire procedure, but I remember a few things so clearly. "We have a little girl" someone said, then someone else said "well, she’s not so little!" She was 7 lbs, 14 oz and 19 1/2 inches long. Then I heard her cry - and cry and cry at the top of her lungs and I broke down and cried too, because I knew she was out and she was ok! They brought her over to Tim and I got to see her briefly (a few seconds it seemed like) and then Tim went with her to the nursery while I got stitched up and headed to recovery. I threw up as they rolled me down to recovery, and was pretty out of it the entire hour I was there. But this made the time go by much faster, and soon I was in my room and holding my beautiful baby girl.
While I didn’t want a c-section, I really wouldn’t have it any other way. I do not feel like less of a woman for not having a natural birth - I do not feel especially bad about not knowing what a contraction feels like or for not experiencing labor. I feel blessed that I was able to avoid the labor/c-section combo that my mother went through, and was able to go into surgery rested and feeling good. The first few days were rough, and I am still very tender, but I am healing well. My incision has healed beautifully from the start and while I know I have awhile before I’ll be back to my old self, I am just so happy and blessed that both myself and Iris are doing so well!
Iris only lost 2 ounces while in the hospital and had gained them back within a week. At her two week check up she had gained 4 more ounces and a whopping 2 and a quarter inches to her length. I had decided from the start not to breastfeed, and she was on an organic cow’s milk formula her first week. However, she wasn’t digesting it as well as we would have liked, and she has been on a goat milk formula ever since. She eats like a little piggy & is very healthy!
Well that is the story of how Iris came to be on three-three!
