I was reading a blog of a person for whom I do not know. I linked to her blog from someone's else's blog that I read. As I was reading, I searched thru her old posts to find out more about her. She interested me because she had lost a baby. I wanted to know what happened. As I started to read my heart just sunk. It felt way to familiar, except my baby survived.
For those of you who do not know, I went into labor 5 weeks early, for a reason that they still do not know why. The pains that I was having were not labor pains. I was indeed having contractions, but the pain that I was having was not contraction pains. While they had me hooked up to a monitor Zachary heart rate dropped. John and I were watching the monitor as I watched the numbers go up and go into pain and my heart rate and Zachary's heart rate we noticed that his was way down....in the 70s. I pushed the button to call the nurse. They came in to ask what the problem was....I was like, why is this number so low. They told me that the monitor must just be in the wrong spot and that it must just be picking up my heart rate, so they proceeded to move it around to find the "fast" heart rate. Then it happened again and I had a flood of people rushing into my room demanding me to get onto my side NOW. When that didn't work they told me to get up on all 4s and they put me on oxygen. It is a true blur if it happend 2 or 3 times at this point. The doctor then came in to tell us what was happening. They told us that they wanted to do a c-section, but couldn't force me at this point. She gave me the options of going down for an ultrasound to see why Zachary's heart rate keep dropping, but if it drops again I would be going into emergency c-section and no one could be a part of it. I could have a normal c-section and they could start prepping. She told me that I couldn't be induced because the baby was already distressed and that would cause more stress on him. She told me no matter what decision I made, I wasn't leaving until I had this baby.....either way a c-section would be performed.....my options were c-section or emergency c-section. I choose the first option. We had already lost one baby thru miscarriage and I was so scared I was going to lose another.
As her post reads....
The Dr returned again at 11:30 pm and my contractions had slowed way down, so he ordered pitocin. He told the nurse to check me around 1-1:30. I was doing fine and the baby was too. Our families were all waiting anxiously with us. The nurse came in at 1:00 and stated that the baby's heart rate dipped a little and she needed to roll me over on my side. I was checked every 1/2 hour. By 3 am I was ready to push. We said goodbye to all of our family and told them we would be out just as soon as the little one arrived. The nurse had been having trouble getting a good heart rate reading since about 2:30, but she claimed it was b/c the baby was moving around a lot (I had the epidural, so I couldn't feel the movement.) We started the pushing process, and at 3:15 an older nurse came in to assist. They could not get a heart rate, so they rolled me several times and then gave me oxygen. Dr. was paged at 3:26 and arrived at 3:28. He inserted an internal fetal monitor and could not pick up anything. He tried another and got the same result. He then turned to me and said that the baby was in distress and we needed to do an ER C-section. His umbilical cord was wrapped tightly around his neck two times. The heavy contractions and the pushing cut off circulation to his little body. (Here is a link to her complete post)
I went to the operating room hoping and praying that my baby would be ok. They brought in a NIC team to be safe. They didn't know how he would be when they took him out. They also didn't know if my placenta had ruptured (casing the pain I was having). When Zachary was born his cord was so entangled around his body that they knew at that moment that his cord was the reason that his heart rate kept dropping. He screamed right away and everyone knew that he was going to be just fine. It was one of the happiest days of my life! Reading this girl's post makes me relive what happened. It makes me think of everything that could have gone wrong. It makes me think that Zachary could have been her little boy. If my body had not gone into what I thought was labor....I wouldnt' have gone to the hospital. If I wouldn't have been hooked up to those monitors I would not have known that my baby was having problems. I thank God every day for the gift he has given me. I know that Zachary is a true miracle!
Happy 6th Birthday Jovie!
6 years ago
