Lucy Paige's Birth Story

Four weeks ago today TJ and I were sitting at China Café eating lunch talking about Lucy Paige, our plans for her delivery, ministry stuff, life in general... (TJ loves, loves, loves China Café and we had about an hour before my doctor's appointment so we decided to grab a bite to eat [and also I really, really wanted Lucy Paige to make her arrival and I had heard several stories about how Chinese food is the "last meal" for pregnant women]).

 

I had no idea that my life would forever change that day...

 

I had jokingly said to my co-worker before I left work that day that I hoped when my dr. checked me that she'd say, "Wow, Ryan you are dilated 8-10 cm - You haven't felt any contractions? You are such a trooper, let's have this baby right now - You are a warrior!!" That did not happen... We got to the dr's office and had to wait a bit to go back - it was fine with us because my Mom was meeting us there and had not arrived yet. When we went back I did the normal pee in the cup, weight check, and blood pressure stuff. Everything was normal, nothing out of the ordinary. Dr. Hancock came in and checked to see if I was dilated and much to my dismay, I wasn't - almost a cm. we got to hear Lucy's heartbeat - it was strong! She then measured the bump to see if that was measuring on track. *Side Note: you should measure the same number of cm as you are far along... So if you are 28 weeks pregnant, you should measure 28 cm from your pelvic bone to above your bump.* Since I was 38 weeks and 1 day I should have measured 38 cm. I didn't... I was a little worried but Dr. Hancock said everything should be just fine and that we'd do an ultrasound just to make sure fluid levels were normal (because of my scare in February, she wanted to be aggressive in checking the levels just in case something was wrong - Dr. Hancock is seriously the best ob-gyn!) and check on Lucy Paige. That was ok with me because I wanted to see my sweet girl!


We had to wait a while for the ultrasound because I wasn't scheduled to have one done that day. I kept jokingly saying that I wanted them to induce me and I wanted to have her that day! Little did I know what would happen after the ultrasound... Everything looked good in the ultrasound except for Lucy Paige was measuring 36 weeks all over except for her legs - her legs were measuring almost 39 weeks! She has some long legs! The measurements were sent to Dr. Hancock and we went back to the exam room. Dr. Hancock met us there and told us that it looked like Lucy Paige was just running out of room - it looked like there was a growth restriction. Dr. Hancock has been very aggressive with the few problems I've had with the pregnancy and I've been so thankful for her, but mostly for Jesus and His guiding hands throughout those 9 months. Seriously, since December so much has happened in my life that I don't know how I would have made it through without Him.

Dr. Hancock told us the news - I thought I would have been overjoyed with her news - it was what I had wanted since she was considered full term. We were going to the hospital right after the appointment to get ready to have Lucy Paige!! I was so scared, nervous, excited, in shock, and just about every emotion someone could feel. I had been saying for at least a week that I was ready to have her - that I just wanted to meet her - that I just wanted her here. But when the time actually came to have her, I was so scared - scared that having her would hurt, scared that I would be a terrible mother, scared that I would have to have a C-section - just scared and afraid of the moment she was actually coming. I was not ready... But I remembered a verse I had written on my arm before my wisdom teeth surgery, "The Lord has not given me a spirit of fear but of power and love and self-control" 2Timothy 1:7. All those fears went away (except for the blasted IV - I hate, hate, hate IVs) - I knew I could do it, with Jesus I knew whatever happened would be fine - I would be ok, Lucy Paige would be ok... We were in His hands and whatever happened we would be just fine.


So we went next door to the hospital - we had our bags packed just in case... The plan was to have this pill called Cytotech inserted every four hours (6:30pm, 10:30pm, 2:30am and 6:30am) to soften my cervix and get it ready for the Pitocin that was to be administered around 7am on Tuesday morning. We got settled and got the blasted IV started by this nurse that I wanted to punch in the face because she was all to cheery about putting an IV in my arm. They started the process - all I had to do was just lay there and rest - the hard stuff was going to start the next morning. My Mom went home after the 10:30pm pill because nothing was going to happen until the next morning and there was no reason for her to stay and watch me get a good nights rest.

Lucy Paige had different plans though... Dr. Hancock would be on call for deliveries on Tuesday and she was going to be there to deliver Lucy Paige - I was very happy because I wanted her to deliver LP! She was going to come in that morning after the Pitocin to break my water and be there to deliver LP late that afternoon/early evening. Well, I couldn't sleep at all. I felt miserable, and I wasn't dilated but maybe a centimeter and a half so the contractions I was feeling weren't that strong. Around 2:30am Tuesday morning before the nurse came in for the 3rd pill, I felt my water break. It was a very strange feeling. TJ and I called the nurse and she came in to confirm that it was my water breaking and not anything else. Since my water had broken I didn't have to get any more of the Cytotech pills. She checked my cervix again and I was still at a cm and a half. I couldn't get an epidural until I was at 4cm. We called my mom and she got to the hospital around 3:45am. After my water broke I was feeling what I thought were really strong contractions but the nurse and my mom kept looking at the monitors and the contractions weren't showing up on the monitor as anything big. I, of course, thought they were super strong but I also feel like I have a low tolerance of pain and just couldn't take the pain of childbirth.

Around 5am, sweet Nurse Shea came in to check on me and to let me know that we'd start the Pitocin drip around 6am. She asked if she should check to see how much I had dilated but I said don't worry about it because she was coming back in an hour anyway. She looked at the machine monitoring my contractions and said that the contractions weren't bad and that even if she did check me I probably wouldn't be at 4cm so they couldn't do the epidural. As I said earlier, the contractions weren't showing up as anything big (even though I thought it was the worst pain ever!) - Nurse Shea and my Mom just thought I had a super low tolerance of pain. Mom said she wondered to herself if I'd be able to make it through childbirth if I was in so much pain with these mild contractions... In between contractions I slept maybe one to two minutes at a time.

At 5:30am on Tuesday morning, I felt the worst pain I'd ever felt in my life - I felt two really big gushes of fluid and the biggest urge to push. I had to push, it was like my body was making me. That was the scariest moment for me - I wasn't supposed to be pushing, I was supposed to start the Pitocin drip in 30 minutes, I was supposed to get an epidural, I wasn't supposed to feel any pain, I wasn't ready... So many thoughts went through my brain at one time! When I felt the gush and urge to push I let out a terrible scream because I was scared - it woke TJ up and scared him half to death. He'll have to tell you his side of how things went down that day... :) Anyway, TJ and Mom grabbed that nurse call button and Nurse Shea came rushing in. She took a peak under the sheet and called the other nurse to come now, that we were having a baby! I heard a stampede of shoes running toward the room. They told me we were about to have a baby! I was in shock, I asked about the epidural and they told me that I had already done the heard part - Lucy Paige was crowning! She was ready to make her grand entrance! They frantically took that bed apart and gathered all the tools to deliver a baby. There was this one nurse, she was my worst enemy and my best friend - she was the one who told me when to push and for how long to push. When she started at 1, I hated her and then when she got to 10, she was my best friend! :) After about three sets of pushes at 5:48am, Lucy Paige arrived! Nurse Shea delivered her because Dr. Head didn't have time to get to my room! They tried to get me to not push and wait for Dr. Head but Lucy Paige was ready to meet us! It was the best thing ever - all the worry and pain just melted away. They let me hold her for a minute and then took her over to clean her up - TJ went with her and I could tell he was immediately smitten. I was too...

Lucy Paige came into this world at 5:48am on Tuesday, July 2, 2013. She weighed 5lbs and 10oz and was 19.75in long. She has all 10 fingers and toes - a nice covering of dark brown hair, it's longer in the back - blue eyes. She is beautiful and just perfect. We were set to go home on July 4 but LP's bilirubin levels were a little high and the pediatricians wanted to be aggressive and not send her home without staying a few days to go under the lights to help break down the bilirubin in her body. They had let a baby go home a few days before with bilirubin levels just a bit higher than LP's and the poor baby had to come back and was put in the NICU (the parents of that sweet baby had insisted that they go home - the peds didn't want to let the baby go but the bilirubin wasn't at the level that they had to keep her). We got to stay too - I thought they'd discharge me and we'd have to go home but they were so sweet, they let us stay in the same room and we kept LP in the room with us. I was so thankful because I was not going to go home - I would have slept in the hall or the car or wherever in that hospital! Her levels continually dropped and they let us go home July 5 in the early evening.

And that's how my sweet, precious baby came into the world! I'll have another post soon with her one month highlights!

Oh, it turns out those "mild contractions" were the real deal... :)