Tuesday, September 11, 2007

MY Story!

As all of you that read often know, Brian told our birth story on the day that we gave birth to our precious Sadie Beth. I said in one of my other entries that I would share MY story at some point. I have not been able to tell or talk about Sadie's arrival without tears in my eyes.

While at church on Sunday I could ONLY think of how very BLESSED we are to have Sadie here. I was holding her and rocking back and forth as we sang praise and worship songs to our Lord and Savior (the one that spared our sweet new daughter's life). I teared up (just as I am now) thinking of how God loves us and cares about every detail of our lives.

On August 25, 2007, I woke with contractions and just as frustrated as any other day. Later Brian arrived home from work at the same time my contractions were close enough to take our trip to the hospital. We rushed around and were out the door in about 30 minutes. We traveled about 30 minutes to drop off Mili at our friend's house. I felt like I needed to go in and discuss Mili's food issues even though I had two pages of typed instructions for Mili. While we were at our friend's house she was shewing me out the door because she didn't want me to have the baby in her house. My contractions were now 3 minutes apart and we were about 30 minutes from the hospital. Brian was driving like a crazy man and I was just sitting back hoping this is really IT. We arrive at the hospital and Brian is honking at a guy that is about to park because he thinks he is suppose to get that parking space since he has the wife in labor. Since we had been to the hospital two times previous to this to stop contractions, you would have thought that they had all the information they needed in the computer, guess again.

After finally getting in a room and being hooked up to monitors, I knew something was not right. The nurses face looked a little worried and I started to ask questions immediately. Brian was incredible calm through the whole process. The nurses started asking for the doctor. I knew that was not standard procedure. When the doctor came in five minutes later (which I also knew was not standard procedure) they all started working on me at one time. All at the same time someone was starting an IV on my left hand, the doctor was breaking my water and placing a heart monitor on Sadie's head, someone was shooting me up with meds to stop the contractions and they put an oxygen mask on me. There was so much going on at the same time that I didn't know what to think.

Everything started looking better and so the nurse was preparing me for a possible c-section by getting me to sign all the necessary paper work. They all left the room. I couldn't keep my eyes off of Sadie's heart monitor. After about five more times of Sadie's heart rate decelerating with each contraction, I told Brian I am ready to do whatever it takes to get her out safely. I was ready to push the call button and then nurses and doctor were back in the room before I knew it. They were there to prepare me for an epidural and talk to me about having a c-section and while the doctor was checking me to see about dilation, Sadie's heart rate flat lined for about a minute. The doctor jumped on the bed with me and started shaking me and turning me from side to side to get Sadie off of her cord. The doctor's face looked very scared and I was as scared as I have ever been. When I looked back up the nurses already had their scrubs on and started unhooking me and giving me more meds to stop the contractions.

The anaesthesiologist began to give me instructions for a spinal (not enough time for an epidural) on the way to the OR. When we arrived in the OR, it was definitely emergency mode. Everyone was running around in the room as I was getting my spinal. My doctor sat at my head and helped me through the spinal, although it didn't hurt maybe because by now my Adrenalin was probably at peak. My doctor then kissed me on the forehead and said, "Sadie will be here soon." From the time I got my spinal until I heard Sadie cry was probably 10 minutes. They already had started before Brian got to the room (not sure if they waited that long to get him or if he took too long trying to get into some extremely small scrubs...read other post). Brian was there to calm me when they pulled Sadie out.

I have never been so happy to hear a cry in all my life. Sadie's cord was wrapped around her arm and her neck. God was so merciful on our family. I have had such guilt about trying to "walk" her out (if you read my other posts about going to the mall to try to get contractions going). I feel like I was just choking her the whole time I was trying to get labor moving. I know that it was not my fault but as a mommy that is all I could think about. It doesn't look like Sadie will have any lasting effects from being "choked" with every contraction (I had a lot of them over a two week period).

We are very happy to have her home and a part of our family. We feel complete now and I don't know what I would do without her. Sadie is amazing and I love her more each day (if that is possible). Well that is my story and I am sticking to it.

5 comments:

Anonymous said...

Wow, I am sorry you all had to experience such a scary thing but Praise God for His love, mercy and grace!
I couldn't imagine how one could get through an ordeal like that without Him!

Anonymous said...

Above post...Love Dawn :)

Anonymous said...

Thanks for sharing your story!! God is such an AWESOME GOD!!

Unknown said...

Awww that made me so bleary eyed I had to stop reading and come back to it later...amazing how God takes care of everything even during our darkest times. So glad Sadie is here safely.

Blessings All Mine said...

WOW! As a former L & D nurse, I understand the emergency mode they all went into...I've been in that mode myself a time or two! Be glad that you were able to stay awake to hear her first cry! They could have knocked you completely out! Another reason to be thankful!

This reminds me of a verse, but I can't remember the reference...it talks about God being a "strong hold in the day of trouble." AMEN to that!