To say that it had been a difficult pregnancy would be a very accurate description... I'll save the gory details and suffice it to say that I could not have my story published on "The Joy of Pregnancy."
As it turns out, my OB was completely incompetent. I had had a bad feeling that we were not dealing with the expert doctor that we thought we had chosen on July 29th. Prior to the 29th, he had identified that the baby was macrosomic (meaning: big baby) and he had decided our due date was August 12th but had reassured us that he would not let us go to our due date because the baby had the potential to get too big and and get stuck. It all seemed logical. But on the 29th he announced that instead of inducing early, he wanted to moniter the baby closely and ordered tons of tests, exams, visits... we were nearly always at the hosptial and our bank account was flat lining from the parking fees alone. Then he decided that our due date of the 12th should have been the 20th!! None of it made sense. No explanation. We knew the baby wasn't doing well anymore, my blood pressure was spiking through the roof with some very unfortunate consequneces, I suddenly lost all of my energy and really my will to live but he would not listen. I wanted to change doctors but when you are nearing the finish line of a pregnancy you are trapped. I never have felt so helpless.
At 11:50 pm on the 17th, I woke up with a lot of pain. I staggered into the bathroom at which point I realized 2 things: my water had broken and I was having contractions 5 minutes apart. I woke my husband up by flipping on the light and telling him he needed to shower. He looked up at me and asked why. I told him I was in full blown labor and it was time to go. He was up like he was shot from a cannon. I knew labor was a slow process, so we showered and then made our way to the hospital. I called ahead and when we arrived, they were expecting us and we were all checked in.
In the triage room, we learned just how incompetent our doctor was. The nurse had located our prenatal records, because I had called ahead, from the doctors office 4 floors up in the hospital. The offical due date was August 12th (and this man had said we could go to the 27th before he would induce! Where he got the 20th from is beyond us) and we were offically labeled as "post term." Then when the on call doctor visited us and learned we were macrosomic and post term, he decided that c-section was the only safe way to go. When I checked to see if I had in fact broken my water, not only was it broken but the baby was laying funny and they refused to let me sit up. My husband and I looked at eachother and knew that we were not getting the whole story from the doctor and nurses, but just relieved that the baby was going to be delivered today.
Next came the epidural. IT DID NOT WORK. I was counting on the epidural and it failed me. The initial injection of the epidural made my blood pressure plummet to 41 over 20. I thought I was dying by the look on my husbands face and the fact that suddenly my hospital room had 14 doctors and nurses and a crash cart was wheeled in right next to me. I survived, but there was not going to be any pain medication.
I was in so much pain that when I was wheeled in for the c-section... it was an out of body experience. I heard my baby cry. That was all that mattered in the whole world.
Looking back at the birth of my baby and the end of my pregnancy I am left wondering what on earth happened. I am frustrated, angry.... and still in a tremendous amount of pain. I've decided to blog because since the birth 10 days ago I feel as though everything has changed in my world. I don't feel as though this body is mine. I don't own or understand the 10 inch incision on my abdomen. I feel certian that this is the absolute end of my marriage. Everything in my world has changed. I am going to blog to try to work through this and see where it takes me. The journey into motherhood.... I can't decide if it is the next chapter in my life or if it is a whole new book that I am entering.
No comments:
Post a Comment