Birth Stories

OMG Heather!!!! I can’t believe that story! AMAZING! I think my husband would have passed out if he took a look “down there” and saw a foot dangling out!!!!! Your husband is quite the trooper! (as are you for doing it naturally… in the CAR!).

Funny about your doc telling you that he felt the head down, because we had the same thing with Sarah. Our doc kept telling me that she was head down, but I didn’t know how she could be because I literally kept feeling (and seeing) an arm and fist punch me near my ribcage. I kept telling him, but he kept saying no. Then at about 37 weeks I didn’t feel her moving for quite a while one day, and the doc decided to do an ultrasound. They saw that she was breech, bum down with her hands up exactly where I felt it punching me! I kept doing all kinds of crazy things to get her to turn- tried to lie upside down, smell these herbal remedies, shine light and play music where her head should be- since I didn’t want the inversion done and I didn’t want a c-section, but they said that it was really hard for them to turn at that point. Luckily at around 38 weeks she did turn on her own- it was the most horrific thing I’ve ever felt.

You’re my new hero! Thanks for sharing.

heather—my second baby was footling breech—but my delivery didn’t go as well as yours. my water broke on the delivery table which was fortunate because she had a prolapsed cord. her legs, body and one arm came out no problem, but then her other elbow got stuck on my pubic bone so her head and arm were jammed in the birth canal with her cord pressed off. they were telling me to push and they were pushing on my stomach to try and get her out. finally the doc reached his hand inside,(along side the arm and head) to free her elbow. i think that is one of the most painful things i have ever experienced in my life. they had to bag breath her and told me her arm wasn’t working like it should. she was taken by ambulance the next day to a hospital out of town to the NICU. she had various tests done. finally when i took her home they told me there was a chance she could have cerebral palsy. she has been in the gifted and talented program and been a star athlete.

my first delivery was uneventful. my 3rd delivery i had to have an emergency c-section. because of a multi-car pile-up on the freeway, there was no one to do anesthesia, so they did my c-section without anesthesia. they got the cut numbed with locals, but i felt everything once they got inside. there was muconium and the cord was short and wrapped wround his neck twice. they packed me and left me until they could get someone to come do anesthesia. i lost alot of blood.

my twins were next, preterm labor at 34 weeks, stopped (spent a week in the hospital), but delivered at 36 weeks by c-section because one of them had quit growing.

5th was a very successful v-bac. the cord was around molly’s neck, but it wasn’t an issue.

6th was another v-bac with a period of very low heart rate for the baby which made the doc think he might have to section me—but all was well.

7th, was a difficult delivery, another v-bac—-baby just would not come. the doc finally took her with forcepts and i broke my tailbone.

we had planned another v-bac with sylvia. i was to be induced. we could see she was in trouble before the induction was even started. off to another emergency c-section. there was muconium and the cord was wrapped around her neck 3 times. she had to be resuscitated (SP?) and my uterus tore after she was born. i think that labor could have killed us both. the doc told me she could have been dead the next day. i’m sure glad my obgyn planned an early induction!!!

With both girls, I had placenta previa. With Kaelyn, the placenta had moved enough by the end that they thought I could deliver regularly. My water broke at 39 weeks, but I never actually went into labor. They tried pitocin and a variety of other things, but she never dropped. So, 26 hours after my water broke, they did a C section.

With Alex, we were hoping to do a VBAC, but with her the placenta never moved. At 33 weeks, I started spotting, so they put me on bedrest. At 36 weeks, I started bleeding heavily, so they admitted me to the hospital, spent 12 hours debating whether or not they should do a C-section immediately or try to give her a few days to grow some more. They ended up doing a C-section which was a good decision because when they got inside they discovered that my placenta had detached, so Alex wouldn’t have survived if they’d waited much longer.

Wow, Heather, what an amazing story to be able to tell Parker one day! I would have totally freaked- you were so brave!

Enjoyed all the stories, BTW, keep them coming! They are all so unique and everyone is so courageous!

For me, I had a very uneventful pregnancy up until week 34. I went in for a normal ob checkup and thought I was fine, I had noticed some swelling in my feet but I thought that was because I was on them all weekend shopping for baby furniture. Anyway, I got there and they took my blood pressure and it was through the roof. They immediately sent me over the hospital and told me they would have to deliver if it did not stabilize. I was a nervous wreck (the dr. actually offered to drive me over since he was going to meet me there but it was only a couple of blocks away so I drove myself). Also, on top of everything else, the ladies’ group at my church had decided to forgo their annual Christmas party in lieu of a baby shower for me that was that evening! So, after frantically calling Dh, I also had to call the host of it and tell her that I was not going to make it to the party!

Thankfully, my blood pressure came down that night and stress tests revealed the baby was fine so they released me but I was put on moderate bed rest. Official diagnosis: preeclampsia. The dr. warned me we would have to take it day to day from there but it was his goal to get me to 37 weeks and then induce.

So, I went home and then went back to the dr. every other day to be monitored and to get a stress test on the baby. True to his word, on the exact 37 week mark, I went in to be monitored and my blood pressure was high again so my doc said “that’s it, we are done, you’re going to have this baby”. This was December 23rd and my dr. was leaving to go out of town for Christmas so he told me to go on to the hospital but he would not be here to deliver. I was so bummed.

I called Dh who was on his way to work and went to the hospital alone and checked in. They induced labor around 10:30 that morning but it did not work. Because of my blood pressure, I had to lay in bed the whole time (so much for all of those prenatal classes!), and could not have any food (I was not a happy camper) and finally the dr. who was filling in for mine (whom I had never even met) came by and broke my water around 11:00 pm to get things going. I finally started to have some contractions, got an epidural somewhere inbetween and Seth was born the next morning at 5:23 AM.

Ironically, the delivery turned out to be the easy part even though it went nothing like plan. After delivery, I had severe bleeding and was passing huge clots (they think all of the placenta was not removed) so I had to get a shot for that to stop the bleeding and then my bladder was not draining so I had to be cathed twice for that too (hurt like he**, worse than delivery!).

But, in the end, it was all worth it. We got to bring our beautiful boy home on Christmas day, the best present ever!!!!

Oh, just wanted to mention that every time I had the stress test on Seth, they told me he had the hiccups! I always wondered if this was a warning of what was to come with the reflux..

Mom2Seth2006-9-18 11:40:33

Kim, sorry your doc wasn’t there either for your deliveries. The fill in turned out fine though. We actually found out later that he delivered my oldest nephew too! I just love my doc though- we had trouble getting pregnant and he saw us through all of that so I wanted him there for the grand finale so to speak.

Wow, those are amazing stories! I know that many of us have had traumatic births and have struggled through the first year or two. Ryann was my second birth with the first being uneventful six years prior. The events that led up to her birth, I don’t think I will ever get out of my mind. So maybe talking about it will help.

I was teaching school at the time, and trying to be very consistent with my workouts. I walked 1 mile a day, did prenatal yoga, and wanted to try swimming to take the pressure off of my belly. AT around 6 months prego, I got in the health clubs pool and slipped. I landed hard and broke my tail bone. The pool was covered in this thick slime. The manager said, “I guess nobody wanted to clean the pool.” He was so rude! Anyways… I had problems with the pain for months, I wasn’t exercising and I ended up having to pass kidney stones. At 35 weeks I was in the post office waiting in line,when I felt a huge gush of water. When I looked down I was standing in a puddle of blood! I ran out of there and drove myself to the hospital with two 6 year olds in tow. My daughters friend was freaking out. She called her mom and told her that Miss Sarah’s “water-tubes” broke. I was in labor and delivered vaginally. When the placenta came out, there was a huge blood clot and tear. We were so blessed that I didn’t go into labor at 6 months when I fell!

The baby appeared healthy. The first night in the hospital I thought it was strange that she only slept on me when I held her upright. Everytime I put her down she screamed bloody murder. So she was struggling with the reflux since day 1. With eveything that has happened in her life, its no wonder why Ryann is so high strung and irritable. She is starting to calm down and bit now that the reflux is getting better. I still wish I didn’t go swimming that day!

WOW – amazing stories!!

I had an uneventful pregnancy – I worked all the way through, never was sick, all my checkups were jsut fine and i did not feel too tired – i was working 7 days a week and mostly until 2 or 3am and i was feeling just great!! People in the office were joking i was going to deliver Matthew in the office!! I was 37 weeks and i decided i was gonig to take it easy and not work anymore. Dave adn I spent that weekend running errands and on Sunday i was feeling so weird. I got up in the morning and had a strange feeling that that was it…. had the same feeling all day and i told Dave we had to finish building the crib etc that day (he thought i was just hormonal). So we finished everything by 9pm and went to bed and i told Dave there was sommething going on. he said i was just tired and he fell asleep. I woke him up at 10pma dn told him i thought we should go to the hospital because something was going on. we talked about it and since i was fine presumably he went back to sleep…. i lay in bed and kept waking him up. At midnight, i woke him up AGAIN and he told me to relax… all of the sudden, i felt it…my water broke on the bed. We called the OBGYN and by the time she called back i was having contractions every 4 minutes, really long ones. So we took a shower and went to the hospital. I spent all night having contractions but no dilation. So at 7am my OB requested the epidural – she did not like the fluid loss and also i had really really long contractions and nothing was happening so they would start me on pitocin.

2 hours after they started, all of the sudden, baby’s heartrate just would not recover after the contraction and the alarm button was pushed… i had 10 people telling me to get on my 4s, they injected some anti-contraction meds and also something to get the baby’s heartrate going. Everything went back to normal and they told me that the baby was OK and they were going to start the pitocin again. I was fine with it. When 2 hours later we had teh same episode, i was freaking out. I could not stop crying and i could not stop feeling that the baby would not be OK and i was a mess. My OB told me the cord was wrapped somewhere and sometimes it is OK, so we tried again. We started really slow and by 8pm i was not dilated at all, and the OB was worried and she said it is time to talk about a Csection. I signed the papers (i felt awful at the time) and within 5minutes i was in the OR. Matthew was born at 8.24pm adn he was healthy and beautiful, but it took me a long time to get over the 2 alarms and the thought of something happening to my baby. (Matthew’s cord was wrapped around him twice and that was causing all teh issues and for some reason, there was no fluid left at all around him and he was under stress i guess).