Savannah's Birth Story
{WARNING: LONG POST with LOTS of pictures!}
I can hardly believe that a week ago today, Peter and I were laboring in the hospital with our sweet Savannah. I have told many people this week that I just don't want her to get big...at all. I don't care about how tired I am or how many diapers I am changing. She is just so peaceful and beautiful and small and cuddly and I just don't want that to go away. But I know it has to. And I know that if she doesn't grow up that I won't get to know the little person that God has created her to be. But for now I am really living in THIS moment - enjoying her tiny little fingers and toes, her skinny little legs (reminds me of Abbie), her eyes rolling back in her head and her funny spontaneous smiles while she is dreaming, her small little body and how it still curls all up probably like it did while she was in my belly, the tiny little diapers and the tiny little bum that they fit - all of it. I am just in awe of how God creates such an intricate little person in 9 months time - starting from only 2 tiny microscopic cells - AMAZING!
So yeah, she is a week old today and I wanted to document her birth story before I forget details. I want to be able to look back on it and for her to be able to do the same.
It began last Wednesday. At my appointment that morning I heard the "I" word - INDUCTION. The baby's movements had decreased somewhat so my doctor had me do a non-stress test, which I passed - do you know how hard it is to "relax and lay still" for 20 minutes while having a 2 year old with you? She also scheduled an induction for the following week (which actually would have been today) because she didn't want me to go much past 41 weeks if movement was decreasing. But since I REALLY didn't want to be induced I let her go ahead and strip my membranes at the appointment to maybe see if that would start things on their own. I was dilated 3 cm, she stripped my membranes, we did the non-stress test and we went home.
Wednesday evening my contractions (I had been having them irregularly for weeks) went from being very manageable to quite painful and intense. They were about 10 minutes apart though so I just figured it was because of all the commotion from my appointment that morning. The contractions continued throughout the night so I didn't get much sleep. I stayed home from work Thursday morning because I didn't think I would be much help when I was having to bend over in pain while doing deep breathing every 10 minutes. So I decided to take a nap and see if I could catch up on some sleep I had missed the night before. Within a few minutes of laying down my contractions mostly stopped (so at least I got a good nap.) I was somewhat disappointed but at the same time I was glad that SOMETHING had changed. I either needed things to get going or stop...and they stopped. I decided that after my nap I felt good enough to go to work for the afternoon so I called my boss and asked if I could come in. I figured that even if the contractions started again and labor sped up, at least I would already be at the hospital, right? Well, work went well and I probably only had two contractions the entire afternoon. I went out to my car to go home for the evening and saw that I had received a text from my sweet friend Dollie, telling me that she had made dinner for us for the evening (seriously...I have AMAZING friends...and God has AMAZING timing.) I went to pick it up on my way to pick up the girls and then we headed home. The evening resumed as normal and we all went to bed Thursday night as normal. I was feeling fine - not many contractions.
I slept pretty well Thursday night but woke up around 5am with strong contractions again. I wasn't really timing them since I was half sleeping but when I got up around 6 and started getting myself and the girls ready for work/school/daycare they were coming a lot closer together. I finally asked Peter to sort of take over in getting them ready while I sat down. I decided I definitely was not going to be able to go into work and asked Peter if he could take the girls to daycare (Abbie rides the bus to school from daycare.) I told him that I would decide whether we needed to go to the hospital by the time he came home from dropping off the girls. By the time he arrived home my contractions were anywhere from three to five minutes apart so he called into work and we finished packing up our things for the hospital. The time we took to pack and get around allowed all the morning traffic to die down as well which allowed for a quick and stress free trip into the hospital.
When we got to the hospital they hooked me up to the monitors to check on the baby. An OB resident came in and checked me and I was dilated 4-5 cm. They asked us to walk around for a couple of hours just to make sure my labor was progressing. If I came back and there was no change then they would possibly send us home but if I came back and had progressed then they could keep us. So we walked for 2 hours. My contractions stayed about the same while we walked - three to five minutes apart and strong. Once we got back they checked me again and I was dilated to 7cm. They quickly moved us from the triage room to the delivery room and once we got all settled...my contractions slowed WAY down. We thought that at the 7cm point was a strange place for labor to stall but that is exactly what it did. I sat on a big ball for a while, walked around the room, laid down, stood up, sat on the ball some more...and nothing. When I would have a contraction it was still strong but they were just way too spaced out and not consistent at all. SOOO, they asked us to get up and walk again. Then the "P" word came up - PITOCIN. I had to have Pitocin with Abbie to make my contractions stronger and it was horrible. It made me throw up for my entire labor with her - not cool. So I REALLY didn't want to have Pitocin. At that point I would have run a marathon if they asked me to just so I didn't have to have it. We walked for an hour this time. 15 minutes into walking the contractions picked back up and were about two to three minutes apart by the time we got back to labor and delivery. They checked me again and I was dilated to 8 cm. AND ONCE AGAIN, as soon as I laid down for them to check me my contractions slowed down. At this point they decided it would probably be best to break my water and see if that sped things up and if it didn't THEN they would have to give me the Pitocin. I was a little frustrated at this point - wondering how on earth my labor was stalled during what was usually the most difficult part. They asked me if I wanted an epidural and I opted to have it as I was having some back labor and that can be a sign that the baby is face anterior instead of face posterior. Olivia was also face up and I ended up pushing for three hours with her - was I glad to have the epidural for that - umm, yes. So even though I really didn't feel like I needed it otherwise I was just kind of nervous about a long, difficult pushing experience again so I decided to go ahead with the epidural. Once I got t he epidural they broke my water and it was time to wait to see what happened. I obviously could no longer walk to get my contractions going so we were just praying that breaking my water would do the job.
I laid in bed, in a state of bliss from the initial effects of the epidural. We watched the monitor for a minute to assess the frequency of my contractions. I had two that were fairly close together and about the same intensity as I had been having them. The doctors said that they would watch for a couple hours and see if things sped up and then they left. As soon as they walked out of the room I started having REALLY strong contractions and an urge to push. The nurse and I were both kind of surprised as I was just at 8 cm about five minutes before that. The nurse said we should wait to see what the next contraction was like just to be sure. The next one was the same and only about a minute after the first one. So she called the doctors back in, they checked me again and I was at 10 cm and ready to push. It was such a rush, having things move SO quickly like that. The epidural was not yet in it's full effect so that was a bit of a bummer but I pushed through it anyway - definitely the most painful of the three girls =). I pushed for a little under 30 minutes and then our lovely little Savannah was born at 5:03pm. I remember that I had my eyes shut the entire time I was pushing (not sure why) and then after hearing Peter say, "It's a girl" I opened them as the doctors placed her on my belly, wrapped in a blanket. She was perfect. She cried for a second but then just laid there quietly with her eyes wide open. And at that instant the miracle of all miracles takes place - falling so in love with this little person - loving them as much as you love your other children even though it never seems like that could be possible.
She was born healthy and with no complications Her APGAR scores were both 9's (they told us they never give 10's.) Peter went with her to the other side of the room to get weighed and examined while the doctors had to do a little stitching on my side of the room - definite ouch since the epidural never had time to fully work. After her examination we held her a while and then I nursed her - I am SO thankful for babies that nurse well. She did great right from the start. We talked about her name for a moment before calling family to tell them the news. Savannah is a name that I had liked, and was at the top of our "girl names" list. It was one that grew on Peter over the course of my pregnancy. We chose June for her middle name just because we both liked it as a name but she actually shares that middle name with her Aunt Melodee (my brother's wife) and her cousin Eliza. After a while my parents arrived with our girls and they were both SO excited to meet Savannah. I was excited to see them as I feel like having Savannah not only expanded my love to include her, but it also made me love more deeply - all my girls. I was so happy to have all of us there - our little family of five.
We are SO thankful to God for our precious Savannah. What a gift he has entrusted us with. His timing just absolutely amazed us. There were so many little details that all fell right into place. Here are just a few of the ways His timing was perfect...
- Having my labor start early in the morning, allowing Peter time to get the girls off to the right places for the day.
- Having friends/neighbors available (thank you Aydelottes) to pick the girls up from daycare at the end of the day and feed them dinner before my parents picked them up.
- Giving birth on Friday - allowing all of our parents to be here for the weekend to meet Savannah and watch the girls while we stayed in the hospital. Our parents would not have been able to come during the week and Peter was just planning on staying home with the older girls at night so it was such a blessing to be able to have him stay with me and know that Abbie and Olivia were with family.
- Having our hospital stay be during the weekend so we didn't have to pay for parking!!!!!!!
- Savannah being born on the 24th of August. She shares a birthday with her Grandpa Mark (Peter's dad) and her late Great Grandmother Jeanette (Marks' mother.) How cool is that?!?
We had so many generous offers from friends to watch the girls but we are so thankful that everything happened the way it did. We really felt God's blessing in all of it.
We are adjusting well now that we are home. Peter's mom was able to stay until Wednesday and Peter just went back to work this morning. The girls have done well - Olivia is just in LOVE with her baby sister. She has helped me change several diapers and hugs and kisses Savannah almost any chance she gets. She is So stinkin sweet and I love it. Abbie keeps her distance a little more (she was the same way when Olivia was born) but she is still very helpful and wants to hold Savannah a lot. Peter and I are tired but that is to be expected I guess. The first couple of days home, Savannah's most awake time was from midnight to 3am. She has since done much better during the night - waking up only to eat and then going right back to sleep afterward. She is eating about every 3 hours and other than that has just slept A LOT!
Thank you to those of you who have been praying for us and to those who visited us while we were in the hospital. Your prayers, kind words, and gifts have been such a blessing!
Now, as your reward (if you made it all the way through this post) here are some pictures of our sweet Savannah. (For those of you on Facebook, most of these are repeats of what I already posted.)
This is our Savannah June. Hope you enjoyed meeting her. We look forward to when you get to do it in person. Thanks for letting us share her with you!
