Spaatz965
10-06-2005, 02:19 AM
My daughter was born on August 14th, 2003. This is the story of her birth, and I will apologize now, as I did not have time to be brief. Before relating her story, we have to flashback to 2001 and the birth of my son…
We were living in Florida at the time, and my wife was very interested in a “natural” birthing experience. She’d been going to a practice of Midwives for her routine Gynecology exams, so it was a natural extension to stick with them for the Obstetrics. This wasn’t quite a “hippy dippy” outfit, but it was definitely a “calm”, “natural”, and “what ever feels comfortable without frugs” kinda place. <note…frugs are f*ing drugs>
Pregnancy went a little long…like two weeks overdue (figured the boy was just comfortable and didn’t want to leave home yet…gonna be a bitch when he comes of age), and there was some concern over size…ultrasound came back indicating over 10 pounds (4.5kg). Labor started in the afternoon on Sunday, but hadn’t progressed very far overnight. We went in for a scheduled checkup on Monday morning. Because of the size, we were “risked” out of using the birthing center, and directed to the hospital, where to my wife’s great relief, she got an epidermal. Anyhow, went through the day and into the night, when it was generally agreed that after 8 hours at 9.5cm (measured at 2pm) we had a failure to progress situation and a caesarian section was needed.
Key tip to all you guys. If the mother of your child is going through a C-Section under anything but a general anesthetic (ie, not completely knocked the <insert significant expletive of choice here> out), and you are holding her hand…be sure you have removed ALL jewelry ahead of time. Did not know she was that strong, nearly broke some fingers against my wedding band.
So there’s the flashback…Son was born via C-Section at about 9lbs 8oz (4.3kg). So now we get back to my daughter’s birth.
Wife was again carrying a big child. (Did I mention both wife and I are about 5’ 10” – 177.8cm?) There was a problem. She had a partial placental previa (placenta was attached near the cervix). Normally, the placenta would migrate, but this one didn’t. It stayed put…best guess is the placenta had attached to the scar from our son’s C-Section. We cut this down to the wire, hoping for a VBAC (pronounced Vee-Back, vaginal birth after caesarian), but not to be. Around 9:30am on August 14th, wife scheduled the c-section for the following week (which would be about 2 weeks before our daughter’s due date). This is where things start getting exciting…
<WARNING – for the feint of heart and easily grossed out, DO NOT read further>
Around noon thirty’s, wife was chatting on the cordless phone with a friend. Our two year old (at the time) son was playing in the living room. Wife got up to head into the kitchen for something. Leaving the carpeted living room, and entering the linoleum floored kitchen, she felt a gush which she immediately assumed was her water breaking all over the inside of her favorite shorts. She was wrong. The gush was blood from a partial abruption (the placenta partially detached from the uterine wall). My wife was bleeding heavily. My son was playing in the living room. Wife told friend she’d have to call back later with no other explanation and proceeded to the powder room to staunch the bleeding with finger towels, and placed the phone on the counter along the way.
There she sat, trying to figure out what to do. She called to our son to bring her the phone, but at two years old he was too interested in what he was doing in the living room (damned idiot box had him transfixed).
So, trying to keep a finger towel in the way of the blood (yeah, right), she walked back into the kitchen, grabbed the phone, and headed UP STAIRS to our main bathroom. For, you see, there are larger towels up there. Interesting how one’s mind works in such a situation.
Having arrived in our upstairs bathroom, amazingly having avoided getting blood on the carpeted stairs and hallway, she lay down on the floor and propped her legs up a tad. She didn’t have our neighbor’s number in hand (left it magnetically affixed to the refrigerator), so she did the next best thing…called her doctor’s office. That’s right, not 911 (the emergency number), but her OB/GYN’s office. Did I mention it was noon thirtyish? Since the OB/GYN’s office was all out to lunch, the answering machine picked up. She didn’t have anything to write with, so it took her three times through to get the number to the answering service. She called the answering service, who brilliantly enough managed to comprehend the import of the situation, actually PAGED someone.
Whilst that was happening, my wife tried calling me at work…and since I was on the phone, she hung up on my voicemail with no message. She tried again, and hung up on my voicemail while I was momentarily away from my desk. Before my wife could try again, a nurse from her OB’s office called her, evaluated the situation over the phone, and asked my wife if she’d like to call 911 or have the nurse do it…my wife’s pause answered the question and the nurse had someone in the office do it.
Somewhere along the line, my son came upstairs. He looked at my wife, lying in a growing puddle of blood and asked, “Mommy belly button broken?” and promptly trotted off to his room to play.
She blacked out a bit, and next she knew the phone was dead. So she tried calling me again…and miracle of miracles actually got me. Here is my incredibly shocky wife telling me in slurred speech that she is bleeding, an ambulance is on the way…and continued babbling until she heard the call waiting tone. She told me it was probably her doctor’s office calling back. It was just after 1pm. After getting off the phone with her, I walked BRISKLY to my 2nd level manager’s office (manager was off that day), gave him a very brief explanation and let him know I was on my way out the door. As I was heading that way, I threw my office keys at a coworker, and asked them to bring my laptop to my place after locking up for me.
I trotted over to the parking garage, leapt into my car (thank god I don’t drive a squirrel train 4 cylinder engined car anymore) and sped home…making the normally 20 minute commute in just under 10…and managing to call the 911 center from my cell along the way to let them know I was on my way and we had a 2 year old in the house.
The fire department paramedics followed me in, making for a total of five emergency vehicles (deputy sheriff, two ambulances, ambulance supervisor, fd paras).
There was a five ring circus upstairs…and the deputy was in the living room with my son. By 1:45 my wife was being transported to the hospital. I was left with a tired (past his nap time) 2 year old and a bloody mess.
Took my son upstairs, put him down for his nap, sent an update email to the folks at work (priorities, right?), then proceeded on cleaning up the scads of blood. Before you start to think I had it all cool and collected, I took all the towels and bathroom mats down to the laundry, put them immediately into the washer and made sure I was using *hot* water to avoid the blood setting into the cloth. (For those of you not catching that, and I knew this at the time, wash blood out with COLD water, else it sets).
Right…I sat down, called the hospital, and found out that my daughter was born around 2:30pm via an emergency C-Section. Since she had called her doctor’s office, all the right people were at the hospital waiting for her when she arrived. Zip/zap and done!
So, there I was. Sitting at my desk. Drafted up a note to the sheriff’s office about how great the deputy was. Sent another update email to work. Sent email out to folks on my wife’s email list. Was starting to breath a bit and let the adrenalin drain…and you would think that’s the end of the story. But then you would be wrong. Anything unusual happen to the USA on August 14th, 2003? Well, yes there was….I tend to listen to talk radio, and had the radio playing in the background. It was coming up on 4pm and a news blurb ran about massive power outages sweeping across the northeastern United States. I smiled and was thinking, “Thank goodness, we still have pow…..er” and the “er” was thought just as we lost electricity.
So here I am. Son asleep. No electric. Stove is electric. No electric. Phones are all cordless. Cell service is swamped. Grabbed a “plain old” phone, plugged it in, and tried calling my mother’s place…hoping she’d hear her only “plain old” phone in the basement.
Got through. Dropped my son off to stay the night with grandma. Went in to see wife and daughter (8pm by then). Stopped by coworkers house on the way home. Had a beer with him and his wife. Was quite buzzed (did I forget to eat in there?)…got home, grabbed some dinner at 11:30pm, and went to bed. The lights came back on around midnight, while I was reading to the light of a mini-mag.
And that
Is the story
Of my daughters birth.
3 weeks early and 7lbs 6oz (3.34kg)
In 9,006 characters, including spaces.
We were living in Florida at the time, and my wife was very interested in a “natural” birthing experience. She’d been going to a practice of Midwives for her routine Gynecology exams, so it was a natural extension to stick with them for the Obstetrics. This wasn’t quite a “hippy dippy” outfit, but it was definitely a “calm”, “natural”, and “what ever feels comfortable without frugs” kinda place. <note…frugs are f*ing drugs>
Pregnancy went a little long…like two weeks overdue (figured the boy was just comfortable and didn’t want to leave home yet…gonna be a bitch when he comes of age), and there was some concern over size…ultrasound came back indicating over 10 pounds (4.5kg). Labor started in the afternoon on Sunday, but hadn’t progressed very far overnight. We went in for a scheduled checkup on Monday morning. Because of the size, we were “risked” out of using the birthing center, and directed to the hospital, where to my wife’s great relief, she got an epidermal. Anyhow, went through the day and into the night, when it was generally agreed that after 8 hours at 9.5cm (measured at 2pm) we had a failure to progress situation and a caesarian section was needed.
Key tip to all you guys. If the mother of your child is going through a C-Section under anything but a general anesthetic (ie, not completely knocked the <insert significant expletive of choice here> out), and you are holding her hand…be sure you have removed ALL jewelry ahead of time. Did not know she was that strong, nearly broke some fingers against my wedding band.
So there’s the flashback…Son was born via C-Section at about 9lbs 8oz (4.3kg). So now we get back to my daughter’s birth.
Wife was again carrying a big child. (Did I mention both wife and I are about 5’ 10” – 177.8cm?) There was a problem. She had a partial placental previa (placenta was attached near the cervix). Normally, the placenta would migrate, but this one didn’t. It stayed put…best guess is the placenta had attached to the scar from our son’s C-Section. We cut this down to the wire, hoping for a VBAC (pronounced Vee-Back, vaginal birth after caesarian), but not to be. Around 9:30am on August 14th, wife scheduled the c-section for the following week (which would be about 2 weeks before our daughter’s due date). This is where things start getting exciting…
<WARNING – for the feint of heart and easily grossed out, DO NOT read further>
Around noon thirty’s, wife was chatting on the cordless phone with a friend. Our two year old (at the time) son was playing in the living room. Wife got up to head into the kitchen for something. Leaving the carpeted living room, and entering the linoleum floored kitchen, she felt a gush which she immediately assumed was her water breaking all over the inside of her favorite shorts. She was wrong. The gush was blood from a partial abruption (the placenta partially detached from the uterine wall). My wife was bleeding heavily. My son was playing in the living room. Wife told friend she’d have to call back later with no other explanation and proceeded to the powder room to staunch the bleeding with finger towels, and placed the phone on the counter along the way.
There she sat, trying to figure out what to do. She called to our son to bring her the phone, but at two years old he was too interested in what he was doing in the living room (damned idiot box had him transfixed).
So, trying to keep a finger towel in the way of the blood (yeah, right), she walked back into the kitchen, grabbed the phone, and headed UP STAIRS to our main bathroom. For, you see, there are larger towels up there. Interesting how one’s mind works in such a situation.
Having arrived in our upstairs bathroom, amazingly having avoided getting blood on the carpeted stairs and hallway, she lay down on the floor and propped her legs up a tad. She didn’t have our neighbor’s number in hand (left it magnetically affixed to the refrigerator), so she did the next best thing…called her doctor’s office. That’s right, not 911 (the emergency number), but her OB/GYN’s office. Did I mention it was noon thirtyish? Since the OB/GYN’s office was all out to lunch, the answering machine picked up. She didn’t have anything to write with, so it took her three times through to get the number to the answering service. She called the answering service, who brilliantly enough managed to comprehend the import of the situation, actually PAGED someone.
Whilst that was happening, my wife tried calling me at work…and since I was on the phone, she hung up on my voicemail with no message. She tried again, and hung up on my voicemail while I was momentarily away from my desk. Before my wife could try again, a nurse from her OB’s office called her, evaluated the situation over the phone, and asked my wife if she’d like to call 911 or have the nurse do it…my wife’s pause answered the question and the nurse had someone in the office do it.
Somewhere along the line, my son came upstairs. He looked at my wife, lying in a growing puddle of blood and asked, “Mommy belly button broken?” and promptly trotted off to his room to play.
She blacked out a bit, and next she knew the phone was dead. So she tried calling me again…and miracle of miracles actually got me. Here is my incredibly shocky wife telling me in slurred speech that she is bleeding, an ambulance is on the way…and continued babbling until she heard the call waiting tone. She told me it was probably her doctor’s office calling back. It was just after 1pm. After getting off the phone with her, I walked BRISKLY to my 2nd level manager’s office (manager was off that day), gave him a very brief explanation and let him know I was on my way out the door. As I was heading that way, I threw my office keys at a coworker, and asked them to bring my laptop to my place after locking up for me.
I trotted over to the parking garage, leapt into my car (thank god I don’t drive a squirrel train 4 cylinder engined car anymore) and sped home…making the normally 20 minute commute in just under 10…and managing to call the 911 center from my cell along the way to let them know I was on my way and we had a 2 year old in the house.
The fire department paramedics followed me in, making for a total of five emergency vehicles (deputy sheriff, two ambulances, ambulance supervisor, fd paras).
There was a five ring circus upstairs…and the deputy was in the living room with my son. By 1:45 my wife was being transported to the hospital. I was left with a tired (past his nap time) 2 year old and a bloody mess.
Took my son upstairs, put him down for his nap, sent an update email to the folks at work (priorities, right?), then proceeded on cleaning up the scads of blood. Before you start to think I had it all cool and collected, I took all the towels and bathroom mats down to the laundry, put them immediately into the washer and made sure I was using *hot* water to avoid the blood setting into the cloth. (For those of you not catching that, and I knew this at the time, wash blood out with COLD water, else it sets).
Right…I sat down, called the hospital, and found out that my daughter was born around 2:30pm via an emergency C-Section. Since she had called her doctor’s office, all the right people were at the hospital waiting for her when she arrived. Zip/zap and done!
So, there I was. Sitting at my desk. Drafted up a note to the sheriff’s office about how great the deputy was. Sent another update email to work. Sent email out to folks on my wife’s email list. Was starting to breath a bit and let the adrenalin drain…and you would think that’s the end of the story. But then you would be wrong. Anything unusual happen to the USA on August 14th, 2003? Well, yes there was….I tend to listen to talk radio, and had the radio playing in the background. It was coming up on 4pm and a news blurb ran about massive power outages sweeping across the northeastern United States. I smiled and was thinking, “Thank goodness, we still have pow…..er” and the “er” was thought just as we lost electricity.
So here I am. Son asleep. No electric. Stove is electric. No electric. Phones are all cordless. Cell service is swamped. Grabbed a “plain old” phone, plugged it in, and tried calling my mother’s place…hoping she’d hear her only “plain old” phone in the basement.
Got through. Dropped my son off to stay the night with grandma. Went in to see wife and daughter (8pm by then). Stopped by coworkers house on the way home. Had a beer with him and his wife. Was quite buzzed (did I forget to eat in there?)…got home, grabbed some dinner at 11:30pm, and went to bed. The lights came back on around midnight, while I was reading to the light of a mini-mag.
And that
Is the story
Of my daughters birth.
3 weeks early and 7lbs 6oz (3.34kg)
In 9,006 characters, including spaces.