Tiegan Skye Loveland
Born at 7:14 AM December 13th, 5 weeks early.
5 pounds 10 oz
19 inches
And absolutely perfect.
Thursday I had every intention of cooking, cleaning, and going to class. When afternoon rolled around, I had a weird feeling that I should stay home from class and clean. I was feeling pretty crampy, but I hate missing class so I was just going to go in anyway. I went to get ready and noticed just a little bleeding. She also hadn't been moving as much as she normally does. The longer I thought about it, the worse my imagined scenario became. I decided to call and see if I was okay to just watch it. But of course they told me to go in to get checked out. Ross was going to be home within the hour, so I decided whenever he got home I'd head in.
By the time I got to the hospital, contractions had picked up, but they still weren't painful. I've had a ridiculous amount of contractions throughout the entire pregnancy so I didn't think anything of it. The crampy feeling had gotten worse though. A couple different doctors came in to talk to me in triage and asked what I thought was going on. They decided to check to see if I was still leaking fluid and check my cervix. The first doctor checked me and said I was dilated to a 6. They left to go consult with my specialist team as well as the doctor on call. After a while they came back in and decided to have someone else check. The second doctor said I was a 4 or 5 maybe, but that I definitely stretched to a 6, so she wasn't sure where to call the number. They left again to go decide what to do with me.
I ended up spending a few hours in triage while they decided what to do. The plan changed a million times and it was frustrating not knowing if I needed to have Ross find someone to watch the girls so he could come in. At that point I was pretty uncomfortable, but just wanted to get sent home so I didn't have to be in the waiting game. I think it was around 10 they came in to check me again. I had thinned and dilated a little more so they decided to admit me.
Wisconsin has an attitude of "Keep the baby in at all costs!!" So none of the doctors wanted to do anything to intervene or help things progress. They were pretty sure I was in labor, but not 100% sure, so there was a chance they'd just be watching me over night and I'd be sent home in the morning. Contractions had picked up. I was uncomfortable but not really in pain. We decided to have Ross come in just to be safe.
I had packed the hospital bags a week or so ago, but I kept them in our room where Aoife naps. During "naptime" Aoife had been slowly unpacking and scattering the contents. When Ross went to get the bags, they were empty. I had to make up a list off of the top of my head and sent him on a scavenger hunt. He was also in the middle of doing laundry, and cleaning as fast as he could. Everyone give him a pinch and tell him what a fantastic husband he is.
While Ross was en route, I was moved to another room. I hadn't been pregnant long enough to have done the Group B strep test, so we decided to play it safe and get the antibiotics going. I was pretty uncomfortable and started feeling nauseous. I got to poke around the room. The bath tub was ridiculously deep and looked fantastic. They also had a birthing ball there that I loved. Once I was hooked up to the antibiotics, I got set up on my ball with my barf bag and water jug and I was set! Ross came in and played a game of Skip-Bo with me before I sent him to get some sleep.
I decided to hop in the tub. Because I was early, babe had to stay on the monitor and they also wanted to keep a close eye on contractions. They were every 2-3 minutes. But they had a really cool portable monitor I could take in the tub with me. The nurse was fantastic and brought me bath blankets and kept checking on me to make sure I was as comfortable as possible. I wasn't hurting enough to want anything, but she kept a close watch on me anyway.
After the tub I decided to get back in the bed and distract myself with Netflix. The doctor wanted to check me again and I was thinner and pretty loose. But still, Wisconsin wants to keep the baby in no matter what, so no intervening. They figured my water would need to completely break to get me progressing much more, and since they weren't going to break my water, the nurse suggested morphine to help me relax. The morphine only lasts about an hour, and just takes the edge off. Right after it went in I felt weird and was wondering what I had gotten myself into. My body just felt heavy and I was woozy. I turned on my lullaby station on Pandora and settled in. Contractions were picking up, but the morphine was wonderful. I was able to sit back and relax. A couple hours later the nurse came in to check on me. I was back to feeling nauseous and was now HURTING. It didn't take long to get to the "kill me now" point. It was close to 6:30 and Ross was awake now. The doctor came in to check me and I was now at a 7. She said my composure had completely changed and I was definitely in labor so she decided to break my water. Instantly contractions got a million times worse and it wasn't long before the tears were rolling and I was rocking around, getting on all fours, and acting crazy.
Shift change was happening so the new doctors and nurses hadn't met me when I was still happy and making jokes. They were walking in to meet me at the worst time possible. Later I found out I introduced myself as "Crazy". I always thought women who said awful things to their husbands while in labor were crazy, but after going through that, I completely get it. I didn't say anything to him, but I definitely shot him looks. Poor guy. Have you seen Bill Cosby's Natural Child Birth? Yeah- it was a lot like that.
While I was praying for death, I
"Holy Frick!"
"Frick on a Stick!"
"Holy Crap!"
And the winner (while I was pushing)-
Me: "HOLY BURNING RING OF FIRE!!!"
Nurse 1: Did she just say holy burning ring of fire?
Nurse 2: Yup. I think that's a song.
All Million People in the Room: HAHAHAHAHA
And of course I had the sobs of "I can't do this." "I don't want to do this anymore." "I don't want to have a baby." "I don't want to push." Everyone was very encouraging and of course kept saying thing like, "You got this" "Good girl" "You're doing great" "Here's your barf bag" But my main nurse was my tough love gal and just what I needed. Every now and then she looked like she wanted to slap me, but she'd say, "We're having a baby right now. You HAVE to do this. You're fine." I was absolutely in panic hysterical. Tiegan was also facing the wrong way so they tried a couple things to get her to turn. They didn't work.
Not much longer and it was time to push. And I really didn't want to. Ross and I had always joked that he'd do the Bill Cosby chant, "Push him out, shove him out, way out!" But due to concern for his safety, he decided not to. It was probably for the best. A few pushes and a lot of "HOLY FRICKS" later, Tiegan came out crying. We had the nursery staff and NICU staff in the room just in case. I got a tiny peek at her before she was whisked away to be checked out. I sent Ross over while I got stitched up. She scored 9's on both apgars, and was absolutely perfect. I'm so grateful for doctors and medicine and for the aggressive approach we took with steroids. And everyone should throw Ross a couple Benjamin's for enduring an epidural-less delivery with me. Poor guy.
We got to cuddle for a while before we moved to the recovery room, which was great because she didn't have a name yet! We thought we picked her name months ago, but recently we started thinking of others. We came to the hospital with a few we liked, but after she was born, none of them were right. It was a little stressful having to start from scratch, but eventually we found the right name.
She's a champion nurser and eats like none other. Because she was so early, they had to test her blood sugars before every feeding for the first 24 hours. She did perfectly. It was so much fun getting to keep her with me and take her home with us. We've had to take her in every day to make sure her weight and bili levels still look good, but we love this little nugget and can't believe we have a trio of little girls!
We are absolutely smitten. And life with three littles is absolutely insane so I'll have to post about that next nap time.
