Saturday, October 12, 2013

Trying to get through it (Part 2)

Ephraim was a good 8 days late. I was struggling this for many factors, basically I had a 5 day early baby last time and even to make it to full term was different. I think though besides just feeling the weight of the unknown, there was also the question of how was this going to end.

So as I said, I went into labor post taking a nap.  Probably a nap that I so much needed because well, I wasn't sleeping well prior to that. I woke up feeling sick.  I called my friend G and asked her she had felt this with the start of her labor.  I hadn't had this last time around, but as I found out every labor and every baby is different. This quickly progressed to cramping like contractions and full out labor.  I called my midwife's office, she said I could have come in at that point, but I said I had to wait till my husband came home to do that.  So I labored at home, giving my husband a heads up first, like I did last time with the inconvenience of a toddler jumping on me this time.

The labor was quick and hard so by 7pm I called the midwife on call again, Sarah, telling her we would be in shortly.  We quickly rearranged that Ben would go to the neighbors house because my in laws were in a concert for my BIL out of cell phone range.  And then headed to the hospital/birthing center.

We got there at little after 8pm. It was about a 30 minute drive to the hospital/birthing center for us. We checked into the ER which is where they take labor and delivery patients at that particular place. And we waited for someone to come down and get us.  It was definitely a good 30 minute wait down in the ER waiting room until someone came to get us.  The ER folks paged the L&D folks a few times because they couldn't understand why no one was coming to get us. When the nurse came, I believe she told us that she was waiting for the midwife to show up, and she hadn't yet.  She asked if I wanted a wheelchair.  I said no, that I could walk, because well my water hadn't broken, I was still lucid and talking normally, and maybe this didn't clue her in to how far along I was in my labor.

So we walked across the hospital, contractions along the way. We pass a statue of St. Gerard on the way, its a Catholic hospital btw. We get to the birthing center room, at this point, I'm pretty uncomfortable, but I manage to lie down on my side so she can check my progress. As soon as she checks I see the look on her face, total shock and kind of scared because the midwife still isn't there.  She goes to page someone to get the on-call doctor in here now.  I get up to use the bathroom, water breaks over the toilet.  The nurse yells at me because she says I should have stayed in bed.  Um birthing center, right?  I signed on for freedom of movement during it all.  Apparently, I wasn't going to get that.

The on call doctor comes in and immediately tells me to get onto the bed. She says I have to deliver on my back, the worst feeling position in the world at that moment.  Birth plan, thrown out the window from here on out.  All I can say, was that it was a good thing it was a second baby and I only had to push maybe 3 times to get him out.  If it was any longer I probably would have punched someone, because on top of all the mess, my husband wasn't allowed to hold my hand.  The on-call doctor told him he couldn't. My husband had been my rock last time, and well he wasn't allowed to do or say anything.

Post birth, I was bullied into a shot of pitocin, which, I was told later if the midwife was there it wouldn't have happened.  And while I know part wasn't on call doctor's fault, she was doing things the way an OB would do it in a birthing situation.  I just really didn't sign on board for all the non-control consents I felt like I was forced into then. And after that I was left alone pretty much.  They did let me feed my baby right away, they didn't weigh him right away like most hospitals would do.  So maybe that helped a little.  But my midwife never did show up during all of this.

It wasn't until 10pm that she, Sarah, did make an appearance to ask if everything was okay and then quickly made an exit.  So either at this point, because Dr. On Call had delivered my baby and she could no longer do anything, or she knew she had let me down. She was supposed to be there and she wasn't.

Now, part of it may have been how the hospital worked with the midwifes and never had them on call on site like they do a doctor, but there was plenty of time for her to get there and she didn't.

The next day, Cara showed up to greet us.  She told us of other stories about 2 of her patients not even getting to the hospital and having to deliver their babies on their own.  This might have been to make us  feel so fortunate that we had at least gotten there and were cared for by someone. But really it felt like I was again insignificant in the scheme of things.  Even though I had done my part, they had failed to do their part, and to try to play it off we tell slightly outrageous stories so that you can't say you were let down.

Read Part 1 here.

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