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| Just a little bit of a smile? |
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| Milk Coma! |
Wednesday, April 30, 2014
Tuesday, April 29, 2014
Debut
Hello all, and welcome to our blog for little Violet June Claflin. I suspect that this will end up largely being a photo blog, but who knows. We'll try to give a few updates now and again as time allows. Love you all, please be in touch, and thanks so much for all of the love and support over the last week.
Friday, April 25, 2014
Violet's Birth story: Part 2
Ted and I weren't really aware that inductions can sometimes take a very long time. As such, I told my parents to start driving and was thinking that Violet would likely be born sometime Wednesday night or Thursday morning. Boy, were we wrong!
The night I was admitted they gave me cervidil which is supposed to ripen your cervix. Sadly, this did absolutely nothing. I was not dilated at all. Things were going so slowly, or more accurately not going at all, that they even let me eat! I was pretty happy about that, but not so happy about sleeping in a hospital bed while I waited for nothing to happen. I did start having contractions which I originally thought was exciting until I realized that I still was not progressing at all. Violet's heart rate was pretty high (in the 180s-190s) so they started giving me a ton of fluid. Since there had been no change with the Cervidil, they gave me another cervical ripening agent, Cytotec. And while you all are feeling bad for me, sleeping in a hospital bed, expecting a baby who doesn't want to come out, we cannot forget about my darling husband. Sadly for him, and the rest of his family, that lovely Easter we had turned out to be one big petri dish. His entire family caught a GI bug which he was suffering through, while staying with me during the induction. Yuck.
But back to the baby. So the Cytotec also failed so I got to have a foley bulb. Lucky girl. By this time it was Friday and I felt like I had moved into the hospital forever. It actually worked and as I was finally dilated enough (4cm), they started Pitocin. OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.
Prior to the Pitocin, I had been having pretty strong contractions and the nurses kept asking me if I wanted an epidural yet. I was breathing through them pretty well so I kept saying no. In retrospect, and advice for anybody getting induced in the future, I would have DEFINITELY gotten the epidural prior to the Pitocin if I knew what was coming. Once the Pitocin started my contractions were about three billion times worse and my water finally broke. The contractions were awful and I basically begged/DEMANDED the epidural. I am not sure I had been happier in my life than when the anesthesiologist arrived (Liam, my hero!). It took a little bit (thanks to my mild scoliosis) but once it kicked in, HALLELUJAH! By around 6:30 pm, I was fully dilated and ready to push. The midwives came in and about five minutes into pushing remarked that I was doing so great, the baby would be out within 30 minutes. I don't know about you, but I can do anything for thirty minutes! Since it was going to be such a short time, I was putting 130% into it. Three and a half hours later, no baby. WTF. Turns out we had a big baby on our hands who did not want to come out. After consulting the OBs, who came in to check and make sure she wasn't in some crazy position, and putting me into about 12 various yoga poses (runners stance, really? you do realize I cannot feel my legs, right?), they finally whipped out this amazing bar which you can use to support your legs. A short time later, Liam was trumped as my happiest moment and Violet June was in our arms. There was a little more excitement in those three hours, including some vomiting, fever, and rigors but in the end, none of it mattered. Ted recovered from his illness just in time for me to come down with the GI bug and the worst cold of my life. Despite all of that, I had never been happier. She was perfect then and is even more perfect now. Each day I think of how I could not possibly love her more and the next day I do. This past year has been the best year of my life and I cannot wait for many more with my beautiful little family.
The night I was admitted they gave me cervidil which is supposed to ripen your cervix. Sadly, this did absolutely nothing. I was not dilated at all. Things were going so slowly, or more accurately not going at all, that they even let me eat! I was pretty happy about that, but not so happy about sleeping in a hospital bed while I waited for nothing to happen. I did start having contractions which I originally thought was exciting until I realized that I still was not progressing at all. Violet's heart rate was pretty high (in the 180s-190s) so they started giving me a ton of fluid. Since there had been no change with the Cervidil, they gave me another cervical ripening agent, Cytotec. And while you all are feeling bad for me, sleeping in a hospital bed, expecting a baby who doesn't want to come out, we cannot forget about my darling husband. Sadly for him, and the rest of his family, that lovely Easter we had turned out to be one big petri dish. His entire family caught a GI bug which he was suffering through, while staying with me during the induction. Yuck.
But back to the baby. So the Cytotec also failed so I got to have a foley bulb. Lucky girl. By this time it was Friday and I felt like I had moved into the hospital forever. It actually worked and as I was finally dilated enough (4cm), they started Pitocin. OWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWW.
Prior to the Pitocin, I had been having pretty strong contractions and the nurses kept asking me if I wanted an epidural yet. I was breathing through them pretty well so I kept saying no. In retrospect, and advice for anybody getting induced in the future, I would have DEFINITELY gotten the epidural prior to the Pitocin if I knew what was coming. Once the Pitocin started my contractions were about three billion times worse and my water finally broke. The contractions were awful and I basically begged/DEMANDED the epidural. I am not sure I had been happier in my life than when the anesthesiologist arrived (Liam, my hero!). It took a little bit (thanks to my mild scoliosis) but once it kicked in, HALLELUJAH! By around 6:30 pm, I was fully dilated and ready to push. The midwives came in and about five minutes into pushing remarked that I was doing so great, the baby would be out within 30 minutes. I don't know about you, but I can do anything for thirty minutes! Since it was going to be such a short time, I was putting 130% into it. Three and a half hours later, no baby. WTF. Turns out we had a big baby on our hands who did not want to come out. After consulting the OBs, who came in to check and make sure she wasn't in some crazy position, and putting me into about 12 various yoga poses (runners stance, really? you do realize I cannot feel my legs, right?), they finally whipped out this amazing bar which you can use to support your legs. A short time later, Liam was trumped as my happiest moment and Violet June was in our arms. There was a little more excitement in those three hours, including some vomiting, fever, and rigors but in the end, none of it mattered. Ted recovered from his illness just in time for me to come down with the GI bug and the worst cold of my life. Despite all of that, I had never been happier. She was perfect then and is even more perfect now. Each day I think of how I could not possibly love her more and the next day I do. This past year has been the best year of my life and I cannot wait for many more with my beautiful little family.
Violet's Birth Story: Part 1
**this post is super long and is really just for me to remember. I can't imagine anyone else being interested in reading it:) as such, I am hiding it in the archives.**
As it has been almost a year since Violet's birth and I am in danger of forgetting even more than I have already, I have decided to document Violet's birth story. (I also got a little motivation by an amazing blog post by Laura) The year has also hopefully provided me with some distance so that the reliving of the story is not too traumatic!
Violet was born the weekend after Easter. We celebrated Easter early on that Saturday (April 19th) and had a lovely time.
That evening, I began to have some pretty intense itchiness (pruritis for you medical folks) of my palms and soles. I didn't think much of it but the following night it was much worse. It was bad to the point where Ted was awakened by the sound of me clawing at my palms. I vaguely remembered this being some sort of a liver problem with pregnancy so the following day I called my midwife. I relayed that I was having a lot of itching and made a point to mention that I was concerned that I may have "cholestasis of pregnancy." It was clear that the person on the phone had no idea what this meant. I, on the other hand, was pretty concerned as my quick bit of reading had revealed that the biggest problem with cholestasis of pregnancy is sudden IUD or intrauterine demise. As in, the baby dies. Horrible, and terrifying. I called on a Monday morning and by around 5pm that day had still not heard back at all. My good friend Erika is an OB resident in Ann Arbor so seeing as the work day was close to ending, I sent her a quick text to see what she thought. She responded immediately (have I mentioned that she is wonderful?) that I needed to go to triage ASAP so they could draw some labs. Truth be told, I was a little freaked out by her urgency, combined with the fact that I had heard all of NOTHING from the midwives. I called Ted and we headed to the hospital.
Our experience in triage was not the greatest. I tried to give the midwives the benefit of the doubt but Ted was decidedly not happy (and didn't exactly try to hide it). It probably did not help that none of them could even pronounce cholestasis, which does not lend confidence to them knowing much about it. Regardless, they monitored the baby (who was doing great!) and drew some labs. Lucky for us, Erika (like I said, amazing!!!!) came by even though it was around 9pm and she was still not done with her day. She whipped out the ultrasound machine to take a look and confirmed that our little one was doing well. Unfortunately, the scariest part about cholestasis is that it basically leads to a build up of bile salts which can cross the placenta, cause an arrhythmia (making the baby's heart beat abnormally), and cause sudden death. So even though the baby looked great, she would likely look great until she didn't, in which case it would be too late. The other unfortunate thing is that the only way to diagnose cholestasis is with a lab test that has to be sent to Minnesota (Mayo) and usually doesn't return for 48-72 hours. Since the baby was doing fine, we were sent home to await the results. Erika had talked to several of the high risk OBs (really, could she be any more incredible?) and they had all agreed that we should wait for the labs to return but if they were elevated, they would induce immediately. The next two nights were pretty excruciating as we waited for the test results. Any time that she wasn't moving (which as anyone who has been pregnant knows, is often)I was sure she was gone. Wednesday morning arrived and I stalked my chart (thank God for having access!) as I had been doing each day. My labs were back and my bile salts were greater than 3x the normal limit. Just as I was paging Erika, she called to let me know she was speaking to triage about what time I could come in. We decided on 3pm so Ted and I met up at home and got our things together. I tried to nap but was way too excited and nervous. To pass the time, I curled my hair (who am I???)
As it has been almost a year since Violet's birth and I am in danger of forgetting even more than I have already, I have decided to document Violet's birth story. (I also got a little motivation by an amazing blog post by Laura) The year has also hopefully provided me with some distance so that the reliving of the story is not too traumatic!
Violet was born the weekend after Easter. We celebrated Easter early on that Saturday (April 19th) and had a lovely time.
That evening, I began to have some pretty intense itchiness (pruritis for you medical folks) of my palms and soles. I didn't think much of it but the following night it was much worse. It was bad to the point where Ted was awakened by the sound of me clawing at my palms. I vaguely remembered this being some sort of a liver problem with pregnancy so the following day I called my midwife. I relayed that I was having a lot of itching and made a point to mention that I was concerned that I may have "cholestasis of pregnancy." It was clear that the person on the phone had no idea what this meant. I, on the other hand, was pretty concerned as my quick bit of reading had revealed that the biggest problem with cholestasis of pregnancy is sudden IUD or intrauterine demise. As in, the baby dies. Horrible, and terrifying. I called on a Monday morning and by around 5pm that day had still not heard back at all. My good friend Erika is an OB resident in Ann Arbor so seeing as the work day was close to ending, I sent her a quick text to see what she thought. She responded immediately (have I mentioned that she is wonderful?) that I needed to go to triage ASAP so they could draw some labs. Truth be told, I was a little freaked out by her urgency, combined with the fact that I had heard all of NOTHING from the midwives. I called Ted and we headed to the hospital.
Our experience in triage was not the greatest. I tried to give the midwives the benefit of the doubt but Ted was decidedly not happy (and didn't exactly try to hide it). It probably did not help that none of them could even pronounce cholestasis, which does not lend confidence to them knowing much about it. Regardless, they monitored the baby (who was doing great!) and drew some labs. Lucky for us, Erika (like I said, amazing!!!!) came by even though it was around 9pm and she was still not done with her day. She whipped out the ultrasound machine to take a look and confirmed that our little one was doing well. Unfortunately, the scariest part about cholestasis is that it basically leads to a build up of bile salts which can cross the placenta, cause an arrhythmia (making the baby's heart beat abnormally), and cause sudden death. So even though the baby looked great, she would likely look great until she didn't, in which case it would be too late. The other unfortunate thing is that the only way to diagnose cholestasis is with a lab test that has to be sent to Minnesota (Mayo) and usually doesn't return for 48-72 hours. Since the baby was doing fine, we were sent home to await the results. Erika had talked to several of the high risk OBs (really, could she be any more incredible?) and they had all agreed that we should wait for the labs to return but if they were elevated, they would induce immediately. The next two nights were pretty excruciating as we waited for the test results. Any time that she wasn't moving (which as anyone who has been pregnant knows, is often)I was sure she was gone. Wednesday morning arrived and I stalked my chart (thank God for having access!) as I had been doing each day. My labs were back and my bile salts were greater than 3x the normal limit. Just as I was paging Erika, she called to let me know she was speaking to triage about what time I could come in. We decided on 3pm so Ted and I met up at home and got our things together. I tried to nap but was way too excited and nervous. To pass the time, I curled my hair (who am I???)
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