Short version: Finn McGovern Fortney was born Tuesday, November 13, 2007, at 9:20 am. He weighed 8 lbs., 11 oz., and was 20 1/2 inches long. He has lots of pretty dark hair and blue eyes. Labor started about 3:30 am on Monday morning, and we went to the hospital around 7:00 at night. He came out the old fashioned way, with help from drugs (and lots of people), and started screaming right away. Got a 9 on his Apgar at 1 and 5 minutes (for those of you in the know on such things). The pediatrician says he looks great, and both Jonathan and I are tired but good, and very happy.
Now, for those of you who want the long version...
Finn was in no hurry. At 41 weeks, still no contractions that were strong enough to be uncomfortable, and few that were strong enough to feel. We went down the list of things that could/should get things started; I went to an acupuncturist; we waited. Our midwife, Lin, did an ultrasound and stress test last Thursday and said that everything looked fine, but that she'd like to do prostaglandin gel on Sunday night, and if that ripened my cervix, start me slowly on pitocin on Tuesday. I was a little nervous about pitocin, but willing to try the gel and go from there. So that's what we did.
Sunday night we went to the hospital for the gel. I was at 1 cm. Everything was fine, normal, and uneventful. We went home.
Monday morning I woke up with contractions I couldn't sleep through... although I tried from about 3:30 to 4:30. At 5:00 we got out of bed, and they were 3-5 minutes apart. We already had an appointment to see Lin at 10:00 so she could see how things were going with the gel, so we just kind of puttered around the house until then. When we went in Lin said I was at 2 cm and that everything looked good, and sent us home, telling us to keep her posted. It looked like we weren't going to need the pitocin after all, which was nice.
We managed to sleep a bit when we got home, and the contractions slowed to almost 10 minutes apart for a while. They were pretty erratic for most of the day, but got stronger and stronger. We tried to reach Lin, but... um... Jonathan and pagers don't get along. We won't dwell on that. We reached Olga, the other midwife, who said we could go ahead and go in if the contractions were pretty intense and we wanted to get checked. So we did. And I was still 2 cm. I think they were going to give me something so I could sleep and send us home, but they put me on the monitor to see how Finn was doing for a while, and by the time an hour had passed and Lin had come in to see us, I was at 4 cm, so they decided to keep us. It was around 9:00 p.m., it was the real thing, and the only way I was going to be sleeping between then and having a baby was an epidural.
We walked around a bit to see if that would help move things along; it didn't. Both Lin and the nurse pointed out that if we just let things move slowly I would probably be completely and utterly exhausted by the time I had to push. That sounded reasonable, since I'd been up since around 4am, so we decided to have Lin break the bag. I think that was around 10:30, and I was at about 5 cm. As expected, the contractions felt a lot more intense after that, and were coming closer together. Lin recommended I try the shower, so we did that for a while, and it helped a bit. But for the hours after the bag was broken, I had a really hard time finding a comfortable position either between or during contractions, and didn't feel like I was getting any rest in between, especially in my back. At some point after midnight, I have no idea when, I felt like I was at the end of my rope. I couldn't focus on anything; I just wanted to cry and for it all to go away. But Lin had had the nurse get the warming table ready, and the cart full of instruments and stuff, and from the questions she was asking me about what I was feeling and where, I got the impression it might be time to push soon. So she checked me for the first time in hours... and I was still at 5 cm.
This was when I finally truly understood what people mean when they say that there are times when having someone stick a needle into your spine sounds like a reasonable, nay, a brilliant idea. So they called Dr. Brown, the wonderful anesthesiologist, and he came and did the epidural. Good thing: I could function again, and think about sleeping. Bad thing: Finn's heart rate wasn't doing so good. They thought it might be related to the epidural and my blood pressure, so they gave me something for my blood pressure. It helped a bit (I think; I was not at my most alert at this point), but his pulse was still falling during contractions, and in between them not getting up as high as it had been. Lin called the doctor on call, Dr. Barrett, and he looked at the readout and said that if it went that low again, they getting him out. Period.
I was so out of it and so tired by then that I probably would have done anything anybody told me to. But Lin was great. She thought that he was coming up high enough between contractions, and as long as he kept that up, we'd watch carefully, give me very small amounts of pitocin, and wait for my cervix to catch up. Apparently some (most?) of the nurses in labor and delivery really thought we should have a C-section, and if Dr. Barrett had come back to check on us, we probably would have, but we didn't hear about any of this. We knew there was concern, and monitoring, but from our perspective the positions I was in and the fluid they put back in had gotten things back in a good place, and everything was fine. Thank you Lin! We slept a bit; they checked on us periodically, and we got through the night. It was scary to go from a free-range person to one attached to no fewer than six instruments/bags/whatnots in such a short time, but we were doing okay, and so was he.
When the new nurse, Maria (who replaced Maria, who replaced Emily) came on sometime around 7:30 a.m. on Tuesday, I'd been awake for about an hour. Finn's pulse was now good (back up to pre-bag-breaking-levels) after every contraction no matter what position I was in, which was great. I could still feel the pressure of the contractions, and I couldn't get entirely comfortable, but my attitude was a lot better. The pressure was telling me it might be time to push, so I told Maria that, and she checked me - completely dilated, and ready to go. She said if I felt like pushing, go ahead. We started pushing; Lin came; and then at 9:20 we had a baby! I guess it must have been about an hour and a half of pushing, but it really didn't feel that long. The cord had been wrapped around his neck, which was probably the problem in the night, but it was around loosely, just once, and he's very healthy. And loud. And has a full head of hair. And is a skilled eater.
We like him. We're going to keep him.
-Katie
My mom has been here since Friday. Before the birth we weren't sure if we would want anyone around the first week or two, but I'm so glad she could come earlier rather than later. I'm not sure how we would have survived the weekend otherwise, and today will be ... interesting... after she leaves. She got in a lot of Finn-holding time, picked up after us when we weren't looking, and even made us a cake. Thanks to her we actually went out to dinner for Jonathan's birthday last night, which was exhausting but fun. I realize this reveals what a dope I am, but I didn't expect to be this ... beat. I think I thought, sure, I'll be sleep deprived, but we'll deal with that. I completely failed to take into account the physical toll of pushing another human being out of my body and then having to put myself back together again. So I'm trying to take it easy, and this blog post is the most challenging thing I have lined up for the day.
Wanna see a funny sign from a hallway in the hospital?
Everyone knows how important tummy time is.
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