The Cesarean

The first thing I noticed in the operating room was how small the operating table was. Then the fact that there were a lot of people in the room. They had me sit up on the side of the table and hunch my back up for the spinal. I sat there for what seemed like forever before they got it done. Of course, it didn’t help that I was still contracting this whole time and having a hard time focusing on any one thing. But as soon as they laid me back I could feel my toes going numb and pretty soon I couldn’t feel my stomach or the contractions anymore. They tilted the table back so that the spinal would run up my chest a little higher since I was still feeling sharp pin pricks. That part was awful cause I felt like I couldn’t breathe and was getting nauseous. But pretty quickly they righted the table up and then draped the curtain over me and got to work. There were about 12 people in the room because there was a group from the NICU waiting to take the baby as soon as he was delivered. But before they start they did what’s called a “timeout” and asked me my name and what I wanted Dr. Jensen to do to me. Guess they just have to keep confirming I am the right person and in the right frame of mind for the surgery. They did this just before the spinal too.


The first thing Dr. Jensen did was mark my belly with a pen for the incision. Then he turned and gave Jamie the pen and said “here’s a free pen from St. Joe.” Then he got to work. All I could feel was pressure, pulling and tugging, but there wasn’t any pain. It only took a minute or two before they said “I see toes” and the baby was out. At this point they told Jamie he could start watching and he stood up and started taking pictures. I was laying there watching him take pictures thinking “I don’t think that’s allowed yet”. Sure enough, a nurse came over and told him he couldn’t take pics yet – but he got a few great ones of the baby coming out and they didn’t confiscate our camera…The next thing I heard was the baby crying. Most wonderful sound on earth since that meant his lungs could handle that. And he kept crying and crying. They immediately took him to the next room and the NICU team went to work on him. Jamie followed them but came back really quickly holding the baby all wrapped in a blanket and put him on my chest. He was still crying and looked like a wrinkly, old man but totally perfect. Jamie said he was doing great on all his vitals and breathing on his own which was why they let him bring him back in to show me. He stayed on my chest for a minute or two and then they took him up to the NICU.

Stitching me up seemed to take forever. Dr. Jensen let the resident do most of it and they just stood up there joking about taking out my gallbladder or spleen while they were in there. I asked for a tummy tuck but they said I didn’t need one! There was lots of pulling while they stitched me back together and I haven’t actually even seen what the cut or stitches look like yet. Jensen did say the cord was a little short but nothing that should have caused any problems and that the placenta looked fine. So we still don’t really know why all this happened. Dr. Jensen did mention that by the time he got in there I was already dilated to an 8.  So with how small the baby was, if he hadn't been breech, I probably could have delivered him in another 30 minutes or maybe even less, considering how fast I progressed.  Very frustrating for me. Especially now going through the pain of the c-section. 
I was in recovery for about 2 hours. Very sleepy and weird as I slowly got the feeling back in my legs and body. I could already wiggle the big toe on my right foot when we got into recovery but it took quite a while before I could wiggle the one on my left. I kept trying to move my feet, lift my legs but couldn’t do it. That’s a weird feeling. Jamie was back and forth telling everyone how we were doing, checking on the baby and checking on me. At 7 pm they rolled me back to my room. Normally they roll the mom through the NICU and let her see the baby before taking her to her room but because he was born in the late afternoon he was admitted during a shift change so they weren’t ready for us to come in yet. So they took me back to the room and it was 11 pm before he was ready. So they rolled my bed back out and into the NICU and we got to spend 15 minutes or so with him there. We weren’t able to hold him or touch him – he was in the incubator sleeping. But all his vitals were looking great and most importantly he was breathing on his own still. The nurse answered lots of questions for us about everything they were doing and what they were testing. He hasn’t had to be on oxygen or have assistance with his breathing at all. They were able to just put an IV in through a vein instead of one in the umbilical cord like most preemies have. She said not to be surprised if it gets moved around because they are hard to keep in those tiny veins. Right now it’s in his arm. He is regulating his own body temperature really well and all of his other stats are looking good. His blood type is O negative (like mine) which means I don’t have to take another Rhogam shot. Hudson was O positive (like Jamie) so I had to have the shots with him and it was one thing the neo-natologist was really worried about. If his blood had been different than mine and ours had accidentally mixed during delivery (like if the placenta tore from the wall) he could have had to have had blood transfusions. But thankfully none of that happened and he had my same blood type anyways.

After we saw him in the NICU they took me back to my room and, after I pumped for the first time, we thanked God for bringing us both through the surgery and that the baby was so strong, and went to bed. I was exhausted and I have to admit, it felt so good to be able to sleep on my back again!