07/06/2022
Four years.
Four years ago today, I headed to my 40 week ultrasound at 40 weeks and 2 days pregnant. Dealing with false labor the past few days and taking as many walks as my body could handle. Diffusing clary sage in my bedroom round the clock.
The ultrasound tech checked Owen out, and quietly dismissed herself, obviously scaring the living s**t out of me. She brought in another person (nurse? Doctor? Who knows) who told me that there was meconium in the amniotic fluid and that I needed to go to the hospital to be induced. As many books as I had read on birth and pregnancy, I had no idea what they had just said, so I sat in the waiting room silently panicking while they called my on-call doctor to tell them I’d be heading to the hospital.
When a nurse came to tell me there was a room waiting for me there and to just drive to the hospital, I broke down and sobbed, telling her I was scared and didn’t know if my baby was okay. She gave me a hug and explained that he had just pooped in the womb and they wanted to get him out of there before he inhaled any of it.
I obviously stopped at the Starbucks by Baptist South and got myself a coffee and breakfast sandwich because I knew I wouldn’t be able to eat until after Owen was born.
Apparently at the hospital you were supposed to stop at a front desk and they would bring you up to the labor and delivery ward in a wheelchair. That’s what they told me after I walked my independent ass up there and completely bypassed all of that, because I forgot about that detail in the hospital tour 🤦🏻♀️
Greg arrived as I was getting checked in and was pacing and nervously snacking.
They got me started on Pitocin and after a few hours of laboring I asked for an epidural. After the epidural they checked me and I was 7cm dilated, so I was happy to be able to relax during the toughest part of labor.
When I was 10cm, they gave me a peanut ball and sat me up so I could labor down while the doctor made her way to me.
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