Birth of Ashley Elizabeth

We had our baby finally.  She came a couple days early which is fine.  She was born on Wednesday, July 18 at 9:28 a.m.  She was 6 pounds 1 ounce, 18 inches long.  Dark brown hair and so little and cute.  The birth was not fun at all, extremely painful but fortunately very short.  I had my doctor strip my membranes at my appointment early Tuesday morning.  That brought on the contractions all day long, but they were not consistant until that night around dinner time.  I started timing them while I was finishing up work and they were about 7 minutes apart.  I tried to sleep that night and seemed at first to fall asleep between the contractions for a couple of hours.  At around 1 a.m. I gave up and went and watched TV for a while and kept track of the contractions.  At about 3:30 a.m. I decided to wake up Kory and head to the hospital.  They were at that point around 4-6 minutes and getting more painful.  We went in and they monitored me for about an hour.  I was at 4 cm and about 6 minutes apart in contractions.  After that hour, I spent about another hour in the Jacuzzi tub to try and relax me and dilate me.  After that, I was getting hooked up to the monitor in bed when my water broke.  The nurse said I would be staying for sure now and got going on all the questions and getting me hooked up to the IV.  Unfortunately, I was group B strep positive, so they started the penicillin and we were waiting for that to go in me and waiting also on the anesthesiologist to do the epidural who was in doing a C-section.  My contractions quickly started to come more often and were unbearable.  I was in so much pain as they were trying as fast as possible to pump the penicillin in me.  Finally the anesthesiologist came in and tried to give me the epidural.  She had a hard time saying my interspaces in my spine were really tight.  They tried a couple of times and finally got it to work.  I would get shooting pains down my back on my right side that were so painful.  That pain along with the heavy contractions were way too much for me to bear.  I was totally losing it and no longer had any control over my breathing and trying to relax.  The pain was too much.  After the epidural was in, they laid me down but only one side was going numb.  Just then the doctor came in and went to check my progress and said that the baby was ready to come out.  Nothing was ready and the baby was coming.  The poor nurses were running around trying to get the bed ready and table for the baby.  It was crazy.  The anesthesiologist was trying to turn the epidural up to max to try and relieve my pain.  I was totally out of it at that point and confused.  I could not believe that it was time to deliver already.  I so wanted the epidural to work so I could take a nap, because I was exhausted.  The last time they checked me I think was right after my water broke and I was at a 5.  They said within 40 minutes I went from a 5 to a 10!  No wonder I was in so much pain.  The nurse said that with me sitting up to get the epidural probably made me dilate so fast.  After everything was set up for the delivery, they had to snap me out of it to get me to hold my breath and push.  Luckily I only had to push twice and he was able to get the baby out.  It was terrible.  The epidural made the pain of the contractions go away on my right side but not my left and when they delivered the baby I could feel everything the doctor was doing and stretching me and feeling the baby come out, that part was not numb.  They put her on my tummy and cleaned her off and it hurt my stomach so bad.  I told them to take her off of me.  I probably sounded like a terrible mother.  I was in tears afterwards from the trauma of the whole thing, vowing never to have children again.  I think I now know what true labor is like.  We have a beautiful result though and I am very thankful for our sweet little girl.  She is probably our best baby.  She is overall a good sleeper and wonderful eater and just good overall.  The kids love her and try to help take care of her, getting diapers and other things to help me out.  They like to hold her and concerned when she cries.  She is a great addition to our family and we are very blessed.