Your due date
was January 13th 2019. The
funny thing is I was certain you would be born in 2018. I was just hoping you would wait until after
Christmas to make your appearance. Why
were we so certain? Tommy, Teddy and
Molly were all early and with Molly I developed preeclampsia. The doctor feared it would return in this
pregnancy as well—which meant the second things started to go sideways they
would intervene. With all predicters
pointing toward an early arrival, I started training my backfill around
Thanksgiving and Susie stopped traveling the 2nd week of December so
she wouldn’t be out of town when/if you decided to surprise us. Little did we know, you had your own plans
for us.
At 34 weeks I started receiving extra
special attention as a precautionary measure (due to a history of preeclampsia
and what they consider a geriatric pregnancy :)) . Each weekly appointment meant a routine OB
appointment followed by lab work, a non-stress test and finally an
ultrasound. Much to our surprise
everything kept coming back normal and even more surprising was that each week
when I was checked I was a zero or a one.
I had always been at least 3-4cm at 36 weeks with the other
pregnancies.
I love being pregnant and was not
uncomfortable at all but the anticipation of when you were going to come,
whether you would be a girl or boy, if the preeclampsia was suddenly going to
emerge, etc. started to drive me nuts.
Knowing that this was my absolute last pregnancy I tried to soak in all
your little movements, kicks and rolls.
One part of me wanted you to come so badly and another part of me wanted
it to drag on forever. I wrote notes to
you during the NST appointments to pass the time. I had started to shift my focus from “what if
you come early” to “what if I go past 40 weeks”.
Thursday January 10th, I
had my 39.5-week appointment scheduled.
It was at 9:00 A.M. Susie and I
drove separately so I could go back to work afterwards and she could get home
and start working also. The appointment
started out routine. Stephanie checked my
weight and vitals, all okay. Dr.
Montague comes in and we start discussing what we are going to do when I reach
40 weeks on Sunday if the baby still isn’t here. She checks me and much to our surprise she
says that there has been progress. Susie
and I are delighted. Susie asks how
much. Dr. Montague digs around a little
more and then suddenly stops and tells us that she accidently broke my
water. I was in disbelief for a half
second and then I felt the warm water all over the table in the clinic. I was in shock. Susie was beyond excited. Dr. Montague asked us if we are ready to meet
our baby today.
Once I got over the shock and
momentary embarrassment of my water breaking in the clinic, we discussed a
plan. We had two vehicles at the clinic
in Woodbury, so we asked if we had time to drop off my truck at home and grab
our hospital bag. Dr. Montague gave us
the okay, but she said we must head to United right after and she would meet us
there. She gave us some instructions
about what to do if the contractions or baby start coming before we make it
back the hospital. Stephanie gave me
some puppy pads and we quickly headed back to Hudson. On my way, I called my parents and sisters
and fill them in. Susie and the doctor’s
office called multiple times asking about contractions, but nothing was happening.
I was taking my time around home and
Susie was panicked about getting to the hospital. I didn’t want to go in until the
contractions were really bad, but Susie and Dr. Montague didn’t want to play
that game.
We arrived at United around 10:15
A.M. The hospital was expecting us, so
we got checked in, met our nurse Sarah and got settled into our room
quickly. That was the last thing to
happen quickly for the next 6 hours.
Everyone kept asking me how the contractions were - the nurses, the
doctor, Susie and my family, but I had nothing to report. Nothing was happening. I was getting eager to meet the little
peanut and was actually wishing for the horrible contractions to start. I rolled on a ball, walked extensively, all
the usual tricks but nothing. I even
napped for 45 minutes, that’s how little was happening . Every hour the nurse would come in and hook
up the monitor to check the baby and monitor contractions for 10 minutes.
At 3:30 P.M. Dr. Montague checked me
and discovered that my water hadn’t actually broken all the way. This time she took a hook and made sure she
got all of it. There was a big gush and
fluid just kept coming out for what seemed like an eternity. Suddenly those contractions that I had been
wishing for were there instantly. Once
you have a real, “get the baby out” contraction, there is no mistaking it. It was real and it was time to get serious. Susie,
Dr. Montague and nurse Sarah would watch my face and try to judge how bad the
contraction was; I continued to walk through contractions until they got too
paralyzing—I would be walking and they would stop me in my tracks. Maggie had sent “Thinking Putty” in my bag
for me to squeeze and play with when they got bad. It actually helped. I stayed on my feet, played with putty,
drilled Susie about when the contraction was over and how much time I had in
between.
The whole hour of contractions was a
blur because that’s when the excitement begins.
There is a flurry of activity going on in the room. The nurses scramble to break down the bed,
set up the doctor’s tools, get the baby warmer ready etc. That hour felt like 5 minutes. I was standing beside the bed when I had the
contraction of all contractions and instantly felt the baby’s head putting
extreme pressure on my bottom. I
declared it was time to push. The doctor
suggested I go to the bathroom one last time so my bladder would be empty. I went to the bathroom and had a contraction
that felt like it last 5 minutes. I
couldn’t move. I honestly didn’t know if
I was going to be able to get off the toilet.
It finally passed and I used all of my strength to walk back out to the
bed. I climbed back into bed a little
before 5:00. The first contraction/push
was so deflating. You forget how hard it
is. Dr. Montague gave me a little pep
talk, and the second push was more productive.
Dr. Montague told Susie to come look at all its hair. That got us excited. By the third contraction I was pleading with
Dr. Montague to grab the head and pull it out, to which she responded “It’s not
a Teletubby, it doesn’t have a handle on its head”. By the 4th push, the head was
out. I am pretty sure Dr. Montague told
me not to push, but at that moment, I couldn’t help it. The rest of the baby came flying out right
after the head. They plopped the baby on
my chest and Susie declared it was a girl.
She was coated in the white “cheese” and had a full head of dark
hair. Just perfect. Millie Marie McNamara was born at 5:08 P.M.
on January 10th 2019. She was
7lbs 15 oz, 20 ½ inches long. She is the
perfect final piece to our family.
Each of my past three labors had
included some sort of postpartum excitement so the months leading up to
delivery Dr. Montague and I discussed options numerous times. She was hopeful that a new drug given before
delivery would be the answer for me this time around, so about an hour before
Millie was born I received TXA (Tranexamic acid). And much to my surprise it was working! I got to snuggle Millie for bit and she came
out hungry! She wanted to nurse
instantly and knew exactly what to do.
Susie and I discussed names. For
the record, you were almost an Abby or a Minnie, looking back now you are the
perfect Millie. Anyhow, Dr. Montague
delivered the placenta, and started tidying everything up. Sure, I was bleeding some but they thought it
was under control. I am not sure when it
started to go sideways but the next thing I know, she tells me she is going to
have to try and remove some clots. I
have had this done in the past and it is 10x worse than delivering a baby. That didn’t seem to slow the bleeding so she
calls in another OB who takes a turn.
Then they start throwing the kitchen sink at me. Pumping bags of Pitocin through, a shot of
Hemabate, some Cytotech in an unfortunate place. Then the other OB doctor gets called back in
and they decide to do a Bakri balloon.
They ask Susie if she wants to leave the room and offer to give me, my
first pain meds of the day, some Fentanyl, so I should have known it wasn’t
going to be pleasant. I would never wish
that on anyone. 2 or 3 times they tried
to get this balloon inflated. I can’t
even describe the pain, at one point I remember asking why they were digging
all the way up in my lungs. They all
eventually gave up on the balloon and decided to call interventional
radiology. I was sent down to Radiology
at 8:00 PM. The last thing I remember
was being freezing cold and staring up at bright lights and thinking the room
looked just like a scene from Gray’s Anatomy.
They ended up doing a bi-lateral uterine artery embolization. I finally got reunited with Susie and Millie
at 10:30 PM. It was a traumatic 5
hours. I felt like my insides that been
turned into raw hamburger. I remember
telling Susie when they wheeled me in to the postpartum room that night, that I
was so relieved to be there and that I finally felt “safe” where no one could
touch me anymore.
I am incredibly grateful to Doctor
Montague, our nurse Sarah and all the other professionals at United. I am not sure another hospital could have
done everything they did. This was by
far the toughest recovery I have had after any delivery. I ended up having high blood pressure
postpartum and was put on medication for a while. I didn’t realize how awful I was feeling
until I started to feel normal again weeks later. All of it is my body’s way of confirming what
my head already knows. Millie Marie is
our last baby and I am perfectly content with that. We love you Millie!
Play-by-play
of the days’ events captured through texts messages with my mom, dad and
sisters. Forgive the typos I was in
labor after all. :)
