> Shannon's Story (Due Date: 2004)

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Henry’s due date was our first son, George’s birthday – June 5^th – but since I’d been having quite regular and even “stuck” Braxton-Hicks contractions for a few weeks, I suspected he might come early like his brother had.  So in early May, when a co-worker, Jenni, asked if I would trade a half shift with her, I told her I would be happy to but she was taking a gamble with me being able to pay her back.  She said she was willing to take that risk.  So I worked the 8 pm – 1am portion of my May 4-5, 2004 police dispatching shift and Jenni came in to relieve me at 1.  Mary (my partner) was happy to see me leave as I had told her earlier that my Braxton Hicks were starting to get a little painful.  She had said, “Great!” and rolled her eyes – I knew she had a great fear of my water breaking while working a shift with her.  So I guess she was glad we made it through the shift without incident.  Even though the pain really wasn’t that strong, I did have a feeling throughout my shift that I should “get my ducks in a row,” so in my spare time I printed off a final copy of George’s care routine for his babysitter(s) and filled out my timesheet.

I drove home and got ready for bed.  My husband was still awake, so we were laying in bed talking at about 1:45 am when he looked at me with big eyes, “Uh, did your water just break?”  I started to laugh – sure enough we were laying in a big warm puddle!  Henry had actually just kicked me up by my left rib and I had heard a loud pop, so we knew he had broken my water with his little strong foot!  I couldn’t stop laughing for about five minutes – I think it was the combination of nervousness (Wow, this is really happening now!) and déjà vu since George’s birth started off so similarly (with my water breaking as I was going to bed on the night of the 4^th heading into the 5^th, Tuesday heading into a Wednesday).  But there were differences between this event and when my water broke with George.  Most notably, with George, my water came out in a gentle trickle.  But with Henry it was a gush every time I stood up.  With George I had to walk around for a couple of hours at the hospital to get my contractions to kick in but with Henry I felt strong contractions right away that were only, on average, five minutes apart.  Luckily, I was mostly already packed, but I was rushing around the house, trying to pack the rest of my stuff while my husband called my mom to start driving up.  Every time I walked more fluid would pour out of me and the labor would get stronger, so my husband got me to sit down on a towel and tell him what to pack.  Since my labor was coming so fast, we got a friend who lived just a few minutes away to come so we could get to the hospital sooner (apparently my mom showed up just 15 minutes after our friend arrived, but oh well!). 

We got to hospital, which was located only a couple of minutes away from our little duplex, at about 2:45 am and were brought to Labor Room #2.  I was 3 cm dilated and 80% effaced – alright – a good start!  My husband had not slept since 7 am, so I told him to sleep while my labor was still manageable.  I used the bouncy ball and squeezed the bars at the foot of my bed to make it through labor until about 5 am.  Every hour the nurse hooked me up to monitors to make sure Henry and I were doing alright.  At the 5 am check I woke up my husband and told him my labor was getting harder.  I asked him to fill the Jacuzzi for me and asked the nurse to check me:  5 cm and 90%.  “Okay,” I thought to myself.  “Let’s get working and get this kid out in an hour or so!”  I got in the tub at 5:20 or so and at first it seemed that my contractions were slowing down.  While that felt better, I didn’t want that!  I had my husband turn on the radio and all of a sudden, the labor HURT!!!  For four or five songs and DJs talking, so maybe for the next 40-50 minutes, I felt like it was one LONG, HARD contraction that just wouldn’t stop.  I thought to myself, “I’ve GOT to be in transition now!”  I just kept saying (and yelling) “Ow, ow, ow!”  My husband kept telling me I could do it and I was thinking to myself, “Oh, I don’t know about that!”  I was praying for God’s help and then Nicole C. Mullen’s song “Call on Jesus” started playing.  I figured it was His way of telling me He was there with me and we’d make it through.  Then I started to wonder if I would know when it was time to push.  I’d read before that some women never feel the urge to push at all. But Just then, I felt it!  So I yelled out, “I need to push!” 

My husband got up fast and pulled the emergency cord to get a nurse to come and….it didn’t work!  He ran out to the hallway and pulled a cord he saw on the wall.  THAT one worked – all of a sudden a zillion nurses were in my room (it was shift change so there were two shifts’ worth on duty at the time).  Joann was the one in charge.  She grabbed my arms and said she had to get me out of the tub.  I told her I couldn’t and didn’t want to and she said that we weren’t going to do a water birth.  Finally she and and my husband managed to help me out of the tub and over to the bed.  She checked me, sure enough, I was 10 and 100% - time to have a baby!  I guess I progressed much faster than anyone expected because Dr. Scanlan wasn’t there yet.  So a very dour faced old doctor named “Minten” came in.  The nurses introduced us and between contractions I tried to say “hi” to him and explain that I didn’t want an episiotomy, etc.  He just stared at me, frowning and not saying A THING!  Then Scanlan showed up (later she told me she had RUN down the halls to get there as fast as she could).  Minten said nothing – just got up, took off his gloves and left.  Good riddance!  I started to push and it was VERY difficult.  I didn’t think I would be able to get little Mr. Huge Head out, but Dr. Scanlan and my husband encouraged me so much that by 7:27 am (and I never did look to see what time I started pushing), Henry was out!  Dr. Scanlan, after seeing his big head, was afraid his shoulders wouldn’t fit out of me, so had me push him out in one full, fast shot.  This meant she didn’t have time to clear out his mouth, so he ingested some amniotic fluid and wasn’t crying at first.  I said, “Cry, Henry, cry!” and he finally did.  He was such a cute bundle of boy – 7 pounds, 2 ounces and 21 inches long! 

I got to hold him for a few minutes but his lips started to turn blue, so off he went to NICU to be put on oxygen.  At one point he was also started on an antibiotic because they thought he had pneumonia, but that turned out not to be true.  I nursed him every three hours, even in the middle of the night (and I got to stay at the hospital for a couple nights even after I was released because they had extra room, so I only had to commute from home for a couple days) and the NICU time was scary but he was BY FAR the biggest and strongest kid there, so it was just a matter of getting him out of the bili bed (oh yeah, he was jaundiced, too) and to a low enough need for extra oxygen for him to be able to join us at home.  He came home a week after birth, on May 12^th, was on oxygen for another week but then was just fine.