Kellan's birth story

Here's the birth story of my beautiful boy Kellan...

(Dec 14th) Felt sore & crampy all day and got more braxton hicks when moving around. In the afternoon we bundled up in the -40 weather and went for a walk to try to get things started. We stopped off at the drugstore and contemplated buying some castor oil...couldn't quite bring myself to do it ;) Lots of bloody show (lost mucous plug the day before) Around supper time I started having more painful & regular contractions - probably every 15 min. It was the Children's Christmas concert at the church that evening so we went - contractions mildly painful and consistently every 15 min. Later that evening the contractions started to become a bit more painful and closer together. Baby was really active. Throughout the later evening and early morning contractions were 10-5 min apart, lasting 30-60 seconds and had to start slowly breathing through some of them. Was doing lunges, squats, and pacing the house to speed things up.

(Dec 15th) At about 2 am the contractions eased off and I layed down and slept off & on until 8:30 am. Had hard contractions every 1/2 hr or so but was able to nap in between. I got up at 9 and the contractions picked up slowly throughout the morning. At about 11 am the contractions were about every 5-10 min and was unable to walk through some of them. At one point I felt the baby move down. Brian made me call the hospital to ask whether or not I should come in - so I did. They asked me a few questions as to how I was progressing and told me I should come in. So at about 11:45 we left for the hospital.

Just before we left for the hospital:

When we got there the LDR was full so I was put in another room and hooked up to the monitor. I don't think the nurses thought I was in labour because I was pretty good at hiding the pain and inbetween contractions I only had mild cramps (which was great- compared to the constant cramp/contraction last time). The nurse checked me and she said I was 6-7 cm dilated, my cervix soft and membranes were bulging! I was having contractions every 4-5 min - still slowly breathing through them.

So, since I was further along then the girl who was in the LDR they kicked her out and moved me in. They hooked me back up to the monitor and the baby was looking healthy - SO GREAT to hear that little heart beat pounding away! At 1 pm my Dr came in to check me. He said I was 5 cm and my membranes were bulging. They left me on the monitor for another 20 min then they let me walk/move around. So, Brian and I hung out in the room by ourselves which was so great. I walked around the room or sat on the ball with Brian massaging my back inbetween contractions. When a contraction hit I sat on the ball, leaned on the bed and breathed through them. (Loved the ball by the way!)

Hanging out in the delivery room inbetween contractions:

At 2:10 my Dr came back in and broke my water. After that the intensity of the contractions picked up a bit and I stayed in the bed - really having to breath through the contractions at this point. At about 3 pm I felt a tiny bit like I had to push - not totally tho, but because I didn't want to be told to 'not push' while they got things set up I told Brian to get the nurse. So, a few nurses and the Dr came in and got things ready. My Dr checked me and he said I was 10 cm with just a tiny lip on one side but enough that he let me push. At 3:15 I started to push. They had me in a funny position so I felt like I wasn't totally efficient in pushing. They then let me switch positions and felt better. I could also definately tell this was a bigger baby :) His head came out after maybe 10 min of pushing but his body didn't rotate and his shoulders got stuck (shoulder dystocia). So, the Dr was yanking on the baby's head and yelled at me to push harder. At 3:27, after a couple really hard pushes Kellan Mark was born!

He was really blue and wasn't really breathing so the Dr cut the cord and they took him over to the bassinet thingy and had to suction him lots and give him oxygen. He finally started to cry (which made both of us cry;) ) and then they let Brian cut the cord again.

They let me hold him for a minute then Brian went with him and the nurse to get him weighed, measured, etc. while the Dr. stitched me up - he had to do an episiotomy because of his stuck shoulders and size.

At 4 pm they moved us to our own room and I started to breastfeed. He latched on like a pro and the nurse was very impressed! :)

So, now I'm a proud mom of a beautiful & healthy baby boy! God is so good!