Part II - Hilton is here!

We got to the hospital around 6pm.  After all the paperwork was done and I was hooked up to everything, I got started on Pitocin at 8:30pm.  I was already dilated to a 3 and 75% effaced, so now we just had to wait for the medicine to kick in.  And it didn't take long for the contractions to pick up speed!  I got an epidural at 10:30 and was dilated to a 4.  Just like with Savannah Kate, the epidural didn't work on my left side.  I guess I have some kind of weird nerve thing on that side.  At 11:45pm my water broke, I was dilated to a 5 and then the pain really kicked in.  Sometime around 12:30 I was given something else for the pain to help with my left side, don't remember what it was, but I was finally able to relax and I even fell asleep for a little while.  I had been up since 6 on Monday morning so I was excited to get to take a nap!

Then I remember people running into the room around 1:30am and putting a shot in my iv.  My blood pressure had dropped too low causing Hilton's to drop too.  After getting the shot I felt like my heart was going to beat right out of my chest.  Not long after, my bp dropped again.  This time I could tell something was wrong because I felt like I was going to faint and everything went black.  I also started vomiting.  This went back and forth a few times.  I got really scared and started crying.  I was just so ready for Hilton to be in my arms and didn't want anything else to go wrong.  I was given some oxygen and then my bp finally settled back down to normal.  I was thankful that part was over.

At 3am I was fully dilated and started pushing.  With SK, I had to push for 2 hours so I was prepared to have to do that again.  Thankfully, Hilton did some of the pushing himself and it only took 30 minutes.  The nurse actually told me to stop pushing and wait for the doctor.  At 3:31am, Hilton arrived!  I love that he was born at 3:31 because our anniversary is March 31st :)  Immediately after, he was laid on my chest and I didn't want to let go of him, ever.  My emotions overwhelmed me.  I was finally holding my miracle baby!

As the nurses were getting Hilton cleaned up and checked out, it became evident that something wasn't right because Hunter wasn't getting to hold him.  After a couple minutes a nurse said that they were paging the NICU to come take a look at him, but not to be worried.  What?  The NICU?

After spending some time with Hilton, the NICU doctor explained that he was having a little trouble breathing normally.  He was having to work too hard at it and you could tell by the way his chest was rising.  He was given a CPAP that blew air into his lungs and helped keep his lungs open in between breaths.  The doctor assured us that this was very normal for term babies (he was considered term, not full term) since they are born just a little early and it was even more common to happen in boys.  We were told that the CPAP would help him transition and he shouldn't be in the NICU very long, but they wanted to monitor him for awhile.

They brought him over to me and let me hold him for a minute and let us take a quick picture.  It was so sad seeing Hilton taken out of the room, knowing he was being taken to the NICU.  I knew he was in good hands, but I just wasn't expecting this.  Nobody does.

6 lb 13 oz

20 1/2 inches long

Part I - Hilton is here!

I'm a little late posting this, but the past month has been a little crazy.  I went to my 38 week appointments with both the high risk OB and my regular OB doctor on Monday, March 17th.  It was unusual for me to be there on a Monday because my appointments were always on either Tuesdays or Wednesdays (later understood that this was God's perfect timing).  First, I see the high risk OB and Hilton's ultrasound looks great.  The doctor then asks me if I have any questions or am worried about anything like they ask every week.  I usually say no, but on Sunday I had woken up and started getting ready for church and noticed that I was itching very badly.  I had noticed this a few weeks before, but it was only on my lower legs.  Now it felt like my entire body was itching, not like I needed to scratch at it, but just really uncomfortable.  I took a Benadryl and basically slept for most of the day.  When I was telling the doctor about this he was very concerned because it was possibly a sign of cholestasis.

Cholestasis is a condition in which the normal flow of bile in the liver is affected by the high amounts of pregnancy hormones causing your skin to itch because the bile can spill into the bloodstream.  A blood test could have been done to know for sure if I had this, but the problem is that we didn't have time to wait on the results.  I was told that if I had cholestasis that the baby needed to be born before 38 weeks or the chance of stillborn would increase.  38 weeks was on Wednesday so we only had 2 days.  Now I knew why God planned for me to have my appointment be on Monday.

Of course I was starting to get worried.  We had already been through so much and were finally at the end so I obviously didn't want to lose Hilton now!  Luckily, Savannah Kate was at the doctor with me, so she was keeping me a little distracted.  After the ultrasound I went down the hall to my regular OB doctor and waited while the two doctors talked about what to do.  My doctor came in and said that they thought it was best to go ahead and induce labor that day.  She didn't think it was worth risking the chance of stillborn, especially given our situation, and I completely agreed.  She wanted me to go downstairs and be induced right away, but we realized that I had taken my last blood thinner shot at 8:30 that morning (meaning I wouldn't be able to have an epidural until 8:30pm) so I was scheduled to come back and check in at 6pm that night.

At the doctor's office that morning

It was 11:30am when I found out, so I called Hunter (boy was he surprised) and the grandparents right away.  They all had to drop everything as we were not planning to be induced until the following week.  I knew this was the very last time it was ever going to be just Savannah Kate and I, so even though I had a thousand things I needed to do, I took her out to lunch and then we went to the mall.  I let her take her time eating every single piece of mac and cheese while at Panera and then let her pick out a new toy at the Disney store.  It was so strange because while I was completely overjoyed that Hilton was almost here, I was sad at the thought of it no longer being just the two of us girls.  And I was nervous about how SK would react to no longer receiving all the attention at our house.

While SK napped that afternoon, I cleaned up the house and got our bags packed for the hospital.  Thinking I had another week, I hadn't done any packing yet.  We took Savannah Kate to the neighbor's house for her to wait until my parents could get there.  While on the way to the hospital I started having contractions.  I guess Hilton was planning to come that day anyway :)

Last belly pictures

One Year Ago

One year ago today, on April 11th, we lost our baby girl at 10 weeks pregnant.  We later decided to name her April since that is when she went to be with Jesus.  April was our third pregnancy and second pregnancy loss.  2013 wasn't looking to be a very good year for us.

But God had plans to take our sorrow and pain and turn it into a miracle all within the same year.  It's amazing to see how God's blessings always come, even in the midst of the lowest valley.  Even when it seemed like the easiest thing to do was to give up all hope of having another baby.  I thought if I didn't try anymore, I would at least be protected from the pain of another miscarriage.

Look at what I would have missed out on if I would have given up:

Please don't give up hope.  God may have a miracle for your story too.  Give Him the opportunity to bless you.  I know that waiting is hard, but I learned that it was all God was asking me to do.  Wait and trust Him.

"I wait for the Lord, my whole being waits, and in his word I put my hope."  Psalm 130:5

A year ago today, I sat on this very same couch mourning the loss of our baby.  Asking God question after question through endless tears.  I remember not being angry, just very very sad.  Tonight, I'm sitting in my spot on the same couch and I'm looking at my miracle baby sleeping peacefully.  I can see so many answered prayers when I look at him.  Hilton will always be a miracle to me and I'm excited to be able to share this story with him someday.

Hilton's birth story details will be in the next post!