Harper Kunkle - The lovely addition to our family!: July 2013

Matt did an awesome job on Harper's Birth blog story, but I wanted to make sure I wrote down everything as I remembered it!

Tuesday, June 18th - Last full day being pregnant!

Since my due date had come and gone, I decided to go ahead and take maternity leave starting Monday the 17th. Monday morning I ran errands, went into work for a bit and then Matt and I had Qdoba for dinner. I had a "stomach ache" Monday night, but figured it was from dinner. I slept pretty well, but woke up about 5:30 am Tuesday morning with the same stomach pains. I had a feeling that my pains might be more than just an upset stomach so I got out of bed and started getting things ready. Matt took Tuesday off work to be home for our new windows to be installed, but was sleeping soundly as I scurried around to shower, clean & finish packing our hospital bags. I wanted to wash the bed sheets and got frustrated with Matt because he wouldn't get out of bed!

The window crew showed up about 8:30 am. Since our house was built in the late 50's and our window sills tested positive for lead, the window crew had to do lead paint abatement and suggested I stay out of the house. So, out to the garage I went! Matt, the dogs and I hung out in the garage most of the morning as I was having consistent contractions about every 5 minutes, lasting about 40-50 seconds each. They were uncomfortable, but bearable. Matt worked on cutting and painting trim while I timed my contractions.

The contractions were starting to get stronger so I called my doctors office to report what was going on. Our final OB appointment was scheduled for 4 PM that day, but she told me we could come in as soon as 1:20 to be checked. We called Grandpa Mark to come over and monitor the window install and headed to the office. We stopped and picked up MSM sandwiches for lunch on the way and arrived at the office just before 2 pm.

The doctor immediately noticed that I was in OK spirits in between contractions and said "that's not a good sign" ... I wanted to punch her! She checked me and found that I had dilated to 4 cms from the previous 1 cm that I had been at for weeks. Unfortunately that was not enough to send me to the hospital and she sent me home with instructions to head to the hospital if my water broke or if the contractions became too strong to handle, otherwise she would see me in the morning for my scheduled induction. We headed home, and I was a little disappointed. As soon as we got home, the contractions started getting really intense. I tried standing, sitting, bouncing on the yoga ball, but nothing seemed to help. Matt had bought me a new purse earlier in the week and surprised me with it and flowers. It was a nice distraction, at least for a couple minutes!

Finally about 5 PM the contractions had become unbearable. I told Matt "I need help!" I was hesitant to head to the hospital because I didn't want to be sent away. I had reached the point where I didn't care anymore! We left the house and headed towards the freeway and realized it was rush hour! Just before getting on the freeway, Matt realized he had left his wallet at home, so we had to turn around and go back. I was SO hot, I had Matt turn the A/C on full blast and got angry that it wasn't "cold enough" when he turned it down! Matt took advantage of the fact that I was in labor and drove 50 MPH in a 30 and almost drove on the shoulder to get around traffic, but we didn't manage to get pulled over, thankfully! I just kept my eyes closed the entire way!

We arrived at the hospital around 5:45 and parked at the emergency room. Matt couldn't find a spot the first time around, so he suggested that he let me off. I told him to park in handicap if he had to! We went in and checked in and waited for someone from labor & delivery to come get us. I texted Amie to come immediately! After what seemed like FOREVER, a nurse came down to take us up. Matt asked her if the hospital had free wi-fi ... the important things ;) and they continued conversation about cell phones the entire ride up to the 14th floor. Again, I just kept my eyes closed!

Once on the 14th floor I was put into a triage room immediately. It was by far the biggest and nicest room I saw during my stay! Amie showed up shortly after we got to the triage room. The nurse was not very quick, but eventually got me hooked up to the heart beat & contraction monitors and checked me - I was 8 cm dilated! I was having a lot of back pain and asked for a heat pack, but I was too hot to use it and took it off immediately. Matt was talking, and talking, and talking, but eventually put some music on and quieted down. He did a great job watching my contractions and telling me when one was coming. Amie tried several times to get the nurse to give me something for pain relief, but no luck!

When it was time to move, the nurse asked if I wanted to walk or ride in the wheel chair. I couldn't believe she was making me get out of the bed! Matt suggested I walk to "moves things along" but I opted for the wheel chair and let him know that we did NOT need to move things along any faster! When I got to the labor and delivery room about 7 pm, the anesthesiologist was very quick to show up. He was very talkative and I was not impressed with how slow he was moving. By this time, my pain was a 9 on a scale of 1 to 10. The nurse propped me up on some kind of "lean on this" device and I FINALLY received a shot of fentanyl while the anesthesiologist worked his magic.

Once I had the epideryl, everything was GREAT. My pain went from a 9 to nearly non-existent. My mom and Kari arrived from Ferndale shortly after. It took several hours from that point to reach 10 cm dilated. At about 11:30 PM, I asked "what are we waiting on" - Kari replied "you!" ... SO I paged the nurse and asked if I could start pushing. They called for the doctor that was on call, that just so happened to be my doctor. She looked like she was half asleep when she arrived! I wasn't too concerned ... I was ready to push this baby out whether she was or not!

After several pushes, Harper's heart rate was dropping with every push. They had me roll onto my right side and her heart rate went back up. Her heart rate continued to do the same thing, but was not recovering. They had me flip onto my hands and knees - even though I was numb from the waist down - to see if that would help. At some point, my doctor (that is a family practice doctor) called for the OB that was on call that night. Since Harper's heart rate was so low, they opted to use suction to get her out. It only took one contraction and several pushes and she was out at 12:34 AM!

I don't remember, but word is that Matt nearly passed out when he saw the suction mark on her head. Thankfully - for Matt's sake - it went away before we left the hospital. After she was born, they put her on my chest and wiped her up while the doctor stitched up a couple tears Harper had left on her grand entrance! There was a small tear that my doctor was unsure of - so she called the OB back in to take a look and they determined it was small enough that it didn't need any stitching.

There was no real explanation why Harper's heart rate was falling, she wasn't tangled up in her cord and came out screaming and kicking! Both her and I were running a fever when she was born, so they gave me Tylenol and took cord blood from Harper to test for infection. At this point, Matt was exhausted and couldn't wait to get somewhere to sleep! Once I was all stitched up, one of the nurses ordered me a box lunch from the cafeteria - the best egg salad sandwich I've ever had! - and moved us down to the 12th floor for recovery. Harper had to go for more blood work once we were on the 12th floor, so Matt went with her while I stayed in the room. It was about 3 AM before we got to sleep.

I hadn't been asleep long before I woke up coughing, and with each cough, felt a huge gush of warm liquid - come to find out it was blood and I wasn't just wetting myself! I paged for the nurse and ended up with a whole team of them in my room. They assured me it was normal, but ordered more pitocin to help shrink my uterus back to normal size and stop the bleeding. I continued to bleed and pass huge clots throughout the night. I was given two additional drugs that are supposed to work similar to pitocin, but nothing seemed to help.

Kari and my mom came back to visit about 11 AM the next day (as soon a visiting hours started). I had another gush of blood shortly after they got there and paged the nurse. The nurse got me up and into the bathroom before I started seeing stars and felt like I was going to pass out. The next thing I know, several nurses were in my room, one of them kept saying my name and another was waving ammonia in front of my face. I was able to make my way back to bed - well they actually brought the bed to me! - but still felt very faint. The nurse paged for the doctor on call.

Once the doctor arrived he discovered that the small tear that didn't need stitching, actually did! They sent me up to the 14th floor to get stitched up. It was late afternoon/evening on Wednesday by the time everything was sorted out. I finally got to eat and we had a pretty uneventful evening and night.

Although the bleeding stopped, I had lost enough blood that my hematocrit was at 22 - almost half of what is considered normal. The doctor encouraged me to stay another night in the hospital, but I was ready to go home. I showered, Harper had her bath and newborn photos, and we took a walk around the floor before the Dr. would let us leave. We headed home early Thursday Evening.