The Induction

**Very long post!**

On the night of December 13th, I got 2 hours of sleep and Josh got just three. We were extremely anxious, excited, and nervous about my induction the next morning. My mom headed with us to the hospital and I checked in at 5:00 a.m. I was having very mild contractions 7 1/2 minutes apart, was 2 cm dialated, and 70% effaced. At 6:20 a.m., I was given the drug Pitocin to bring on labor.... they upped the drug every 10-15 minutes while monitoring my contractions.

At 7:50, I was starting to really feel stronger contractions and then Dr. N came into break my water. At 10:30, I was given Nubaine (sp?) to take the edge off the contractions and back pain. I finally showed some progress (3 1/2-4 cm) at 11:27. Next came the WORST part of all of my labor and delivery. .. the epidural! The anesthesiologist called mine "much more difficult than most." He tried for 45 minutes, poked me three times, and actually hit bone once. While he was trying, I had to sit up in bed with my back arched (during extremely strong contractions which were 2-3 minutes apart).

By 1:10, my pain was under control and I started progressing rather quickly. At 2:15, I was 9 cm and then fully dialated by 2:43 in the afternoon! I remember being soooo hungry and hoping I'd get to eat dinner. LOL I pushed for about an hour and 45 minutes (with my mom and Josh right there as my coach and cheerleader). My nurse called my doc to update him on my situation and he decided that I should take an hour break so as not to rush my big baby!

I pushed again for 45 minutes... but, the baby was not coming down any further. My epidural was good, I could still feel when to push. The nurse could see Isaac's head, but it had started to swell as he was rocking back and forth on my pelvis bone. Two nurses tried checking the position of his head and they couldn't seem to figure out how it was positioned (face down, but... sort of angled in a funny way, not straight).

At this point, Dr. N checked me out and basically just told me, "There's a better way to do this. I'd like you to stop pushing." It wasn't a suprise to me really that he was suggesting a c-section. We knew it was a possibility and we both sort of sensed the urgency coming from the nurse as she tried her best to help me deliver naturally. I myself remember the look on Dr. N's face as he entered the room and knew what he was going to say before he did the exam.

Basically, he thought that I probably could deliver the head, but he wasn't sure the shoulders would come out. He told us that it wasn't safe to try any longer due to complications... he said the baby could have life-long health problems if things didn't go well with the rest of the delivery. He, too, was also not positive about the postion of Isaac's head... as it turns out, Isaac's one ear is still sticking out a little bit from the way he was stuck (It should be back to normal by 6 wks.). :(

Twelve hours of labor! At 6:43 p.m., I was rolled into the operating room for my c-section and I'll tell you all about that when I can find some time to type up the post!