Welcome McKenzie Ann Clough

She's Here!!!!

On Tuesday November 16th at 3AM I was awoken with weird back pains.  By 4 AM they were bad enough to keep me awake.  At 5 AM I experienced my bloody show and was pretty sure labor was imminent!  The whole day is kind of a blur, but I remember timing the pain a lot, googling back pains, and walking to try and get thing moving.  By mid-day, I the pain was increasing and coming at regular intervals.  I was not convinced this was labor though, because I had yet to feel any contractions in my abdomen.  Finally at 4PM, 13 hours after the pain begun I called my doctor to state I may be in labor.  At this point the pains were coming about every 5-10 minutes for 40-70 seconds long.  The midwife at the hospital called me back and truly believed I was in labor, but did not want me to come in yet.  She said to call back if they became 4-5 minutes apart for 1 minute long for 1 hour.  Well by 7:30 PM I had about had it and called Diane back.  She told me I could make my way to the hospital if I'd like.

At 8PM, Bidde (the midwife who came on after Diane) checked me and I was 100% effaced, 3 cm dilated, and -2 station.  Baby was not turned the "right" way so that is why all my labor was back labor.  Bidde said we needed to get baby to turn before she could come out.  She was very understanding and said after 17 hours of labor I could try getting in the tub, but then I could get an epidural!

8:30 PM - I got in the tub and tried to work through the contractions until about 9:15 and then I was ready for the epi!!!!!!!

At 9:30 PM The anaesthesiologist came in to do my epidural.  She tried various times, but I guess something wasn't working and she said she was going to try one more time.  I prayed that this was going to work.  It did!  Although I still felt a lot of pressure it was a whole lot better and manageable now.  After I got the epidural the nurse said lights out to Chris and I!  She wanted us to rest.  Well....as Chris was snoring away, I couldn't sleep!  My blood pressure was dropping...although the only way I knew it was because the machine kept beeping and I felt the pressure was too much, so the anaesthesiologist came and gave me a little something extra!  By this time it was November 17th...and we knew this would be our baby's birthday.

After 25 hours or so of back labor it was time to push around 4:30am.  This was the scariest part for me...mainly because I didn't think I could do it!  Chris stayed up by my head and Bidde and the nurse held my legs up.  I could still feel pressure so I knew when to push.  Bidde let me push for as long as I wanted.  I did sets of 3 pushes then would rest.

After 45 minutes of pushing at 5:09AM on November 17, 2010 McKenzie Ann Clough entered the world!  She was screaming before she was even all the way out!  She was put on my chest right away and stay there through all her tests and clean up!  She only left to get weighed...she was a healthy 9 pounds 3 ounces!  I was astonished that I just delivered a 9 lb baby!!!!!!!!!!  and even more that I only needed 2 stitches!