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POSTED BY JON FOR CATHE
Hello. I would first like to extend a warm thank you for all the kind words of support. Cathe is fortunate to have sooo many friends. Tears came to her eyes when I brought printed out copies of the responses to the news about Eric’s birth to the hospital the next day. Cathe is still busy learning motherhood. She is breastfeeding and Eric is not sleeping through the night, so she gets tired. He originally started out sleeping through most of the night and then suddenly had a change of plans for this week. I help out when I can. And that is why I took the time to write this. Cathe has wanted to post for sometime but I have insisted on her taking it easy for at least a couple of more days. So I’m sure you will be hearing from her VERY soon. Obviously I am treading in Cathe’s expertise so bear with me as I try to briefly describe the big day as many have requested. If you do not care for the details you can stop here.
We were up visiting Cathe’s parents in the late morning Tuesday Dec. 28th specifically for Cathe’s scheduled family baby shower. She was mentioning weird cramps every so often the day before. We were not thinking that it was contractions of course, so Cathe was just dealing with the pain (quite well too). We attended the shower during which Cathe did not feel well so she did not eat much. Later in the evening (still at her parents) she was still not very hungry, but forced a slice of pizza down, “because Eric needed something”. We were thinking about heading home because we had said that after Christmas and the baby shower, we were going to devote our attention to packing our hospital bags and preparing for Eric’s arrival. We had even joked about not forgetting to pack my special Labor Coach Kit. As I was getting all of the packages together and Addi fed (we brought him with us to her parents), Cathe called out for me. She was in the bathroom and mentioned that she just felt a gush of liquid pour out of her. She thinks her water broke and she called the doctor (its about 10 pm). The doctor told her to go to the closest hospital for an evaluation. Cathe asked the doctor (great doctor by the way) if we could meet him at the hospital that she was scheduled to deliver at, but that hospital was about 2 hours away and he was not comfortable with that. He suggested a couple of very reputable hospitals near her parent’s house and we headed to the closest one. During the drive (Cathe was in the back seat on her side) the contractions started coming more regularly. I timed them and they were about 4 to 5 minutes apart (sorry, I didn’t have my coaching kit with my stop watch in it packed). I pulled up to the hospital emergency and walked in and asked for assistance. I must have been too calm because I did not get much of a reaction until I stopped an EMT that was walking in. Well, when he saw the situation he must have said something because a large crew from the emergency room came running out with a stretcher. I caught up with her on the stretcher on the way to the delivery floor. We had to wait at registration (that seemed to take forever) before they pushed her into the delivery room. Everything seemed to be normal from then on. I stayed with her for the entire time. They started by giving her an exam to see if her membranes had ruptured. They had and therefore started an IV with an antibiotic into her because of the strep B bacteria that she had tested positive for earlier in her pregnancy. They said this was standard procedure. I’ll let her go more into the details of labor but at 4 centimeters dilated they were able to give her an epidural (I think Chris posted that she went natural but I think what he meant to say is that she did not have a c-section). A very in pain Cathe swears she was already 5 or 6 centimeters dilated before the epidural because the anesthesiologist took an hour to get to her after she was 4 centimeters. After the epidural, (it was now 3 am) Cathe actually seemed to be in a great mood. She was joking around and saying that she couldn’t believe how easy this was now. She waited around until she was 10 centimeters dilated (the contractions slowed down to 3 minutes apart again after the epidural so things took a little longer) and then the doctor told her to start pushing (it was now 6:20 am). The doctor was somewhat specific in that he wanted her to hold her breath and push. Cathe was somewhat confused by this because her whole career is based on exhaling as you push and now she is being told to hold her breath. She also told me that in Sheila’s Watkins prenatal coarse that she took this past summer, Sheila had told them to avoid this kind of pushing (I think Cathe said it was called purple pushing---don’t quote me on that). Cathe reluctantly tried this doctors “hold your breath” method for about 3 contractions and then stated that she felt like the blood vessels in her eyes were going to explode. The doctor agreed to let her try the method that she was taught (slowly exhaling with force as you push) and was so impressed that he invited her to come teach the hospital staff her “magical aerobic training method” as he called it. With Cathe’s pushing method in tact, we saw the top of Eric’s head appear in no time. Then they moved a mirror over to Cathe so that she could see what was happening. Talk about motivation, she really pushed hard now. This effort must have taken the doctor by surprise because suddenly he told her to hold off a second as a staff of doctors appeared quickly and changed into surgical garb. That startled Cathe and she was afraid something was wrong. The doctor assured her all was well, so she went back to pushing. Well good thing the doctors changed when they did because it did not seem like more than five minutes before Eric’s head popped out. How emotional that was. Cathe and I were laughing and crying as she gave another push to get the shoulders out. At 7:03 am on Dec. 29th, we heard Eric let out a little scream and then he (and we) started crying. I was soooo proud of them both. Cathe was amazingly strong throughout the whole thing. This was truly a miracle. Cathe was dying to hold the baby but had to stay still while the doctor sewed up the episiotomy that he gave her after she tore a little (the doctor said it was a second degree tear). Shortly after, little Eric was placed in her arms and I leaned over and squeezed and kissed my new family. Life is wonderful !!!!
Thank you again for all the support!
Jon and Cathe
P.S. For future reference, Cathe even mentioned shortly after Eric’s birth that she would gladly do this again.
)))