I always dreamt about the birth of our very first child. Wondering what day it would happen, where I would be, what pain levels I could bear (because physical pain and I are not friends), what my husband's face would look like when he saw our son for the first time, what our son's first cry would sound like and what feelings and memories I would capture and remember from that day.
Wednesday, April 15, I started noticing symptoms that I hadn't had during my pregnancy. Blurred vision, nausea, stomach pains, dizziness and extremely swollen ankles (minus ankles, because you literally couldn't find them with a magnifying glass). I had a couple of these symptoms for about a week, but that night they were intensified and happening all at the same time. I had the idea to check my blood pressure and found it in the extreme ranges. I didn't know what was going on, but decided to go to bed and call my doctor in the morning.
Thursday, April 16, I woke up feeling even worse than the night before. I checked my blood pressure again, and it was worse than the previous night's reading. While I was just one day away from beginning maternity leave at work, I decided to go in and wrap up a few more things, "just in case." About an hour after arriving at work, I called my doctor and left a message, letting her know what was going on. Soon after, she returned my call and let me know what I was experiencing was not normal and I needed to see her immediately. My boss and coworkers helped me quickly pack up my office and load up my car. Somehow, we just knew this was it. I waddled to my car, hugged necks goodbye and that was officially the last day that I worked.
My mom met me at the doctor's office and a nurse took my blood pressure, which read the highest it had been yet. My doctor was casually walking by and said, "Did we decide what time we're going to induce you next week?" The nurse responded, "Um, she might not make it to then." My doctor peeked at my blood pressure reading and immediately sent me to the hospital with a, "We might have this baby today!"
My mom and I snuck over to my house to gather a few things that I left out of my car and packed a bag for Matt (you know, because I wasn't supposed to get induced for another week) and headed off to the hospital. We arrived around 11:30 a.m. My doctor called to let them know I was coming, so they took me back right away and started hooking me up to monitors. My husband arrived shortly after we did and was my rock. They only let one person in triage at a time, so my mom left and slowly more family arrived and took turns coming back to see me. My sister gave me a pedicure while we waited, because what new mother can have chipped polish, and I put on fresh make up.
Around 2 p.m., after having my blood pressure monitored for a couple of hours, I received a call from my doctor. She let me know that due to my lab work and blood pressure readings, she was diagnosing me with preeclampsia and gave me the choice to get induced or have a c-section that night. Talk about a plot twist! After much prayer and debate, my doctor, Matt and I decided the safest and healthiest choice would be to move forward with a c-section. The OR was booked for two back to back twin c-sections, so they let me know to expect the operation to begin at 10 p.m.
Over the next couple of hours, the anesthesiologist and several nurses came back to explain to me what would happen, sign forms and prep me for surgery. Shortly after letting us know about the 10 p.m. surgery time, they let us know that we were getting bumped up to a 5 p.m. surgery time. I don't think I have ever been so freaked out and excited in the same moment. I was going to meet my son in a couple of hours! My doctor arrived soon after and came back to let me know she had to deliver a vaginal birth and then twins in the OR and then I was up next on the list. I can't even imagine her life - delivering four babies in one night!
Due to the line of up births that night, we watched the hour hand move from 5 p.m. to 6 p.m. to 7 p.m. We were able to sneak my sister in law back in triage with us to take photos and distract me from the slowly moving hour hand. I hadn't eaten anything since 9 a.m. that morning and wasn't allowed even ice chips. Talk about an angry mama bear - this woman was still pregnant with a pregnant appetite! It was so interesting to know I was about to having a baby, but wasn't actually in labor or any pains. Not saying I am complaining at all. It was perfect for this woman, who can withstand emotional pain to the nth degree, but cries when her dog steps on her toe. No lie. I did that. About a month ago. It was pathetic.
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Around 7:45 p.m., what looked like a SWAT team of nurses came back to let me know it was time. In this moment, I found out that Matt wasn't allowed to come back with me while I got the spinal. Let me tell you right now - this is what I feared the most. I knew too much about this to know that this was not going to be fun and could only imagine the needle in my spine a thousand times over. I walked down the hallway with my nurses after kissing Matt goodbye and walked into the most silver and shiny and white and blue OR I have ever seen. They had me sit on the edge of the bed and wrapped me in warm towels. I immediately had a panic attack as the anesthesiologist slowly talked me through what she was doing. In case you haven't noticed, I am my own worst enemy in these situations. I don't even remember the nurses name who held my hands with my nails in her arms and my tears on her chest, but as our foreheads were touching, I felt pressure. No pain, only pressure. I remember this because they kept asking me if I was in pain, obviously due to my dramatic display, but I assured them that I am a baby with any pain and I was fine. In a second, I felt my hips and legs and toes begin to tingle. In the next second, I was laid on my back and from my ribs down, was numb. It was the worst feeling I have ever felt, and it wasn't even pain or pressure. It was just numbness. As if two of the world's largest elephants decided they wanted to sit on my legs and take naps. I couldn't feel them, move them, nothing. The only feeling was heaviness. I remember crying out to the nurses saying, "I need to straighten my legs! I need to straighten my legs!" and they responded with, "Honey, your legs are straight."
Thankfully, that is when they let Matt in. He took a seat right next to my head as the curtain went up so I couldn't see anything and an oxygen mask was put on my face. I pulled Matt close and just asked him to pray out loud. Poor thing - he told me later he just kept praying the same thing over and over because anytime he would stop I would respond with, "Keep praying!" After what felt like only a couple of minutes since he walked in, the nurses said, "Dad, do you want to see your son?" He stood up, pulled out his phone, clicked on the camera app and I started to feel some pressure and pulling. I thought this part would be horrid to experience, but it was nothing to me. I mean, I had two elephants sitting on my legs, what was some pulling and pressure!? The nurses and Matt started to exclaim that the baby had hair - dark hair! In those moments, I forgot about all of the pressure and elephants and finally started to focus on the baby. I will never forget Matt looking down at me half a second before Paul cried for the first time. I couldn't see anything but his eyes due to his mask, but I knew he was smiling so big. I heard Paul Harrison Roberts' first cry at 8:04 p.m. and Matt took a seat next to me, letting me know he's perfect. Everything felt like seconds, going by so fast. Immediately after Matt sat down, my son was carried around the curtain just for a moment, screaming at the top of his lungs, white and bloody and perfect, so that I could see him. Talk about the most surreal moment of your life.
As I said, everything felt like seconds, going by so quickly. As soon as they started working on clearing Paul's lungs and cleaning him up, Matt looked and me, changing our biggest smiles to serious sterns and said, "I'm going to step out for a moment. I'm ok. I'm just going to pass out." He turned sheet white and with my paralyzed body and arms stretched out to my sides, I started saying, "He's going to pass out! He's going to pass out!" Another half dozen nurses from who knows where (seriously, there had to be three dozen people in that OR), wheeled Matt out of the OR in the chair he was in. The nurses assisting my doctor made a comment on how the last dad in the OR also passed out and they were two for two that night. I let them know that my husband had passed out before and would be fine. I knew that he hadn't had anything to eat or drink since he was so nice as to not do it in front of me while I was starving in triage, he had to watch his wife have a panic attack (which does not happen often), watch his wife get cut up (which does not happen ever) and watch his son get pulled out of his wife's body by his head through gushes of blood and amniotic fluid. I was the "wife" part of this, and it even makes me feel light headed to imagine what he had to watch and experience. Shortly after he left the OR, a nurse came up to me (you know, who's still laying on the table with arms out, elephants on legs and getting sewn back up) to let me know that my husband did pass out and started to seize and were sending him with his parents to the ER to get checked out. My doctor, who I could only identify by her voice on the other side of the curtain, assured me he didn't have a seizure and convulsions are normal after what he went through. Long story short here, he didn't have a seizure, saw all aspects of the birth and was/is perfectly fine.
After that nurse left my side, I laid there hearing my son screaming, choking and gasping for air as they worked on him. I was quite ignorant to what happens to babies when they are delivered c-section, but apparently during a vaginal birth, all of that fluid and blood that they inhale while in the womb is pushed out of their lungs as they make their way down the birth canal. C-section babies don't have a way to getting the fluid out while in the womb, and essentially take a secondary inhale of it all as they are pulled out. Needless to say, Paul had a lot of fluid in his lungs. The nurse brought him up to my face, still screaming, and I placed my hand on his cheek and said hello for the first time. I will never forget what happened - he stopped crying. The more I spoke to him, the calmer he got. Ya'll, motherhood is amazing. Even in that first moment, wow. I was this baby's mother and he knew it. The same nurse who just told me that must husband was headed to the ER let me know that Paul needed to go to the NICU to get his lungs cleaned out and monitored.
So, after getting sewn back together and cleaned up, I was whisked away to a post-op recovery room, by myself. No husband. No baby. I knew they were both going to be well taken care of, but that is not what I thought would happen. I thought I'd have my baby in my arms. I thought I'd have my husband by my side. I thought a lot of things would be different. Only a couple of people could come and see me at a time, so over the course of about an hour, my parents, siblings and doctor came back to say hello and let me know that Matt was able to stop by the waiting room to see our anxious family on his way to the ER and was smiling and beaming, showing off the pictures he took of his new son. Apparently after he passed out, and while Paul was making his way to the NICU, they stopped to let Matt take a look at his new son and snap some photos. Hearing that made me so happy that my husband was able to meet his son and my son was able to meet his dad.
I was wheeled into a labor and delivery room after about an hour in the post-op room, with my mom by my side. They immediately put me on IV fluids and medications to make sure that I didn't have seizures due to the preeclampsia. After the longest four hours of waiting, my husband was finally finished in the ER and able to join me in recovery around 2 a.m.. He and my mom were able to go to the NICU to check on Paul, but due to the medication I was hooked up to and the darn elephants on my legs still, I wasn't able to join them. I received a dozen photos texted to me while I patiently waited in my room and studied my son's face on my phone for hours. And hours. And hours. I must have slept only minutes that early morning because I was so anxious to meet this son of mine that I had somewhere in this hospital.
