A Birth Story

On Jan 2, at 2am (same time as with my first), I started feeling contractions.  They were about 10-15 min apart.  I timed them for 2 hours, panicking because she was not full term just yet.  I thought I would make it at least to 38 weeks.  After 2 hours, they started getting further apart.  I would have them randomly throughout the rest of the day.  Next night, same thing, except they lasted 5 hours before getting further apart and I had them ever 30-45 minutes throughout the day.  That evening, January 3rd, they started getting closer together again (probably  around 4 or 5pm), but they were very random.  I tried laying down and guzzling water and they seemed to get further apart (about 10-15 min), but as soon as I stood up to do anything, they would be 5 min or even closer.  I finally decided around 8pm, after we put Brady down for bed, to call someone to watch him and go to the hospital.

I was expecting to be sent home, but I was already dilated to 5cm!  I wasn't really getting frequent contractions at this point.  I was at 6cm by the time they admitted me.  The contractions were very painful (like last time), but not close together at all (unlike last time).  I wanted my second natural childbirth, but I just couldn't let me body go.  I labored for a few hours stuck at 6cm.  I finally said I wanted an epidural.  The first epidural didn't work, so they had to stick it in me again.  Yuck!  Once it started working, the contractions got very close and I didn't time it, but I think I went from 6 or 7cm to fully dilated in about 2-3 hours.  After only a few short pushes, Ada Josette was born on January 4th, 2013 at 4:44am.  She was only 5lbs and 17" long.  Her gestational age was 37 weeks, 1 day.

She hadn't been nursing very well, but I figured it was just the learning curve and the fact that they took her to the nursery to be in a warmer for a few hours because she was having issues regulating her temp.  Our pediatrician came in to check her out that afternoon.  We already knew she had Down Syndrome, but he said she also a cleft palate.  He asked if it would be ok to feed her some formula in a special bottle.  Daddy got to feed her and she ate about 10mL of formula.  The pediatrician decided that she couldn't afford to lose weight so he had her admitted to the NICU, saying it would probably only be for an IV and observation over 24 hours.

She's now 8 days old, but still in the NICU.  We continued to try breastfeeding for a few days, but it really wasn't working out between her being tired, slight tongue thrust, and her cleft palate.  They did her echocardiogram and that all looked great.  They did an ultrasound of her brain (to check for a midline defect) and that also looked good.  An occupational therapist worked with her on the bottle one feeding a day and she did really well.  After a few days, I decided breastfeeding would have to take a backseat to bottle feeding if I wanted to get her home soon.  At this point, she was only getting pumped breastmilk.

She has now been exclusively bottlefed for 4 days and does a little better each day.  She gets almost all of her bottle and only gets about 8-16 mL pumped into her feeding tube at each feeding session.  Once she can consistently take all of her bottle, then they will remove her feeding tube.  Then they will watch her to make sure she is still gaining weight for 48 hours.  This has been so hard and exhausting, especially with Brady being sick at home now.  I'm really hoping to take her home by next Wednesday though.  I know it's not in my control, but she hasn't taken any backwards steps yet.  She just takes baby steps forward.  She is so determined and absolutely adorable!

I am absolutely in love with this little girl!