The Arrival of Audrey Janine

We were surprised to welcome Audrey Janine into the world late last Thursday night. She was born at 11:58pm on September 10th. She weighed 5 lbs 10.5 oz and was 18.11" long. The full story follows the pictures below from our stay in the hospital.

Sleeping in the bassinet.

She opened her eyes most often when the lights were dimmed.


She wrapped her arms around my hand when I was trying to burp her.

Her first time in the car seat. She's almost too small for it.

On Thursday the 10th, when Kim arrived to watch Aaron in the morning, she commented that I seemed to be carrying low and said "Are you sure you aren't going into labor?" I laughed that my friend Heidi had commented the day before that I seemed to be carrying lower and wondered if the baby had "dropped". I myself didn't notice anything different.

By early afternoon, I noticed some Braxton-Hicks contractions. I jotted down the times I felt them and they were about 50 minutes apart. I tried to drink more water and didn't worry too much since I had had contractions at 12 minutes apart that hadn't been labor. But by the time Kim left around 1:15, I told her that she had me paranoid now since she was the second person in 2 days to comment on the baby's position and I was having some contractions. She said that she didn't have much going on over the weekend in case I needed her. I told her I hoped I wouldn't.

Close to 3pm, I noticed the contractions were more frequent, but still not painful. But they quickly went from 15 minutes apart to 7-8 minutes apart and by 3:15 they were only 3 minutes apart. I tried drinking more water since dehydration can cause BH contractions. They kept coming 3 minutes apart. After the 12 minute apart contractions that had sent us down to triage a few weeks ago, my OB said not to worry about contractions unless they were 3-5 minutes apart. I thought this qualified. I finally called Thom and said maybe he should come home early. I texted Kim that I might need her to come back. I hesitated to call my OB's office since I was sure I'd get sent down to triage and I was hoping that the water and some rest would calm the contractions down.

But when Thom came home around 4:30pm and they were still 3 minutes apart, I called the doctor's office. They sent us to triage. It was late enough I knew we wouldn't see my OB when we got down there. (If it had been earlier, we might have been able to get his opinion.) We waited for Kim to arrive while I packed a bag just in case (it was mostly packed after the last incident). Then I wrote down instructions for Kim for making Aaron's breakfast. Again, I hoped it would be "just in case", but I knew that if we were admitted, I didn't want to have to worry about not having given Kim any information she needed in case she spent the night.

Although I as consciously thinking that this would be another false alarm, like the last 2 trips to triage, I also had a strange feeling of calmness and excitement. I didn't want to deliver Audrey so early, but I just had this feeling that if I did, it was going to be OK and I was excited to meet her. The feeling didn't last. Once we were in triage, waiting around for hours not knowing what was going to happen, I was very anxious.

When we first got there, they hooked me up to the monitors and confirmed I was having contractions every 3 minutes or so. They still weren't painful (except for some here and there that were about a 2 on a scale of 1 to 10). The nurse was waiting for the OB on call to call back, but thought I'd probably get a shot of terbutaline and be sent home. But by the time the OB called back, the contractions had become painful. Almost all of them were about a 4. They gave me the terbutaline which calmed my contractions for about 30-40 minutes (I only had 3 or 4 contractions in that time and they weren't painful.) But the nurse wanted to watch me a little longer and soon the contractions came back stronger than before and still 3 minutes apart. By now, they were about a 5 on a scale of 1 to 10 and I couldn't finish a sentence once one hit.

Although the nurse had said they could give me up to 2 doses of terbutaline, the OB said she didn't want me given a second dose. Shortly before 10pm, the OB on call came by to see me. The nurse had checked my cervix earlier in the night (before I was given terbutaline) and found that it was closed. The OB confirmed when she arrived that it was still closed. But then she gave us 2 options. She said she could try to more aggressively stop the contractions, but that she'd want to do an amnio to make sure it was worthwhile (I guess to make sure everything was OK with the baby). Or she said she could go ahead and deliver the baby. Since we were planning a repeat c-section, she would just go ahead and do it that night.

Thom and I both wanted a third option. I guess we kind of had another option of getting another shot of terbutaline. The OB would have let us try that option, but she didn't think it would help. And after seeing how little effect the first shot had (compared to when it stopped my contractions completely the last time), I figured it would just delay the c-section until early morning. I was already tired and hungry and didn't see that a delay was going to help. I had hoped that one option would be to just wait and see, since my cervix wasn't dilating. I really wanted to make it until morning to talk to my OB and to have him do the surgery if we had no other options.

But the OB explained that she didn't want me to continue contracting on the scar from the last c-section since that poses some risks. I was surprised since some people opt to do a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) but the nurse said they are moving away from that and some doctors won't do them at all.

Neither of the options appealed to us. We were worried about her lung development since we were at 35 weeks and 3 days. But I also knew from talking to my OB the week before that he wouldn't stop labor after 34 weeks. I asked why not, since prior to 37 weeks is considered pre-term. He said that it is all about balancing risks. After 34 weeks, the baby has a very good chance of being born healthy and that the most common reason for preterm labor is infection. If I went into labor before 34 weeks, he'd want to do some testing to rule out infection before trying to stop labor, but after 34 weeks, he felt it was just safer to deliver. He'd never opt to deliver before 37 weeks, but if I went into labor on my own, he said that's what he'd do.

So that conversation with my OB helped us rule out the one option, which only left doing a c-section. It was obvious I wouldn't be able to wait until morning, and Thom and I thought the OB on call seemed competent. It was shortly after 10pm when we had to make a decision. Thom had been going outside repeatedly to call Kim with updates as well as to cancel 2 play dates I had scheduled for Friday, and to call my parents. When the OB came by a second time to answer any questions and to see if we had made a decision, I asked her if we could deliver before midnight. As long as we were going to deliver anyway, I wanted to do it earlier rather than later, while people were hopefully not too tired. But I also wanted to avoid a 9/11 birthday if possible. She said she would try. She had an emergency c-section to perform first, but that if I was prepped while she did that, she could probably deliver before midnight.

So we decided to go for it. I was nervous and worried about the baby. But they were going to have the NICU team there ready to evaluate her when she was born. They had said she might need to spend some time in the NICU.

They took me to a room to get ready for the surgery. I had to fill out forms and have an IV put in. The anesthesiologist, Dr. B, came in to introduce himself. Once they took me to the OR, Thom had to wait outside until I was prepped. I had mentioned how painful the spinal was last time to the OB and she said it was only for a few seconds. I said, no, it had been several minutes, so she assured me that the anesthesiologist on call that night was very good. And she was right. It was a little painful when he put the topical anesthetic in, but it only lasted a few seconds. I then braced myself for more pain, but it never came. Then I felt my feet starting to get warm and realized he was done. I mentioned the painful experience before and the fact that there were two people and Dr. B agreed that a resident had probably done it and said he'd give the other anesthesiologist a hard time about it.

After the spinal was in, they finished prepping me and put up a blue sheet so I couldn't see anything. I felt nauseous at one point, which the doctor had warned me about. He put something in my IV and it passed. This happened a couple more times before I was done, but he managed to keep me from getting sick. I also didn't have to wear an oxygen mask this time and I never felt like I had trouble breathing like I did last time. I think he did a better job.

Shortly before Thom came in, the clock said 11:45pm. I didn't think about it again until after Audrey was born. I was listening for her cry. Aaron cried as soon as they pulled him out. But I didn't know if she would since she was so early. So when I heard her little cry, I cried in relief. Then someone mentioned that they just managed to deliver her before midnight.

The NICU nurse looked her over and found she was fine. She had great apgar scores and seemed healthy, but small. I got to see her briefly before Thom and she went to finish getting her cleaned up and weighed.

We spent about 1.5 hours in recovery, until I could lift my knees up (although my legs were still pretty numb). I was so tired and thought the night would never end. A nurse kept coming to check on Audrey every 30 minutes or so, but she continued to be fine. Finally around 2am we were taken to a room. After that it was kind of a blur.

I was disappointed that we didn't have our camera. We didn't get pictures in the delivery room like we did with Aaron. And I regret that I didn't get any really pregnant pictures of myself like we did at the end of the last pregnancy. I was disappointed my own OB didn't deliver Audrey. My one fear was of going into labor late at night and having some OB I never met perform surgery in the middle of the night. But overall, it worked out.

We came home on Monday. Things were a little easier this time. Audrey cries less and I was more relaxed. In fact, Thom only stayed the first 2 nights. The second 2 nights, I took care of Audrey by myself while Thom stayed with Aaron and got some rest. Unlike last time, I felt ready to come home when I was discharged.