Amelia Ryan's Birth Story

Hello there...6 weeks later! Staying home during my maternity leave turned into a complete hibernation. I absolutely ADORED my special time at home with just me and my girl. It went by wayyyy too fast. Now it is back to the real world and I don't like it one bit!

Before too much time passes and I start to forget the little details, I want to document the events of the day that led to Miss Amelia's debut into the world. It's a pretty long story so I'll be sure to include plenty of pictures of this little beauty to keep your attention until the end.

After being hospitalized unexpectedly because of my high blood pressure, I spent the next 5 days on strict bed rest in the hospital. Although I didn't even have my hospital bag packed and hated the feeling of being disorganized, being forced to stay in bed gave me some much needed time to get mentally prepared for the big day. The night before I was induced, I was moved to the labor and delivery room. From about 7pm until 7am the next morning they inserted a strip of medicine which worked to thin my cervix. Too much time has already passed because I can't even remember what that thing was called!

During the course of the night I tossed and turned with excitement and anticipation. Trying to find a comfortable sleeping position was also causing a lot of tossing and turning. It was very important that I stay propped up on my left side the entire time due to my BP issues and so that I wasn't cutting off circulation to the baby. I was extremely uncomfortable all night and could feel my lower back beginning to tense and throb from laying in awkward positions for so long.

Early the next morning, the nurse came and removed the strip and I was allowed to freshen up before they started the pitocin drip. I distinctly remember how wonderful it felt for that brief half hour or so where I was allowed to shower and walk around the room a bit. And after not eating since 4pm the day before, they even let me have a grape popsicle! After so many days on bed rest, I was practically dancing around the room with happiness!

Around 8:00am, they started the pitocin drip. We were told it would likely take about 12+ hours so we weren't expecting things to move very quickly. The nurses continued to monitor my BP (which remained high) and also ran labs to monitor my blood platelets which had begun to drop. Since my platelets were dropping, I was told that if I wanted to have an epidural I would need to get the catheter inserted as soon as possible or run the risk later of not getting one at all because I would possibly bleed out. It didn't take me long to say, "get me that epidural catheter STAT!". I have a low tolerance for pain and knew I would not do well going the natural route!

My nurses told me that getting the IV inserted was worse than getting the epidural put in, so I was not worried about this part being painful as I had breezed through the IV like a champ. But boy were they wrong! The anesthesiologist could not find the right spot to insert my epidural and he ended up sticking me in the spine 3 TIMES ... IN THE BONE!!! It was THE most horrible physical pain I've ever felt. I can't even describe it. Chris literally almost passed out just watching me cry out in pain. Just telling the story about it makes me shudder in remembrance.

Once the epidural catheter was FINALLY in, my doctor came in to check on me & decided to break my water since I was not even dilated to a 2 yet. It did not take long at all for me to start feeling my contractions more, not to mention my back was really starting to hurt. I'm not sure if my back was hurting because of the epidural mishap or from sleeping on it wrong, but I was in a lot of pain so I asked if they could go ahead and start my epidural. I knew it was still early and we had a long way to go, but like I said..I have a low pain tolerance and I needed help!

After the horrific epidural catheter experience, I was still shaking like a leaf and couldn't stop crying so they all decided to leave me alone for a while and let me try to calm down and rest and let the epidural do it's magic. After about an hour, I felt much better. The drugs were doing their job!  Nana and Chris were in the room talking to me when the nurse decided to come check me again. I was now at a 7! We all couldn't believe how fast I went from a 2 to a 7! The nurse ended up having to turn off the pitocin to slow things down!


Nana ran to the waiting room to share the exciting news with everyone else. Mom and Beth came back to talk to us at this time. Mom and Beth weren't in the room longer than 30 minutes when the nurse checked me again and I was already to 10 cm! We were all shocked at how fast things were moving along. It was go time!

I didn't know what I expected delivering a baby to be like, but it wasn't at all like I thought. I guess I was expecting to be screaming in pain at my husband like they do in the movies! But Amelia's birth could not have been any more calm and peaceful. No one was screaming, no one was crying. After about 3 or 4 sets of pushing, Amelia was out! She didn't even cry! She just looked around like she was checking everything out and taking it in!

The first hour of her life was spent with our family of 3 just staring at each other and doing "kangaroo care" where Amelia laid skin to skin with me on my chest. It was such a sweet time of bonding.

After kangaroo care, they swaddled her up in a blanket and our families came in to meet her. Everyone was head over heels in love at first sight.

That should be the end of the birth story, but it seems that my journey was not quite over. As soon as the epidural wore off (probably an hour and a half after she was born), my blood pressure shot up through the roof! Also, my back pain came back with a vengeance and I couldn't stop crying in pain. They ended up having to start me on a magnesium sulfate drip to try to lower my blood pressure and gave me some medicine to try to manage the back pain.

So needless to say, it was a slightly rough first night with Amelia. Chris was in charge of all diaper duties! I was able to hold her and love on her but since I couldn't get out of the bed, it limited me to being able to really take care of her yet. Thankfully after a night of some rest and medicine, my BP lowered and my back felt better by the next day.

After 8 days in the hospital, most of the time stuck laying in the bed, I was SO glad to break outta there finally and bring our sweet baby home, blessed for us both to be healthy and happy.

And every day has been better than the last! I love motherhood!