Hannah's birth

I always love to hear the stories and experiences of having a baby and so we remember July 28, 2008, here it goes....

Jon and I went to our scheduled OB appointment on Monday morning, knowing that there was the possibility that she'd send us to the hospital. We were hopeful that would be the case. Over the weekend, Jon had taken some of my urine to the ER and we discovered that the protein level had increased. While waiting for my doctor, we could hear lots of talk in the hall about one of the doctors being in a C-Section, another woman was crowning and 2 different hospitals were on the line for my doctor. I kept thinking that there was no way she was going to add us to the list of laboring families! But, she walked in and said "it looks like you're having a baby today - the protein level is even higher." Yeah! I was dilated to a 3, but the baby was still really high. So, we headed over to OSU Medical Center and started our day.

The hospital put us in triage so they could draw blood and see if my doctor would still let us do a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesearean) or if she'd just want us to do a C-Section . We ended up being in triage for 4 hours. Oddly enough, when they put the monitor on, they discovered that I was contracting every 8 minutes. A couple hours later, it was down to every 5 minutes and a couple of hours after that, every 3 minutes. All that, without any pitocin. I'm beginning to wonder if I just need to walk through a hospital door to get started in labor! We finally got the go ahead that some liver tests were slightly elevated, but the doctor was still going to let us try. By this time, my mom and Becky had arrived at the hospital.

We went up to Labor and Delivery and got settled in a room. There were technical difficulties going on in the room with the wiring, so they had to wait until that was fixed so they could read my monitors at the nurses station. They got the pitocin started at 4:00. Because of testing positive for Group B Strep with Lindsey, they needed to get 2 rounds of antibiotics in - ideally 4 hours apart and ideally before breaking my water. They turned on the antibiotic and pitocin and we started. However, shortly after, Hannah's heart rate took a dive and they turned off the pitocin, had me turn on my side and I had to have an oxygen mask on most of labor. They decided they need to go ahead and break my water so that they could get an internal monitor on. The resident and nurse kept commenting on how much fluid there was, but it was clear, so we were glad about that.

They turned the pitocin back on, at the minimal amount and we continued. I asked for the epidural at 5:00. It took effect great - yeah! and after another dip in Hannah's heart rate, everything settled down. Jon and my mom left to go pick up the kids from Kirsten (who had had them all day), take them home, feed them dinner and come back. Our Bishop's wife, Caryl, came over at 7:30 and put the kids to bed.

My mom and Jon got back around 8:00ish. About an hour before that, I had only dilated to a 4. Around 8:30, I felt pressure and told the nurse. I guess by your 5th baby, you know what to report to the nurse. She checked me and sure enough, I was fully dilated and Hannah had moved down. They called the doctor and she said she's be there in 15 minutes. Rather than start getting me ready to push, my doctor told the nurses to wait until she got there (one of the blessings of delivering with the same doctor). She got there at 8:45, changed into scrubs, they got me ready and I pushed. About 3 pushes later, at 9:04 p.m., Hannah was out! It was incredible!

Jon, my mom and Becky were there and it was such a great moment to see this sweet, little baby take her first breath. They placed her on my chest, Jon let Becky cut the cord (which we discovered had a knot in it) and we started to adore her. She was breathing great, but wasn't crying, so they took her to the warmer to evaluate her. She was great (9 & 9 on the Apgar), but she just didn't want to cry. She was perfect and we instantly fell in love with her!

We're so very, very grateful that everything went so well! We were very much watched over and taken care of and we'll be eternally grateful for this new addition to our family! Welcome to Bowen craziness, Hannah!