40 weeks – The story – Part 1

24 Jan 2010 3 Comments

by Heather in Birth

This post is going up a week and a half after the 40 week date of our pregnancy for reasons that will soon become clear, assuming yesterday’s post didn’t make it evident, of course! 

January 12, 2010 – the day before Nathan’s due date, his uncle’s birthday, and the date of one of my appointments with our midwife.  I headed to the midwife’s office for a 9:40 appointment with the expectation that I would head into work after that.  After all, I didn’t feel like I was in labor or near it and didn’t anticipate any issues coming up.  All was well until she took my blood pressure… 140 over 100.  Oops!  That’s a little high!  Looks like the Tower family genes had kicked in since the previous week.  She measured it 3 times in different positions and it didn’t improve.  With a look of concern on her face, the midwife started to explain that she felt that the best course of action was to induce me since I was full term.  I didn’t love hearing that because part of our birth wish list was that we wait until Nathan decided to come in his own time.  However, as we talked it became clear that blood pressure isn’t something you want to mess with so we made plans to meet at the hospital that evening to start the process.  I still wasn’t 100% sure that this was what I wanted to do but I needed time to think about it and talk with other folks. 

I went out to my car and called Pete at work.  I explained the whole situation to him and we talked about our options.  Neither of us were sure we wanted to go forward with the induction but with no medical training, we weren’t really sure what to think.  We decided to talk with our doula to get her opinion.  My next call was to my boss to let her know I wasn’t coming in to work.  I was still in shock and overwhelmed and I think what I said to her was something along the lines of, “My blood pressure is up and, um, I’m not going to be coming into work any more.”  Smooth, very smooth!  I explained about the induction and she was very understanding.  The third call was to our doula and we talked for about 45 minutes.  She helped me understand more what the midwife’s concerns were, what high blood pressure means, what our options might be, and generally helped me get my bearings.  In another call to Pete we decided that I would go home, lay down, and try to relax in an effort to bring my blood pressure down.  We also decided to go back to the midwife’s office before the close of business to have my blood pressure taken again.  If it was down, we would consider talking with her about waiting until labor started naturally.  If it was up, we would go have ourselves a nice dinner out – kind of a last date before the baby comes – and report to the hospital as planned.

I spent the afternoon relaxing in bed, sleeping and listening to the radio.  Pete finished up at work and came home.  We snuggled a little bit and then he set to work packing his back, finishing up my bag, and putting our supplies (birth ball, yoga mat, Gatorade, etc.) into the car.  At 4:45 the midwife took my blood pressure again and found that it had come back to normal. We briefly discussed options including bed rest until labor started on its own.  She put me on a fetal monitor and said she wanted to check it again in 15 minutes or so.  Unfortunately, my blood pressure was back up so that made our decision… induction it is!

We headed out to Cafe Alessio in Doylestown for a carb-filled dinner date.  Needed some carbs for the work ahead!  After dinner we headed off to the hospital, arriving a little after 7.  We got settled into the room, I got to model the oh-so-stylish hospital gown, and I was hooked up to the fetal monitor for about 20 minutes. 

The last belly picture

After that was done we got to wander around and check out the birth center while we waited for the midwife to arrive around 9.  It was a little surreal to see the babies in the nursery and think that within a day, we hoped, we would have one of those. 

A little after 9 the midwife arrived and gave me a medication designed to soften the cervix & prepare it for labor.  The nurse and the midwife both said that sometimes the medication can put people into labor without the dreaded pitocin.  We very much hoped that would happen for us.  For the next two hours I had to be on the fetal monitor in bed with no eating or drinking.  Apparently sometimes people have strange reactions to the medication but, fortunately, I didn’t have any of those.  We went to sleep and I woke at 1:15 with what I thought were back pains due to an uncomfortable hospital bed.  Little did I know…

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