Jaderston Baby: The Birth Story {part two}
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So if you haven’t caught up, HERE is the birth story {part one}. That one ended with the epidural and relief around 7:50 AM.
They checked me at 8:45 and I still hadn’t made any further progress… Whoa.
At 10:00 am they checked me again and finally I had dilated to a 6, but baby was still at -1 station.
Thankfully we were able to get some rest in between checks and it seemed that moving me around every 30 minutes or so really helped so we kept doing that.
At noon my doctor came and checked me (the on call doc had been checking me before). I was dilated to a 9 with an anterior lip on my cervix! My cervix finally moved into the correct position and he informed us that it would probably be before 5 that we’d meet our boy! He came around again at 1:15 and I was fully dilated and ready to push, but the baby still needed to move down a little bit more for really effective pushing so we continued to wait hoping that I would eventually feel some sort of pressure to help with the pushing.
At 2:00 we started to “practice push” and I was starting to feel a little bit of pressure with each contraction. During our wait we had been praying for me to feel just a little bit with no pain so that I could really assist in pushing him out instead of blindly hoping I was doing it right. Sure enough with each contraction I could feel it build up and peak but with very little pain.
At 2:15 my doctor arrived with lots of other nurses and support staff. The room was buzzing with excitement. We were about to meet our boy – we just couldn’t believe it. I spent most of the next 30 minutes in my head with my eyes closed just waiting for the next wave to come so that I could push. I had so much encouragement and support surrounding me and even though it wasn’t natural or how I had hoped it would happen, it was beautiful and peaceful.
Dwayne was born at 2:45 pm. We delayed the cutting of the cord and he was moved to my belly just briefly before the nurses and doctors realized something was wrong. They took Dwayne over to the warmer and many more doctors swarmed into the room. We spent the next 5 minutes waiting, crying, begging the Lord to breathe life into his lungs. I never took my eyes off Mike and he never took his eyes off Dwayne. You could feel the tension in the room as people waited for him to respond and at 5 and a half minutes when Dwayne made the tiniest little squeak the tension lifted and Mike was finally able to tell me (with confidence) that he was ok and I was able to look at Dwayne for the first time and watch him turn pink.
It was the longest 5 minutes of our lives.
After a few more minutes and some assessments from the doctors, Dwayne was put on my chest and Mike and I were able to look into his eyes for the first time. He was perfect. All 9 lbs 1 oz of him.
After an hour of skin to skin our families were able to come in a meet him. Thankfully my OB had filled them in on his traumatic entrance so we didn’t have to relive it quite yet.
Eventually we got moved up to recovery and we settled in for a few more nights.
Dwayne: Mike’s middle name and the name of his uncle who passed away just before Mike was born.
Henry: Dr. Henry Lederle (above picture) is Mike’s mentor and our dear friend whom we consider family. Everyone calls him DH. It turns out that Henry is also a family name for both of us!
Dwayne Henry Jaderston
Our journey to parenthood didn’t go exactly as we would have planned, but every bump in the road, pain of pregnancy, and change of plans made this little man all the more worth it.
I can’t believe he’s already two weeks old. He threw us a bunch of curve balls during those first 2 weeks but we are so grateful to be home with a healthy, breathing little boy.
Happy Day!