Katie and I are big planners. We have syncing calendars on our phones, We plan our dinners, We plan our trips. Long story short we plan everything. We planned we would become parents on March 5. 2013. In fact we planned for all our final preparations to be completed the week before that date. We planned on working up to the day Noah decided to come. I had also planned for my school class to end 2 weeks before Noah was due.
Little did we or anyone else know that we would become parents on February 11, 2013.
It all started like most with an early morning wake up from my wife at 04:57 on February 10th. I awoke to Katie Whispering "Honey, Honey, Casey Wake up. I think my water broke". That led me to jumping head first out of the bed. Chasing my tail a few times to get my bearings. After which I walked into the bathroom and was greeted with clear fluid on the floor. I responded "Honey we are both nurses we both know damn well thats your water". You take a shower and I will clean the floor, change the bed linen, make the crib, pack our hospital bag, wash your clothes you wanted to wear etc etc etc. ( As you can see we were not prepared for that early morning wake up call) Later I remembered to call the doctor. Why we did this I don't know. I knew she wasn't going to examine Katie via FaceTime on a cell phone. A few minutes later an obviously tired nurse midwife Michelle called and told us to come to the hospital. She said pack your bags you will be staying. Go figure premature rupture of membranes is something they don't take lightly.
So after my wife's multiple showers because she couldn't find the faucet to turn of the supply of amniotic fluid, we finished packing and headed out at 630 to Kennestone hospital. Of course being nurses we knew this wasn't going to happen fast. We stopped and had Martins chicken biscuits for breakfast and I also stopped and got some man snacks from Walgreens. After parking in the employee parking ( I am to cheap to pay for parking at a health system I work for) we walked the 3 miles to labor and delivery. We arrived promtly right at shift change.
After being told to walk here, walk there, walk back here they finally had us in a triage room. The nursing staff completed the test that confirm the presence of amniotic fluid. It of course came back positive. The only problem was Katie's membranes were ruptured but she was no where near ready to deliver a baby. She was 1 cm dilated and they couldn't even feel the babies head. At this point with small talk between us all the nurses discovered we were also Nurses. Unfortunately for us this brings about a issue known as the nurse curse. We had a long day, a lot of work to do, and bad luck coming our way. We were then taken to the delivery room. Our home for the next 24 hours. This room was like a cave, No windows, on the corner of the building, complete with a broken pot.
After being told to walk here, walk there, walk back here they finally had us in a triage room. The nursing staff completed the test that confirm the presence of amniotic fluid. It of course came back positive. The only problem was Katie's membranes were ruptured but she was no where near ready to deliver a baby. She was 1 cm dilated and they couldn't even feel the babies head. At this point with small talk between us all the nurses discovered we were also Nurses. Unfortunately for us this brings about a issue known as the nurse curse. We had a long day, a lot of work to do, and bad luck coming our way. We were then taken to the delivery room. Our home for the next 24 hours. This room was like a cave, No windows, on the corner of the building, complete with a broken pot.
What does a women do to go into labor besides eat egg plant parmesan? You WALK! So we started our journey of walking about 8:30. We walked alot, 20 times around the 2nd floor of L&D. I myself was tired after this. Of course there were a few visitors in the waiting room room since babies are not only born during office hours. The old men who cheered us on every time we walked by was awesome. The other man who tried to jinx twins on us, not so much.
So after walking and making very little progress they decided they would try to induce her labor. The physician started with an oral medication named Cytotec. Katie swallowed her pill and waited, 4 hours to be exact. This gave us time to visit with each other and our families. I also had a few exams that were due for school the following day. After 8 hours the nurses rechecked her and it was decided to repeat the medication again. A couple hours later the second pill finally got the ball rolling. In between her worsening contractions I was completing my final exams for class.
After two doses of Cytotec they put my wife on the medication that is rumored to be formulated by Satan himself. Pitocin or also known as Pit, that crap is no joke. They start slow and titrate up "To desired effect" Watching what is was doing to my wife it seemed to seep through her skin and put my stomach in knots also. After failed rounds of pain medications we quickly decided to hell with natural childbirth and said bring on the epidural!
The anesthesiologist came pretty quickly. Without saying much he was putting needles in my wife's back within what seemed like 5 minutes after calling. He stuck it in and literally struck a nerve. My wife's right leg shot straight up and almost took out the very part of my anatomy that got us here in the first place. It took him, my wife, and me off guard. He finished by explaining that striking that nerve is an uncommon side effect. It happens in so few people he forgot to warn us. (The nurse curse at us again)
After the epidural was in and medication flowing it was all down hill we thought. My wife was numbing up, the contractions were getting more organized and also easier to deal with. In the mean time we both were attempting to rest during the contractions.
Very Late that evening or early morning Noah's head could finally be felt. It was discovered he was not rotated in the position he needed to be. The nurses started turning Katie onto her side to attempt to get him to rotate into the correct position. This complicated matters because he either fell on top of his cord or he decided it was something fun to grab. Either way a compressed cord leads to major complications. Noah started experiencing decelerations with his heart rate. His heart rate dropped down to 80 beats per minutes at one time. While the nurses were busy grabbing ephedrine and bags of fluid I decided to take the easier route. I grabbed my wife's bed linen and rotated her back the other way. While it did work for the short term he continued compressing his cord.
Around 2 am we sent Cindy to care for the dogs. They had been housed in our basement since leaving for the hospital that morning. Not 30 minutes after letting Cindy leave the nurses came it, checked Katie, and decided it was time to start pushing. I called Cindy who hadn't even made it to our home yet she turned around and came back. The dogs would have to wait. After Katie began pushing she discovered the left side of her stomach was not really numb. She could also raise her left leg off the bed. Nursing staff told her hit your button on the epidural pump. Doing this resulted in nothing happening. It was decided the pump was broken. The nurse curse again is making its presence known.
They called the anesthesiologist again, he quickly delivered a new pump and pushed some medication into her epidural. Crisis resolved now it was time to get down to business.
Katie begin pushing with direction of an awesome nurse who had been with us since shift change. Her name was Brandy. She was a new nurse but you really couldn't tell with her confidence level and skill set. She kept calm and helped us get though it all.
After 2 more hours of pushing Mr. Noah Campbell Stokes made his grand entrance into the world. He was born at 4:57 in the morning. A little over 24 hours after our journey started. He weighed 6 lbs 10 oz and was 18.5 inches long. After this grand entrance we quickly learned we can plan all we want to but he is the one who is really in charge.
