Birth Statistics

Calendar of early milestones

 

Story of the Birth (told by Dad)

(not too much gory detail)

Elizabeth's due date was June 1st.  As the date approached, Heather and I were basically getting to the point where we just wanted to see it here.  As June 1st came and went, we were getting a little anxious.  She had a doctors appointment on Tuesday, and for some reason the doctor ordered an ultrasound.  It was then that we found out that Elizabeth was in full breach position.  Since the week before the doctor was SURE that Elizabeth wasn't, that means that she flipped around in her last week - very uncommon.   We made an appointment for Thursday for a "version", which is supposed to turn the baby around.  Basically, it is one or two doctors pushing on the baby, through Heather's stomach, hoping to turn the baby to the proper position.  If it was successful, Heather could wait for a normal delivery, if it wasn't it would be a c-section.  On Wednesday, Heather had some cramps, and thinking she was in labor, we went to the hospital.  She wasn't.  Thursday came, and the version therapy was tried (Heather said it felt like the movie aliens, but an alien trying to get in).  It didn't work, and we scheduled a c-section for Friday morning.  However, 4:30 am, Heather's water broke (with merconium in the fluid, which can cause problems).    The c-section was scheduled for 10:00.  By 8:30, Heather was fully into active labor (a side note - Heather said she had thought she had a high pain threshold, and could simply "bear" the pain of labor, and that all the complaints were exaggerated.  Well, she now knows she was wrong - after the level of labor she reached, she says that she knows the pain is not exaggerated at ALL).  There were some problems with the baby's heart rate dropping down to the low 60's during the contractions (it was supposed to be in the 120 to 150 range), and the nurses kept trying to page doctors, but no one was answering.  Finally, at about 8:40 a doctor came in, saw how far Heather had progressed, and moved the c-section up (it took about 5 minutes after the doctor said so move it up, till Heather was being prepped).  I got some gear to put on to join her in the delivery room.  Without going into too much detail, we finally heard "baby out", and about 5 minutes later we heard her cry (the doctors had to completely pump her lungs and stomach completely before she started to breath on her own, due to the merconium).   I then got to walk over to where she was (past where Heather was being sewn up) and saw her for the first time.    She looked fine (the drop in the heart rate was due to the fact her cord was wrapped around her neck twice) and did quite well on the apgar test (8 after 1 minute, 9 after 5 minutes).

And that's how Elizabeth entered the world.  Mom and Dad have gotten very little sleep since.