**I wrote this on March 21, 2020 - Just 2 weeks after Mackenzie's Birth. I am posting it nearly 10 months after the birth. It is crazy to look back on these photos and see that none of us had to wear masks and there were 9 of us in the room for delivery (not including the medical staff). The day that E&C landed in Denver, we had our first confirmed COVID Case here in Colorado. We didn't know how it would rock our world or change how we handled what happened after the delivery. It is crazy to look back on these photos and think of how much has changed since that day...**
It is always hard to start this sort of thing -- jump in and start at the beginning or paint a picture first then start at the beginning? As I start to write this, two weeks after the birth, I am realizing that there are a lot of hazy parts of the labor that I just didn’t know what time it was and it felt like time stood still. This is my birth story. All birth stories are different. Not all of the birth story is glamorous. And as many of you know, sometimes I can over tell on the details -- but again, this is MY birth story.
As the date of induction was looming ahead of us, I started to get concerned. What if it didn’t go well? I just had this feeling in my stomach, that something wouldn’t go quite right. Would the dads not make it in time for labor? What about crying doula and my amazing photographer? The stars would all need to align just right to make this go well.
The week before the induction, I started noticing everything. Mostly the frequent and sometimes painful braxton hicks contractions. I just crossed my fingers (and my knees) and hoped for the best. On Monday, I went into the midwife to make sure our plan for induction was still on. I had my cervix checked and it was 3cm dilated and 30% effaced but the baby was VERY high. That meant that the plan for the cervadil induction was still a go and that I would go in Thursday night, have the cervadil placed to ripen my cervix, sleep and perhaps that would be enough to get labor started.
Wednesday morning came and when I woke up, Nonnie said she didn’t make her flight and that the flight was too full to get standbys on. I just knew that this was the beginning of my plan not working out. Who wouldn’t make it next? But we were able to get her on a flight and get her here Wednesday afternoon instead of Wednesday morning and I was able to volunteer at the school for a bit before heading to the airport to pick up Nonnie.
Thursday got here and
E&C, Rowan and Grandma got in. We were able to meet them for them to
grab some dinner at Chick Fil A by the airport and pass off some things that
would be useful for their stay. Leah got to hang out with Rowan and play
with her for a bit. They headed to their rental downtown by the hospital
and I headed to the airport to get the Fabulous Julie (my awesome photographer
who has been at every surrogate birth) as she flew in from Little Rock.
From the airport we went to dinner at one of my favorite places, Lazy
Dogs. After we were done there, I ran home, showered and grabbed some last
minute things for my bag. Then we were off to the airport again so that
we could go pick up the Crying Doula (Melissa) from New Orleans. This was
it… The crew was all here and I could stop being nervous about the stars not
aligning!
So off we went to the hospital to get this party started. We couldn’t
start any medication until after midnight since I wouldn’t technically be 39
weeks until midnight. As we were getting checked in, we learned that the
rental house that the guys had rented smelled strongly of cigarette smoke and
they would not be comfortable bringing a newborn baby home to this (who would
be?) so they called base lodging and were able to secure a TLF apartment type
home on base which was closer to us. They had to move all of their stuff
and a toddler in the middle of the night to a location that was 25 minutes away
-- and not convenient to the hospital but it sure would make milk pickups/drop
offs postpartum more convenient. Also, when we checked in, we learned
that children were not allowed on the L&D side due to COVID 19 so Leah, who
wanted to be present for the birth, now would not be able to come up to be
there which was a major bummer.
As we were getting started with the prep, I had two nurses attempt to place a single IV and it took 5 sticks to get it done. Eventually the last place they could get it was on the hand which I definitely did not want since it is not a comfortable spot to have an IV for an extended amount of time - they really dug around trying to get these IVs in and one of the nurses (the charge nurse) was not my favorite. 2 weeks later, I still have some terrible bruising from the attempts. Melissa and Julie set up the room for me getting me comfortable and settling in for the long haul. Julie snapped some last belly bump photos and caught some great shots around the room then went back to my house really late to tuck herself into bed for a few hours of sleep before the labor got started!
Eventually (around 1230am) the nurse came in to place the cervadil. I had to lay in bed for at least an hour before getting up to use the bathroom. Around 0130, I got up to use the bathroom and the string of the cervadil fell in the toilet. I called the nurse in to ask if that was okay and charge nurse told me to tuck it back up in - literally - she said it was fine and to just tuck it out of the way…. There was 6 inches that were not in the correct placement. I asked if that was sanitary and she just told me to tuck it back in. My fantastic nurse (Jordin) was in a delivery and so I did what the charge nurse said. An hour later, the midwife came in and was appalled that the nurse had told me to leave it in and she replaced it -- so the 12 hours from the start of this medication to the finish had to restart. At 0430, the midwife came back in and said I needed to get some sleep -- I knew this more than anyone, but it just wasn’t happening so she offered me a melatonin. I finally fell asleep at 0515 and was awake at 0615. I feel like this was an incredibly long and unexciting night. I felt even worse for Melissa who was there with me, but not having a baby so its very unexciting for her -- especially sleeping on a terrible couch bed for the hour we were able to rest.
Morning came and with it came breakfast and a new midwife. I loved the midwife overnight and the two that came on during the day. I just knew I would be delivering with them so I was excited as one of the reasons I scheduled induction for the day I did was because the midwife Mary was on. She had a student midwife learning alongside her and Nicole was pretty fantastic too. The plan was to start pitocin once the cervadil had been in place for 12 hours -- so it was decided that we would use the first cervadil time instead of the second to get things started. As the morning wore on, people began to show up to cheer this baby on out of me.
I have two cousins in the area and they came to keep us company and to crack me up all day. There was talks of dance offs to keep me entertained They brought the makings for margaritas -- after all, we would be having a baby by dinner and celebrating with drinks before we knew it. Around 3, the dads showed up, my husband showed up around 5pm on Friday… now we were just waiting and waiting and waiting.
At about 3pm, pitocin was finally started. The labor and delivery deck was insane and we were just all waiting for something to happen. I started getting contractions but they weren’t really painful. At around 6pm, my water was broken. Nice clear fluid. But my cervix wasn’t making big changes but I expected this. I was about 3cm (still!) but now I was about 70% effaced and the baby was -1 rather than the -3 she had been in labor the whole time.
After a bit of time, the contractions started to get more painful. I decided to get in the large bathtub in the bathroom and labor there for a bit. The water felt really lovely -- but when I got in and sat down, there was no non-slip mat in the bottom of the tub and I just about went under the water. I had 2 IVs in at this point (one for the pitocin and one was a just in case port if I hemorrhaged and needed blood post birth). I was able to keep my head and IVs above water barely but the tub was too long for me to sit in and the bottom was too slick for me to sit up in so I wasn’t able to stay there long. By the time I got out of the tub, the contractions were coming on pretty strong and I was shaking like I was hitting transition. We got the nitrous oxide set up and I used that for a while with some relief but still, the contractions were really painful. During this time, I started to feel like I needed to have a bowel movement. I kept trying over and over again on the toilet knowing that I would have an audience for the birth and that was the last thing I wanted -- to poop during labor. I know it is normal, but no one wants to be that laboring woman.
All of my previous births, I would go from not changing to changing very rapidly in a short period of time. I thought this would be the same. At 8:30pm, they checked my cervix again. I was about 4cm, 70% effaced and -1. The student midwife was the one that checked me and the new midwife that came on for the night was in the room sitting across from me. The staff midwife said to me “Your contractions are really wimpy so we are going to keep turning the pitocin up because you won’t have a baby with your contraction pattern.” I just about lost my shit. Wimpy? I was working hard. She was looking at a monitor that only monitors the frequency of contractions -- not how strong they are. And can we look at the laboring woman and determine the strength of contractions or the labor pattern from how she is reacting? The rest of the time I was in labor, I kept saying to myself how wimpy these contractions were. If I was having pain for these wimpy contractions, I would not be laboring without pain medications because I knew it was just going to get worse.
I was in so much pain from these wimpy contractions, I felt a bit defeated -- a while later, I opted for the epidural. I have done pitocin induced labors with and without epidurals, but this time, it was something I needed. They checked me just before the epidural was placed and I was 5cm at 9:28pm. The epidural was placed and the anesthesiologist was really fantastic. He got it done quickly and we were chatting the whole time -- he is actually from Grand Rapids MI and often visited Grand Haven where my grandmother lived. I did get a zing feeling on the right side and knew that this would be a one sided epidural. When I rolled back over, it sure enough was on my right side but I felt all of the pain still on my left side. I started feeling pretty extreme pressure in my bottom as soon as I laid back down. They checked me again and I was 8cm, 90% and -1 in just 12 minutes from the last time I was checked.
At this point, most of the crew was in the family waiting room just kind of giving me space and quiet since labor had gotten intense. But when I was checked, they set up the room for delivery and everyone came back in … and we waited and waited and waited. And everyone watched me. And just like that… labor stalled. Everyone waited around for about an hour and a half then went back out to the waiting room. I don’t know if it was me being watched or the epidural but I am not sure if I have ever felt so defeated in my life? I wonder how the labor path would have changed if the midwife didn’t tell me how wimpy I was being - Would I have pushed through it and continued to labor feeling like a rockstar? As always, hindsight is 20/20. I got the epidural and I felt relief. I knew that 3 of my other labors out of 5, the same exact thing happened. Asked for the epidural then had a baby less than 30 minutes later.
Not long after this, little Miss started having decels during contractions. She would recover very quickly, but the midwives weren’t thrilled to see it so they opted to put an internal heart monitor to watch her more closely. Eventually they actually had to do a second one because the first one wasn’t picking up well. I was laying on this side and that side and her heart rate was still dropping. Then to make sure my contractions were being efficient, they put an internal contraction strength monitor in as well. I had every bell and whistle done.
As the night progressed, baby was looking more increasingly serious and the OB who was supervising the floor started getting antsy. She kept telling my nurse she was not liking what she saw on the monitor and even cesarean started getting thrown around. My nurse Jordin just did not want to see a mom who had delivered 5 times vaginally, taken back for a cesarean and she was pleading with them to give me more time and was trying other positions. I started running a low grade fever. Around 1am, she came in and sat me in the throne position and also started an amnio infusion to give the baby more fluids to make a bit more of a buffer between her and my uterus. She said she thought it was a cord issue -- that maybe the cord was between her head and the uterus or that she thought it was getting crimped during the contractions. Her heart rate would go from 150s to 80 for the one minute of contractions then go right back up. Even though I was being cared for by the midwives, the OBs can call the shots on a cesarean on that floor. For hours, I sat in a quiet room in the throne position because that is what baby girl liked -- for me to sit straight up - it made her heart rate stable during contractions so that is what we did for her. Julie and Melissa grabbed a nap in the room in the chair and on the couch and I was sitting up completely straight afraid I would fall out of the bed, so no nap for me. I took advantage of this time to catch up with my friend Amy who was halfway around the world in UAE. Knowing that it was the middle of the day there, I was able to text with her when everyone else was catching a cat nap. (Support comes in so many forms and I would be amiss to not recognize her importance to this story!)
At around 2am, the midwife came in to check me again and to put oxygen on me since baby was not looking great - the last time they had checked was when I got my epidural so it had been about 4.5 hours. When they first checked, I was still an 8. Feeling defeated yet again. This was more than just a single battle, I know. But hours later and not making any progress. Baby’s heart rate went down and wasn’t recovering quickly so they checked again just minutes later and I was 9.5cm with just a little anterior lip left. Suddenly she wanted me to push but I was in the most uncomfortable position - lying crooked, not feeling like I was right in the bend of the bed. Apparently my phone was under me the whole time (She made a snide comment to me about it when we found it there later). It was just all so weird and I was not prepared. She was constantly stretching my perineum and I don’t know… it just didn’t feel right. Not to mention, I could feel everything except the hard contractions in my belly (which was a good thing). By this point, everyone was back in the room and we were getting ready to have a baby…
Or so we thought. I knew I needed to have a bowel movement (Remember me saying I overshare?) and I didn’t want a hundred witnesses to it (really it was just 9 of my closest family members and friends but who is counting?). I just wasn’t pushing because I was afraid I would push out poop. Yes it is natural, no I did not want a whole room of people to see that. I pushed weakly for about 15 minutes and the midwife sat me back up and told me to labor down again. Again, I felt defeated - for previous births, I had pushed for about 5 minutes and had each baby quickly. This time, I had a whole room of people waiting to meet this girl, and I just wasn’t doing it - I was tired. I was hazy. And I developed this really awful itch all over my body from the epidural. I was destroying my skin. And I felt bad for all of the people who had been by my side for 24 hours or more.
Two hours later, they checked me again and I was complete and she was much lower. It was time to push again and the student midwife gloved up and was ready to catch this girl. The senior midwife pulled her aside while I was pushing with no direction and said “There are too many cooks in the kitchen and you need to step to the side” and I was so mad at her…. I wanted the student midwife to deliver. Afterall, she had stayed after her day shift to deliver us… she had been a breath of fresh air this entire time. And never mind the fact that I was over here trying to push while the midwife was discussing who was in charge. I also like to use a pulling method on a towel or a rebozo when I am pushing to push effectively -- but there was no one there on that side. Again, it just all felt wrong.
Midwife comes back and I am
still pushing - but holding back. I knew this baby wasn’t going to get out
pushing like that but -- so many people in the room. All of these people
were so lovely during the labor but I have had 5 babies and never pooped during
delivery, but now, with an audience, I knew it was going to happen. And
it did. For me to get this baby out, poop was coming too and I felt so
GROSS. I was mortified. Dad is planning to catch the baby - midwife
isn’t keeping it covered. I could cry thinking about this honestly.
Mortified doesn’t even begin to touch how I felt. But you know, the baby
came out and that is what nature wants to happen, even if you have to get the
sh*t out of the way for that to happen.
Once I started pushing like I should, she was here very quickly. I felt
it all - her descend and each body part as it passed through my body. Her
papa caught her and helped place her on my chest. When she came out, she
was an almost grayish purple color. Not crying. Laying
still.
Baby cry. Please cry.
They rubbed her vigorously, cut her cord quickly and took her to the warmer to check on her… and she cried… she was good. She came out with a true knot in her cord -- causing all of the dips during labor. True knots in cords can absolutely be fatal for the baby and there is nothing at all you can do to prevent it from happening. They happen in just one out of every two thousand births! Just the week before birth, she had flipped breech -- she had done this several times causing that knot in her cord. Her APGARs were 6 and 9. I believe we were just minutes from a cesarean at the time of delivery.
After getting a good checkover, the dads were able to have skin to skin time with her while I awaited the delivery of my placenta which seemed like it would NEVER come. The midwife told the nurse to cut off everything and that I wasn’t hemorrhaging so we didn’t need any medication and the nurse did so. Ten minutes went by. Fifteen. Twenty. Twenty Five. Then they called in the OB because they were nervous they may have to take me to the OR to remove it… Right before the OB walked in, they realized the pitocin was off and turned it back on and I delivered the placenta finally. I was starting to get nervous. I was already nervous about hemorrhaging since it was my 6th delivery. But whew, crisis averted! After the placenta was delivered, they noticed that it too was special in a statistical way. It was a three lobed placenta - also known as a succenturiate lobed placenta. This happens more frequently in mothers who are advanced maternal age and those who have conceived via IVF. This happens in about 1-2 out of 2,000 births as well! So we had all sorts of rare things! Complications that can happen with this placental abnormality usually don’t impact the health of the baby - instead they can appear after the birth if the entire lobe is not delivered or there are vessel ruptures causing heavier than normal bleeding for the birthing woman.
After a thorough check out
rendering everything below intact (No stitches needed, not even minor
swelling!), I was able to sit up and place my eyes on the beautiful Mackenzie
Elise. She was born at 0416 in the morning and was 7lbs5oz. Though it
seemed like the labor was 3 weeks long, I was actually only in labor for just
over 13 hours from the time pitocin was started. (Probably could have been a
bit sooner if I let my own fears go). By 0630, we were all moved over to
the mother/baby unit. Melissa & I bunked together and Mackenzie and
her dads were in the room next door. They brought her over to nurse every
2.5-3 hours and she was a great nurser.
The next day we were all released and we had to take Julie and Melissa back to
the airport the day I was released. It was really hard to see them
leave. I felt like I didn’t even get to just be with my friends since it
was such a busy weekend since they arrived. I was so thankful for their
support though -- especially in those quiet moments. The guys had to hang
a bit longer at the hospital because although Mackenzie was a great nurser, she
was struggling to transition to a bottle and was dribbling milk out while
trying to eat from the bottle.
I honestly have struggled with the postpartum transition period this time. The lack of local friends and support have been so noticable. At my last duty station, friends came over and dropped off meals and just generally checked on me. My husband didn’t take any time off. It was back to normal when Nonnie left at just 2.5 days after I got home from the hospital. Take care of kids. Make meals. Pump 9 times a day (Around the clock). I really struggled with how I was feeling about just being forgotten about. I realize I didn’t have a baby to take care of but that didn’t change that I had just delivered a baby and physically, I was not 100%. I started worrying about whether or not I was going to struggle with Postpartum Depression. I didn’t, but I was worried. I was crying from feeling overwhelmed and under supported. I was arguing with my husband. Just overall, I was exhausted and I felt like I had very little people in my corner, on my side.
But now, as I write this (nearly 4 weeks after birth -- I write a little here and a little there), I am emotionally and physically well. I am still tired from pumping every 3 hours around the clock (including twice at night). To add to it, this COVID 19 doom and gloom, it has been so hard on me. I alienated myself towards the end of pregnancy because I felt so bad. I was looking forward to getting out, seeing friends. I have also looked forward to our trip to UK/Ireland in July (Unsure if that is happening anymore sadly). I had some post pregnancy complications as well. Just 2 days after being released, I started having high blood pressure and bad swelling continued. When it got to just one foot/leg, I had to go to the ER and get it checked out to make sure I didn’t have a clot. Fortunately, I just had a random pocket of fluid in my ankle and eventually the high blood pressure resolved on its own after making me feel crummy for about a week. At three weeks postpartum, I developed a bad bladder infection also making me feel terrible. The pain from that was incredible.
I have also noticed a decrease in my output compared to past journeys. This makes me sad but you know, it is what it is. Here at 4 weeks postpartum, I am producing about 52-54 ounces per day. That is huge compared to many, but not as high as I have produced in the past with the same amount of work and effort put forward. I spend about 5-6 hours a day pumping and about 1-2 hours a day storing milk and washing/sanitizing bottles. This is definitely a labor of love. To date, Mackenzie has received 525 oz of milk and I have another 370 in the freezer to ship to her. I drive it to the airport in a styrofoam cooler and ship it to the airport closest to her dads.
Speaking of the dads, I text with them several times a week. They seem to be getting into the swing of things back home. When they left, they had to leave pretty abruptly due to the COVID travel restrictions heating up and I didn’t even have a chance to say bye to them or the girls. Fortunately, when I ask for photos, they always send me a ton!
I also want to take a second and be grateful for how everything turned out. First, both Mackenzie and I are healthy. We had a good and safe delivery (even though it was a bit different than I anticipated). The dads were both here for delivery, so were my fabulous cousins, Crying doula (there were some crying doula moments!), Julie, and Kurt. So it was really good. I have seen so much heartache with surrogates (and other pregnant friends) throughout this corona virus pandemic. We were able to birth how we wanted (with the exception of my own daughter not being there) with as many people as we wanted. I have seen stories of parents from China still unable to meet their babies born months ago. I have seen stories about parents being from inside of the US but meeting their baby curbside when it is released and not being allowed in the hospital with their newborns. I have had friends deliver with no support person. This is hard. This is so heavy. We are so lucky how things happened and played out. Finally, I want to mention that even though the midwife wasn’t who I would have chosen for my birth for various reasons, I do think she was competent and an excellent midwife. She just wasn’t the one that I WANTED for the birth though I am glad she was patient with me and Mackenzie and we were able to birth vaginally.
I often get asked “Is this the last surrogacy?” Maybe. I said I would never call it until after the delivery was over and we were both safe. No one has told me it is unsafe to carry another one. I will probably never do another one at high altitude as this was my hardest pregnancy. Short answer is that I am unsure if I will do this again. Yes I felt bad this pregnancy, but nothing was seriously wrong with me rendering me unable to do it again. If the right couple comes along after we move from Colorado, maybe I will do just one more. Until then, I will be pumping for Mackenzie until we can get her enough milk to get her to a year! And if I don’t do another journey, I will consider ending that chapter of my life on such a high note with having such a wonderful experience with the guys and having brought three beautiful girls into this world as a surrogate.
Without further ado, here is the birth story video. I know everyone always
looks forward to these!
