Little Lucas: My VBAC Birth Story

My beautiful baby boy was born yesterday, February 20, 2013, at 12:58 pm, faster than I even had time to prepare for! Everything went so well and I feel so incredibly blessed! This will be a long post because obviously it was a very important moment for me :) and the fact that I was able to successfully VBAC meant a lot to me too.

My due date was the 21st. My doctor's policy is not to let VBAC patients go past their due date, so I was scheduled for an induction at 6:00 am Friday morning. At my appointment last Wednesday, I was dilated to 2 cm and 50% effaced. I was excited that my body was doing something on its own! Every day, I waited and wondered if I was advancing, or if the random pain and pressure I felt could possibly maybe be a contraction!

By the time Tuesday rolled around, and nothing had happened, I resigned myself to the fact that I would be induced Friday. So I got on the phone to let everyone know that Marcos would be arriving in the morning and to just plan on coming Friday as the most likely. We decided that Marcos's friend Josh would pick him up at the airport at 9:30, and then we would meet them for brunch/lunch. Then we'd go together to my appointment at 1:00. I was just hoping for a 3 cm or something.

Well, of course, you can't plan labor! All week I had been just waiting for it to happen, knowing I couldn't predict it. So when I finally made a plan, baby decided to throw a wrench in it!

I woke up at 4:00 am and after awhile realized that the pain I was having were, finally, this time, contractions! I decided to get up and do some packing just in case, and then try to time them. I thought they would slow down if it was only false labor. When I started timing them, they were 5-6 minutes apart and consistently 40 seconds long. I went to lie back down to see if they would slow down, and I had two 8 minutes apart. Then Leyla woke up and in that rush I had some that were only 2 minutes apart. So, they were kind of irregular, but always lasted 40 seconds. When Beth and Cliff woke up, we decided to go to the hospital because they weren't slowing down and my doctor had said to come in when they were 10 minutes apart.

We took one last picture...and headed out the door!

I thought my contractions were pretty intense, but they were irregular, and the first ones I felt so I didn't think I was very far along. I could still talk through them somewhat, too. When I got to the hospital and checked in close to 8:00, I was 3 cm and 80% effaced. Progress! Dr. Salter came in to discuss options - he had to go out of town that night and wouldn't be back until Thursday night (that's why the induction was scheduled for Friday). Of course I would go into labor the day he has to be out of town! He was not very happy because he didn't want to miss it. So he wanted to speed it up to make sure I had the baby by 4:00 pm because he had to fly out at 5:00. I was admitted and had some labs done so they could break my water. Something else kind of scary to think about: the nurse went to set up the OR just in case of an emergency.

Around 11:00, he checked me - I was 6 cm, 90% effaced, and at 0 station! He actually said, wow! So then he broke my water. I can't believe I dilated THAT quickly, and without pitocin. What's more, my contractions were not coming closer together and were still irregular in their intensity, although I felt them as more intense.

Then we started talking about epidurals. The plan was to go natural, but as I thought about it, I changed my mind. Marcos would arrive at the airport and come straight to the hospital, and I wanted to be able to greet him, talk, and be comfortable and enjoy the birth with him since it was happening so fast. Also if I had to have an emergency c-section, having the epidural in place already would make it easier. So we went for it. It took awhile to take effect and my blood pressure dropped, but then I was okay. She checked me again I think around noon, and I was 8.5!! They started setting up for delivery and called the doctor.

I thought, this is crazy, I'm about to have a baby. I just got here and I'm almost done. I had no time to process it!! I could not believe how fast it had happened.

I started pushing and they brought in a mirror so I could see his head and his/my progress. I pushed for I think 3 contractions. Then his heart rate went real low. They waited and decided to use a vacuum to help pull him out, and an episiotomy. I pushed with the next contraction and there was his head! He suctioned his airways and I pushed one more time, and he was born :) They immediately put him on my chest and then cleaned him up.

(I forgot about the oxygen mask on my head.... I guess I was kind of preoccupied!)

 It was incredible to watch him being born and to have Marcos right there, and to hold him immediately. It is a beautiful experience. He let out a cry immediately, it was sweet!

Jonathan Lucas
7 lbs, 12 oz

21 inches long

14 inch head circumference

Big boy!

 The "stars aligned" for me that day - I got everything I wanted and none of my worries came true. I had so many things in my head that couldn't happen or my risk of uterine rupture would increase: slow labor, failure to dilate, pitocin, high blood pressure, etc. NONE of that happened. God was right there, moving things along, doing everything possible to give me an amazing birth experience. I really feel blessed, loved, and supported - that God wanted it to be this way.

He has chubby fluffy legs :)

 Silly big sis :)

I had quite a bad tear since they had to get him out so quickly (his cord was wrapped once, as it turns out), and that is the only complaint I have. Otherwise it could not have gone better! I had the BEST doctor and the BEST nurses and the BEST care, it was so great, and such a different experience, and I am so grateful for everyone who helped me and was there for me.

He came out looking JUST like his ultrasound pictures. And the first thing we both said was, wow he looks just like Leyla did! His hair is a bit darker, I think, and he has more of it - although she had a head of hair, too! He is more than a pound heavier and 2 inches longer too. She is so proud of him and loves to hold him and kiss him, too.

We love our little boy!!

39 Weeks & Making Progress!

I was SO excited to hear my doctor today say, "Two centimeters dilated and about 50% effaced - and I can feel the baby's head!"

Music to my ears!

He seemed to be confused at first, so I thought he was going to say, "Well you're starting to dilate...wait, no, not really" or something of the sort. So when he said 2 cm I thought, was the confusion between 1-2 or 2-3?? Either way, I'm happy! Last week I had no changes so I can safely say that in one week I have dilated to 2 and started effacing. I wonder if that's considered quick or not? I know a lot of women who stay at 2 for 2-3 weeks so I'm not exactly expecting to go into labor tomorrow, but I am still excited that my body has started the process naturally. Even if I have to be partially induced in the end, being already somewhat dilated gives me a better chance of success (unlike with Leyla, being 0% effaced and 0 cm dilated, induced, and ending in c-section). My blood pressure was also still low, at 110/70.

I keep thanking God that everything is going so smoothly so far :) I have been waiting for something to happen and to be told I won't be able to VBAC and will need an immediate c-section, or something. But so far I feel really good and confident that God is supporting me and has put such great people in my life who support me too. I feel extremely blessed and excited that I just might be able to do this!

These ultrasound pictures look just like Leyla's! And he has chubby cheeks and fat lips! He apparently weighs 7 lbs, 12 oz already and his head - although still big - is no longer ahead of schedule. I'm happy about that! Can't wait to meet him.

Science Museum

Boy am I on a roll with posting! This is like my 3rd post in a week, I think.

First we started the day off with homemade biscuits, sausage, and boiled eggs. Leyla loves to help bake so that was something fun we did together.

Then I took Leyla to the Perot Science Museum here in Dallas. It was in the low-60s today so I thought an indoor activity would be a good idea. I looked up several places like discovery museums, jump and plays, parks, go-karts - before deciding just to go to the science museum. There was a neat jump and play place but the open jump for toddlers is only on Wednesdays and Thursdays so that wasn't going to work for today.

Luckily, I learned from Chuck-e-Cheese and wrote down step by step directions to find the museum. And I only got lost for about 15 minutes, when I hit downtown. But I didn't have to call anyone or ask for directions and found my way to the right place...haha.

 The top floor of the museum was a dinosaur exhibit. She enjoyed seeing the bones and recognized a few from one of her kiddy TV shows, but the mammoth scared her! It had huge tusks and there was a stuffed bison beside it too that I think she thought was real. But she was fine really after we looked at it together.

She thought it was cool to sit in the dinosaur footprint.
Each floor had a different exhibit but for her age it was a little too much reading and explaining and in-depth. Plus I wanted to walk through quickly since I knew we'd be there awhile and we had 4 floors to get through! On the geology level though, she liked looking at the pretty crystals in the caves AND we got to experience a fake earthquake - she laughed at that when she couldn't stay standing!

 So we headed down to the lower level to the Children's Museum. They had a river-dam station where the kids could play in the water with boats and cups to measure and pour.

 Then there was a farmer's market where you could "unload" the truck with the groceries and stock the produce in the store. And of course buy and sell the groceries. Leyla just hoarded all the baskets.

 There was a construction site where you could build with these foam blocks, transport them on conveyor belts, crawl through tunnels and go down slides, etc.

 THEN she realized there was a sandbox outside. I am so lucky I have a child that doesn't like feeling dirty! She chose to sit at the table and build a castle instead of sitting in the actual sandbox. One kid was sitting there covering herself with sand...and another throwing it in his hair....ugh.

 It was getting close to 4:00 by then so I started getting Leyla ready to leave - we headed back upstairs one last time because another mom told me there were some interactive exhibits I had missed. They had an exhibit where you could build a robot, play with kinex, remote control cars, and other mechanical things.

 They had a little music studio too, so we played the drums!

All in all it was a good day and I think money well spent - she enjoyed it and got to do some new things. We were there from around 12:30 to 4:30! And of course she fell asleep in the car. I really want her to get to do some fun things while we are here, explore places she can't in Honduras (like the zoo and the museum). Hopefully it'll be warm enough later this week that we can go to the park and feed the ducks at the pond. And if I don't go into labor soon, we may get a chance to go to the aquarium too.

I was secretly hoping all the walking at the museum would bring on some contractions....but nothing yet. :)

Mommy-Daughter Date Night

Saturday night, Beth and Cliff had an elder's dinner/meeting so I decided the best way to keep Leyla from driving us all crazy, getting in the middle of things and making a mess, was to have a date night! I really wanted to go to Chili's and get a chocolate cake so I found one close by we could go to. Then I looked up restaurants in the area just to see and found out there was a Chuck-e-Cheese's! I really wasn't in the mood for pizza and figured it wouldn't be the best quality but I thought it would be something really fun for Leyla. So I decided to go to Chili's first for dinner and then to Chuck-e-Cheese's to play.

Dinner was great and Leyla helped me eat the chocolate cake - she wouldn't let me take a picture of her eating it though. So here she is drinking her milk.

She was pretty good during dinner and the food came amazingly fast so that helped!

Now here's where the "fun" started. I had looked up the Chuck-e-Cheese but I didn't really pay attention to the address. I knew it was on N Central Expressway around McDermott. **Note to self: READ the step by step directions!** The Chili's was on McDermott, by hwy 75. So I got back onto McDermott and drove until I hit what looked like an expressway and looked around for a Chuck-e-Cheese! The problem is, it was already dark, and drizzling. I really couldn't see and not being familiar with the area, couldn't drive and look at the same time! I had driven and driven and didn't see one anywhere. So I finally decided to call my mom and she looked it up on her computer. I knew I was at McDermott and (what I thought was) the expressway, so I just needed her to point me in the right direction. 

Well. Her map says it's only 6 miles from Beth's house. I didn't know for sure but I KNEW I had driven way more than 6 miles. I was so confused. I realized the "expressway" was some other highway - but I couldn't see to read the signs so I had missed that. And, in this part of the country, all the roads are split by the highways and run one way next to them and you have to do a million u-turns to get in the right direction. So, I had pulled over by this point, and then got back on the road and did a u-turn to go back the direction I had came.

And suddenly I am in the middle of nowhere. Taking a u-turn should put you going the opposite direction, right?!? Not so apparently! I had no idea where I was and I was NOT going back the direction I had come. I was so tired and upset at this point because it was getting late, I was wasting all my gas, Leyla had been so good and was patiently waiting to play, and then fell asleep. And I just wanted her to get to have fun and believe me that I really was trying to find this place for her to play!

So after being really frustrated - Mom AND me - we finally figured out roughly where I was and which direction I was going and I was able to get back to some roads I knew. Then Mom tells me that it looks like the N. Central Expressway runs parallel and right next to Hwy 75. This is where the story gets good. The "expressway" is the stupid FRONTAGE RD FOR 75! So guess what. The Chuck-E-Cheese was on the frontage road literally a quarter of a mile around the corner from the Chili's I had eaten dinner at an hour before, on McDermott. And it took me an hour to get there...

I woke poor Leyla up and decided she was GOING to play, ha, if I had to drag her in there. No really, I knew she would wake up as soon as she saw all the games and toys and kids (she did). I figured, we didn't really waste her playing time, because she could only play for as long as I had money. So the only thing wasted was gas and it was already past her bedtime. But she still had fun.

 The games for toddlers didn't involve many tickets and were really only rides like this one. I took her over to the basketball and bowling games and she had fun but couldn't throw the ball hard enough to score. So I turned it into a watch-mommy-and-pull-out-the-tickets game. Every time I scored a ticket would pop out and she would exclaim, "Mommy, look, ANOTHER ONE!!" :)

 It cost $10 for 40 tokens and we ended up with 150 tickets that she turned in for prizes - she chose a ring, a toy rubix cube, and a blue crazy straw. Those were her picks. I'm glad she had fun even though it took us an hour to find it. She even told me, "Mommy, you found it!" What an adventure....

Here she is playing on the playground today at the park, after church. It was really nice out and we were both able to get some exercise, walking around the pond, chasing the ducks, and swinging :)

Oh, and baby still doesn't seem to want to make an appearance. Stubborn boy.

Two weeks to go!

Well I am 38 weeks pregnant now and had an appointment a couple days ago that was a tad depressing. No changes. Not dilated, at all, yet. I have been a little concerned though because I keep "measuring small" even though they go on and on about the baby having a big head and being big. So I had to have another ultrasound to check his measurements. At 38 weeks I should have measured 38 cm but was only 33. Odd. But according to the ultrasound he is still on target and is now 7 pounds, 2 ounces. He gained an ounce. I however gained 2 pounds, ha. I'm okay with that though - I'd rather him not gain much more. Still it's odd that I would measure so small, and I don't feel like my stomach looks any bigger than a few weeks ago, and definitely not as straight out as Leyla was. They said it may just be his position, or that he is all curled up in a ball. He still moves plenty. Yesterday right at my belly button I had this very strange tiny round pointy thing pop-up. It was so strange and freaked me out because that's normally where his butt is!! The only thing I can figure out is it may have been a heel. Although I'm not sure why it was at my belly button - unless he has dropped lower and his butt is now lower so his feet are lower. He's just a strange little thing...I can't figure him out! I don't have that bowling ball feeling yet but Beth said she thought I did look a little lower. Who knows!!

 Here is Leyla and a couple kids from church in a 60's corvette :) Some friends of Beth and Cliff's brought it to church to show off - apparently he had been working on it for a few years. Pretty nice!

 We had home-made chicken pot pie one night and Leyla got to help Beth roll out some of the dough. She made heart "cookies" with her dough, then we made the pie. I caught her eating the leftover part of her dough, though! You can probably guess that after that she didn't eat much supper, ha.

 

 Here's my cutie-pie on the rocking horse in the bedroom. She puts a hat on herself and the horse and says she's a cowboy!