Labor and Delivery, as in my home for the past 3 days. Ugh. I had an appointment on Monday for a Non Stress Test which I wrote about in my last entry. On Tuesday I had an appointment at the office with my favorite Doctor, Dr. Wessman. My blood pressure was a little bit high and we kinda had the conversation about how its just time to induce. This baby has caused my body enough stress and its just time to be done with it. She told me that if anything was off on Wednesday morning when I had my next Non Stress Test she was just going to admit me and start the induction process. I went home and kinda talked myself in to it. I said to her, well now that you told me that I am going to be all anxious and my blood pressure will be higher. She winked at me and said, " I know!" Well, I showed up to my appointment on Wednesday and my levels were all fine. She came in and told me that everything looked okay and I could go home if I wanted to, or stay and be induced (which is what they were telling me for days). I said, I think its time, what do you think? Heather was with me and she agreed. Dr. Wessman agreed. So, I started the induction process.
Thankfully I got one of the bigger rooms that they have down here. I have a window THANKFULLY. The room is really nice, the nurses are wonderful. I started with the drugs (orally) on Wednesday at around 1. That was a pill that I took. They had to monitor me 1/2 hour before the pill and then 2 hours after. After that was up I was allowed to walk for 1/2 hour before putting me back on and repeating the process. That was 6 pills, so 18 hours. I finished that on Thursday morning around 5. After that I just hung out for a bit and my cervix was checked around 10 or so. I was 1 CM but still long and fairly thick. The next step was this ballooon (AKA Torture). Basically its a catheter with two balloons. Once of them goes inside your cervix and the other inside your vagina. They use a GIGANTIC speculum and insert them and inflate them with saline. I had to leave these in for 12 hours. I was able to be up and about quite a bit with some monitoring. The contractions got REALLY bad with this. They were strong and often. I think around 2 in the afternoon I ended up getting some pain medicine, nubane with some sort of muscle relaxer in my butt. That was almost instant relief! I ended up snoozing for a bit and felt much better after. They took the balloon out around 10 last night and I was still 1 cm dilated. Maybe a little bit more progression but not much.
The next step was cervadil which is a thick string that they stick in your cervix and wrap it around and it hangs out like a tampon string. That didnt bother me at first but this morning was VERY Burny. I woke up and told my nurse that my vagina felt really sore and stingy like I had had a LOT of sex the night before. She thought that was very funny. So, I pulled that out myself around 11 am. I was checked around 1:30 pm and my cervix had gotten shorter and softer but was still only 1 cm. So, the plan was to start pitocin. I started that around 2pm. Low dose of pitocin and just hung out all afternoon.
Tonight, my favorite, Dr. Wessman, came back on. She checked me around 7 after a few hours of pitocin and I she said that my cervix was very soft and a generous 2, maybe 3 cms. Her plan was to put the balloon back in and hope that it falls out, but otherwise to leave it in for 24 hours. If it falls out I will be 4-5 cms and if they have to take it out at 24 hours I believe the next step will be to break my water. So, hopefully baby will be here in 24 hours or so, but I guess it could be longer.
All I have to say about these past 3 days is Thankfully the doctors and nurses are amazing, thank goodness for sleeping pills, and I have had more people stare at/touch/put things in my vagina in the past couple of days than ever in my life. Send happy, healthy, well wishes to me and baby and hopefully in the next day or so I will have a birth announcement.
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