Thursday, August 28, 2014

The importance of kick counts!

There's so much you have to keep track of when you're pregnant. Doing kick counts is just another thing you need to track. I hated doing it. I was pretty much aware of when my baby moved so I didn't really focus on it like I did with my first 2 pregnancies.

Right before bed when I'm putting my youngest to sleep, the baby would start kicking and moving so much that it takes less than 1 minute for me to count 10 kicks. Pretty simple. It's pretty much the same every night.

The day my son was born... I was 34 weeks. The day before, he moved very little. I had more braxton hicks contraction than what was normal for me. During my nightly kick count, he didn't' move like all the other nights before. In fact, I couldn't remember if he moved at all during the day. Why didn't I remember? My 4 year has been sick. He was hospitalized for fevers of unknown origins. I took him to the clinic for a follow up appointment that day and was just so busy and my mind was somewhere else....

Back to that night. During dinner, the baby didn't move after my meal which is unusual. I tried juice, chocolate and water. Nothing. I showered and laid down during my normal bedtime (when he's most active) and nothing.

After talking to the advice nurse at Labor & Delivery from the hospital, I drove to the hospital at 10pm. I counted 9 braxton hicks during my drive there and they were starting to hurt. Is this real labor contractions?!?

They hooked me up to the monitor. Did ultrasounds of the baby. The baby is moving but not enough for me to feel it and it's not his "usual" moves. The amniotic fluid was good. They checked my cervix and I was not dialating after a couple of hours.

I thought they were going to let me go home after the 2nd cervix check but they came back and said that the doctors recommend I stay to be monitored. I agreed and was admitted.

They put oxytocin in my IV to make me have stronger contractions and my baby did not like that. After 12 minutes, he started moving all over the place. I later found out that meant he was stressed during the contraction and a C-Section was recommended. It turns out he also pooped. There was meconium when they got to him. He didn't cry and more than once they assured me that they didn't make him cry on purpose. I finally heard him cry from outside the OR room and I felt so relieved. I wanted to cry and for some reason I felt like I had to be strong... why? I have no idea. I can easily cry when Bolt saves Penny from the burning building (any Bolt fans?!) but this, I can't cry?!

So the point of all this? I'm glad that I called and went in to check on my baby. It's always better safe than sorry. That's why I visit the clinic a lot even if it's a cold! That's another story... haha

The rest of the labor story is here.

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