Mallory Quinn
After 41 weeks - a day before 42 weeks - Mallory Quinn was born. Her original due date was October 4, but instead she was born on October 10. Though I was frustrated that she was late and I had to be pregnant for longer, I think it's really cool that she was born on 10/10/10. I delivered at Mercy Folsom and couldn't be happier with the way that I was treated while there.
I had been dealing with inconsistent contractions a couple weeks prior to her arrival. They weren't painful enough to make me stop in my tracks, but they definitely didn't feel good. And each day they got more intense and more regular. My goal was to wait until I couldn't stand them any longer before we made the trip to the hospital because I really didn't want to have to get turned away a bunch of times. The night of Friday, October 8 I barely got any sleep because my contractions were so powerful. I didn't even need to time them because they were pretty much constant. When Jody woke up Saturday morning I told him that we would definitely be making a trip to the hospital sometime that day, but again I wanted to wait as long as I could stand the pain. I took a shower and got pretty because I knew it could be the last time I felt that way for a little while; and I wanted to make sure I looked good. We went for a walk, cleaned and organized some last minute things, dropped off our rental from Blockbuster, grabbed some lunch at Rubios, and then headed for the hospital. Jody and I both still laugh at how nonchalant we were about getting to the hospital; definitely not like the panicked scenes from the movies.
We checked in around 12:30pm and got set up in our room. When I was checked by the nurse I still was only 1.5cm but my blood pressure was high and my contractions were only two minutes apart so they wanted to keep me. Within two hours I had dilated to 3cm so they deemed me fit to stay until Mallory arrived. I called my mom and told her to hit the road to make sure she was at the hospital in time. An hour later I received my epidural and was relieved from the piercing pain. I don't know how people do it without one. When the doctor came in to check me a few hours later I was dilated to 6cm and cruising right along. Though she had initially told me that she expected I would be delivering Mallory no later than that night, it was now looking like she would be a 10/10/10 baby. Unfortunately this was when my labor started slowing down so they had to give me pitocin. Finally around 6:30am on Sunday morning I was ready to start pushing. By then I had been up for more than 30 hours and was so exhausted but I was determined to get her outta there. Almost five hours of pushing later the doctor concluded that we were going to have to explore other options of getting her out, especially since when they broke my water earlier there was meconium in it. My two options were vacuum and c-section. I really, really didn't want to have a c-section so we started with the vacuum option. Vacuum wasn't successful either so c-section it was. Of course I broke down and started crying. I had gone through 23 hours of labor and five hours of pushing for nothing. I felt so defeated. But I also realized that we needed to get her delivered safely and had run out of time.
My mom had to go to the waiting room with the rest of the family to wait, Jody was given his scrubs attire, and I was wheeled into the OR. Everything happened so quickly that I don't remember a whole lot, but I do remember feeling anxious. As soon as I heard her cry I too started crying. They didn't show her to me right away because the respiratory therapist had to get the meconium out of her lungs and make sure she was breathing okay. Before they took her back to our room to get cleaned up I got to see her and give her some kisses. She was beautiful and I couldn't wait to hold her. Once Jody left to go with Mallory I then was overcome with nausea. I got sick a couple of times while the doctors were putting me back together and was overcome with the shakes so badly that when I got back to my room where Jody and Mallory were I couldn't hold my little girl until it stopped an hour later. But once she was in my arms it felt like the world around me froze and all I could do was stare at her adoringly. All of the pain, exhaustion, and frustration was washed away. Finally the little girl that had been tumbling around in my tummy for all those weeks was real and it was awesome.
Mallory Quinn Jenkins was born October 10, 2010 at 11:51am, 7.7lbs, 19in. Welcome to the Jenkins family beautiful little girl. You will be loved and spoiled like crazy.
I had been dealing with inconsistent contractions a couple weeks prior to her arrival. They weren't painful enough to make me stop in my tracks, but they definitely didn't feel good. And each day they got more intense and more regular. My goal was to wait until I couldn't stand them any longer before we made the trip to the hospital because I really didn't want to have to get turned away a bunch of times. The night of Friday, October 8 I barely got any sleep because my contractions were so powerful. I didn't even need to time them because they were pretty much constant. When Jody woke up Saturday morning I told him that we would definitely be making a trip to the hospital sometime that day, but again I wanted to wait as long as I could stand the pain. I took a shower and got pretty because I knew it could be the last time I felt that way for a little while; and I wanted to make sure I looked good. We went for a walk, cleaned and organized some last minute things, dropped off our rental from Blockbuster, grabbed some lunch at Rubios, and then headed for the hospital. Jody and I both still laugh at how nonchalant we were about getting to the hospital; definitely not like the panicked scenes from the movies.
We checked in around 12:30pm and got set up in our room. When I was checked by the nurse I still was only 1.5cm but my blood pressure was high and my contractions were only two minutes apart so they wanted to keep me. Within two hours I had dilated to 3cm so they deemed me fit to stay until Mallory arrived. I called my mom and told her to hit the road to make sure she was at the hospital in time. An hour later I received my epidural and was relieved from the piercing pain. I don't know how people do it without one. When the doctor came in to check me a few hours later I was dilated to 6cm and cruising right along. Though she had initially told me that she expected I would be delivering Mallory no later than that night, it was now looking like she would be a 10/10/10 baby. Unfortunately this was when my labor started slowing down so they had to give me pitocin. Finally around 6:30am on Sunday morning I was ready to start pushing. By then I had been up for more than 30 hours and was so exhausted but I was determined to get her outta there. Almost five hours of pushing later the doctor concluded that we were going to have to explore other options of getting her out, especially since when they broke my water earlier there was meconium in it. My two options were vacuum and c-section. I really, really didn't want to have a c-section so we started with the vacuum option. Vacuum wasn't successful either so c-section it was. Of course I broke down and started crying. I had gone through 23 hours of labor and five hours of pushing for nothing. I felt so defeated. But I also realized that we needed to get her delivered safely and had run out of time.
My mom had to go to the waiting room with the rest of the family to wait, Jody was given his scrubs attire, and I was wheeled into the OR. Everything happened so quickly that I don't remember a whole lot, but I do remember feeling anxious. As soon as I heard her cry I too started crying. They didn't show her to me right away because the respiratory therapist had to get the meconium out of her lungs and make sure she was breathing okay. Before they took her back to our room to get cleaned up I got to see her and give her some kisses. She was beautiful and I couldn't wait to hold her. Once Jody left to go with Mallory I then was overcome with nausea. I got sick a couple of times while the doctors were putting me back together and was overcome with the shakes so badly that when I got back to my room where Jody and Mallory were I couldn't hold my little girl until it stopped an hour later. But once she was in my arms it felt like the world around me froze and all I could do was stare at her adoringly. All of the pain, exhaustion, and frustration was washed away. Finally the little girl that had been tumbling around in my tummy for all those weeks was real and it was awesome.
Mallory Quinn Jenkins was born October 10, 2010 at 11:51am, 7.7lbs, 19in. Welcome to the Jenkins family beautiful little girl. You will be loved and spoiled like crazy.
Now Jackie, I don't throw this comment out very much because I think most newborns have a face only a mother can love, but Mallory is a beautiful baby. She looks perfect. Sorry everything didn't go as you planned but glad you both made it through safe and sound. I REALLY tried to get a 10.10 baby but had to settle for 10.11. Hope you are healing OK, I'm fine unless I try to sit. Fun, fun.
ReplyDeleteI totally agree with the above comment!!! She is absolutely gorgeous!! Congrats on the amazing adventure of birth- You are hard core- doing all that pushing!! I love when people share their birth stories because each one is unique. The best part: you don't have to "do that" for a long time, now, and you can enjoy who all the hard work was (& is!) for - Congrats...xoxo
ReplyDeleteCONGRATS Jackie!!! I too went through a c-section although mine was scheduled so I def did not go through the exhaustion of labor that you did...you poor thing! Now the fun starts, enjoy every moment my dear it goes way to freakin fast! She is so beautiful...good job momma!
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