The best laid plans :-p

Two things before I start off on the birth story this time. One, thanks to all those who left their wishes on Sunny's birth. Things have been so hectic around here that its been difficult to even leave a comment and I'm sorry for that. But right now, we are adjusting to a whole new routine and you know that takes time :). Secondly, as I said this is the birth story, so those who don't want to read the "gory" details, please leave now, or you know you'll regret it later ;-) :-p. Also, all of the definitions in Snugli's birth story hold good for this post as well. So please feel free to refer to that anytime :-p.

They say, the second time things will be much faster. They say that the delivery usually happens a lot earlier than the first time. They say the contractions become frequent, regular and painful sooner. They say you won't have time to get to the hospital, so you better leave early and so on and so forth. But well, "they" were all wrong in my case. 39 weeks and I wasn't even having proper contractions - they were still in the Braxton-Hicks mode. They were in no way painful (and believe me, I'm glad about that :-p), but things weren't progressing as I expected them to. I had felt heavy throughout this pregnancy so was expecting the baby to appear sooner and nothing was happening. I was already out of patience..

On May 20th, I had an appointment with my gynec, in which I was told that she was worried about my weight and she was thinking that the baby might be on the heavy side. I was told to get an ultrasound weight measurement and warned of the possibility that the baby may be heavier than 10 pounds. If so, then we'd have to seriously consider a C-section. I wasn't really worried about the so-called surgery (though I did run a scenario in my mind where I'd be wheeled to the operation theatre and holding Sri's hand, would say to him "Agar mujhe kuch hogaya toh khudka aur humaare bachchon ka khayaal rakhna" :-D) but C-section has several consequences - breastfeeding is tougher, recovery takes time and all that, so was a bit worried about that. But obviously we would follow the gynec's advice, 'cause thats what ensured the safety of the little one.

Well, the Ultrasound was scheduled on Wednesday, May 25th and the day came. We couldn't really make out anything in the pics as such as the baby was grown, but at the end of it, we were told that the baby was measuring 9 pounds and 7 ounces. There was a 10% margin of error and we were hoping that it'd be on the lower side ;-). My gynec suggested that since there'd be a weekly growth of half a pound for the baby, there was simply no point in waiting (as the 10 pound threshold would be crossed) and the best thing would be induction. The induction had some risks of suddenly becoming a C-section, but since we were looking at the same thing if we waited, it wasn't really a risk as such :-\. So it was decided that I'd get admitted to the hospital the next night and they'd start the induction process. The initial procedure would take the night and in the morning, the process would speeden up and the baby was expected to be born at around May 27th afternoon.

The next day, May 26th, everything went according to plan, meaning nothing happened for me to rush to the hospital ;-) :-D, so we went and got admitted in the hospital at around 8 PM in the night. I had told Snugli several times about how I had to go to the hospital and stay for a while there, but wasn't sure how she'd take to both me and Sri being missing for hours together. So I asked him to go back home with her and keep her bedtime schedule as normal as possible (meaning wait till she falls asleep) and then come back to the hospital. I had also asked my parents to sleep in our room, so that they can keep an eye on her. So once everyone left, the nurse asked me a 100 questions about medical history (as usual) and placed the baby heartbeat and the contraction monitoring devices on my abdomen. She also set up an IV in my arm. Since my cervix hadn't dilated to even 1 cm, the first process would be cervical ripening.

Cervical ripening refers to the softening of the cervix into a dilated opening. The agent they used in my case is called Cytotec which is inserted vaginally to start the ripening. After 3 hours, I was checked again (this time the cervix was about 1.5 cm) and administered a second dose. I was hardly able to sleep since the baby was moving all the time and the nurses kept coming in to change the position of the baby heartbeat monitor :-p. At about 3:45 AM, the actual contractions started - they were not very painful, but just enough to wake me and keep me awake. At 6 AM in the morning, the next stage of induction started. The nurse added Pitocin to my IV to kick off the contractions in full mode. And mad, did they! In about half an hour, the contractions had speedened up and by 7 AM I was screaming at the top of my lungs for the epidural :-D. I can grin at it now, but the pain was crazy, it felt worse than the time I had Snugli, but seriously I don't even remember enough to compare.

The nurse checked my cervix and it had dilated to about 5 cm by then. Epidural, as I have said in the earlier birth story, takes its own sweet time :-p. Since epidural lowers the blood pressure of the mom, the mom is first given fluids through the IV and only then the epidural is administered. So yeah, I was screaming for another hour before I was given the damn thing. The good part is that my water broke somewhere within that hour, so that water-breaking part was avoided. All this time, Sri was holding my hand and trying to encourage me to breathe. Half the time, I was crying because of the pain and he'd ask me to stop crying since it'd make me lose my breathing pattern. I think, at one point I literally shouted at him that I couldn't help but cry and that he could shut it :-D. At the end of the hour, I called the nurseline and shouted for the anesthesiologist. Thankfully he was on his way and what seemed like many contractions later, I was sitting up and the epidural needle was finally piercing my back into my spinal chord. Man, I can still taste that relief. Later I told my mom that she was great for going through 2 deliveries without epidural and "nanna doDDa namaskaara" to all such women ("my big salutation" :-D). I have to marvel at the pain-suffering capability of women and am glad to have born in this world which has epidural :-p.

Anyways, after epidural, it was bliss for 2 hours in which time my parents, Darsh and Snugli came to the hospital to see how I was. Dad, Snugli and Darsh soon left to wait at the waiting area which even had a play area for Snugli. Then the nurse came in, checked me and declared that I had dilated to 10 cm. She called my gynec for the labour and got everything else ready. Soon, my gynec was there and I was pushing with all my strength (which I had to gather again and again). After several of these pushes, nothing happened :-\. The baby's heartbeat was falling and I was given an oxygen mask to breathe through and ease that. 2 more pushes later, still the baby wasn't making an appearance, so the doc decided to perform an episiotomy and pull the baby out with the help of a vacuum. And so, Sunny came into this world on May 27th 2011 at 11:22 AM EST.

I was crying again, mainly because of relief and the baby was again placed on my belly and Sri was asked to cut the umbilical cord. Sunny was taken to the warmer and checked for the apgar. The baby weighed 10 pounds and 7 ounces! Baap re! I don't even know how they got her out! I was told that they would be checking her sugar levels since bigger babies usually have lower sugar levels. But she was fine :). Her pediatrician later said that she was surprised to have been brought into this world suddenly so there were some problems with her breathing patterns but everything else was fine. She even has a small bump on her head thanks to the vacuum, but the doc says that'll soon be alright.

This time, we had the camera with us, so were able to take photos once my family joined us :).




Here's Sri with the newborn..




Me with my 2 darlings :).




Here's Snugli with Sunny :).







And here are my parents:




And there's Darsh who was really afraid to hold the minutes-old baby, but soon was behaving like a pro :-D.




And here's the 3-day old Sunny :).




So what else has happened in the past 2 weeks?

1) I have realized that a few more things you never forget once you learn how to do them (other than swimming) are swaddling and diaper changing :-p. Or Maybe you should ask me when I am a grandmom :-D.

2) Unlike Snugli, Sunny didn't have a jaundice problem. She did have high bilirubin levels in the hospital and we were asked to go to the pediatrician for a follow-up, but the levels, thankfully, remained low. But I do have a major rant. Usually babies lose weight for a while after they are born until the mom's milk starts. And the particular pediatrician we saw raised concern about it and insisted that either I have to pump and supplement her or feed her extra formula. I remember the same guy doing the same thing for Snugli too (he must be the organization's formula marketing fellow :-p). Sometimes even though you know its not necessary, you have to follow what the doctor says. So I pumped, 2 times, when I faced the engorgement monster. Man, I was so mad at that stupid doctor. I must have cursed that man a 100 times :-D >:-). I stopped pumping after that and never gave Sunny any formula. Next day when we went for the follow-up checkup, she had actually gained weight (we saw another doc, had we seen the same doc, I'd have given him a piece of my mind grrrrrr).

3) Snugli absolutely loves little Sunny. She wants to hold her and carry her and what not. Sadly, during the first week, Snugli had a bout of cough and cold and we had to keep her away. But now that she's alright, whenever she sees Sunny, she shouts "Saani" and cleans her hands with a sanitizer (her dad's insistent rule :-D), then runs to her side to hug and kiss her :). She is curious about everything - the diaper changing where she insists on helping (God save us :-D), the swaddling and even the feeding (much to my discomfort :-D). On the flip side, her behaviour with us has turned to a worse phase. She doesn't listen to anything we say, doesn't obey a bit and usually listens only when we threaten her with spankings. She was pretty okay during the 2 days we were away at the hospital, though she asked for me whenever she got up at nights. But after that, she has been quite unbearable. Some of it might be due to her grandparents' pampering ;-) :-D, and some might be because she didn't go to school for the first week, but the rest of it, the pediatrician says, might be just to get attention (he says "if not good attention, then bad attention" :-D). Hopefully things should be back on track soon.

Thats about it for now, I still have loads to write - want to write about Sunny's thottilushaastra, and about the baaNanthana thats going on (have been wanting to write about that since Snugli was born, better late than never :-p) and many more things. But don't really know when I'll get the time to post, sigh :-\.

Pain and Pleasure :)

Before I start off on what I consider the biggest rant of my life, let me thank all the people who have left best wishes for Snuggles and me. Thanks a lot and sorry for not replying. Exhaustion is only one of the things that I can quote as a reason ;-).

Secondly, yes, the name Snigdha was my choice. One, I like the name very much. Two, I wanted the baby's name to have both Sri's and my first letters in it :). Later Sri came to like it too. We were told it'd be a girl, but since I have always wanted a girl, I thought it'd be better not to trust it and later be kinda disappointed (only kinda :-D) if the baby turned out otherwise. So we had a name ready for a boy as well :).

Thirdly, my duty, the disclaimer :).

"If thou thinketh that any lengthy explicit description of the labour and delivery pains is gross, then thou have been warned. O ye of the faint heart, thou shall avoid this post and if thou shall want, view only the pictures in this post."

Now all the single men should have stopped reading the post :-D. But if you are a guy and you are single and still sticking to the post, then kudos to you. You are probably a guy like Sri :).

It all started 9 months ago. Wait, don't run, I'm only kidding :-D. But before we set out on the arduous journey, some definitions for the clueless (in which category I too belonged not too long ago)..

1) u·ter·us

A hollow muscular organ located in the pelvic cavity of female mammals in which the fertilized egg implants and develops. Also called womb.

2) con·trac·tion

The change in a muscle by which it becomes thickened and shortened.

3) cer·vix

The constricted lower end of the uterus.

4) di·la·tion

The action of stretching or enlarging an organ or part of the body.

5) in·duc·tion

The inducing of labor, whereby labor is initiated artificially with drugs such as oxytocin.

6) ep·i·du·ral

Anesthesia produced by the injection of an anesthetic into the lumbar area of the spine in the space between the spinal cord and the dura, which eliminates sensation from the point of insertion downward, used esp. in childbirth.

7) wat.er break.ing

The breaking of the membranes containing the foetus and amniotic fluid, usually followed by the first stage of birth: labour.

8) pi·to·cin

A synthetically created form of the naturally occurring hormone oxytocin, which causes uterine contractions.

9) la·bour

The physical effort and periodic uterine contractions of childbirth.

10) de·liv·er·y

The event of giving birth.

11) e·pi·si·ot·o·my

An incision into the perineum and vagina to allow sufficient clearance for birth.

12) pla·cen·ta

The organ in most mammals, formed in the lining of the uterus by the union of the uterine mucous membrane with the membranes of the fetus, that provides for the nourishment of the fetus and the elimination of its waste products.

13) umbilical cord

A cord or funicle connecting the embryo or fetus with the placenta of the mother and transporting nourishment from the mother and wastes from the fetus.

14) ap·gar

A test to evaluate health of newborns, scoring 2 points each for appearance, pulse, grimace, activity and respiration.

I know I know! That was almost a medical dictionary. That done with, lets start off with last friday the 14th Dec 2007, when I thought all was well with the world and that contractions were simply painless tightenings of the uterus. I had an appointment with my doc. Everything was good, except that my cervix had already dilated to 3 cm (10cm means birth), but since my water hadn't broken yet, I could either wait for one more week or immediately get labour induced. Since I had just completed 39 weeks, I chose to wait for another week, well, which sorta became my downfall ;-).

That night my troubles started. I started having painful contractions of about 30 sec each, only they weren't regular (they ranged anything from 7 to 20 min). Unlike India, where you can get admitted as soon as the pains start, here in US, there are a certain number of conditions for you to even go to the hospital. The contractions have to be regular (within 5-6 min), or the water should break or there should be bright red blood (which might mean some placenta trouble) or if there is no noticeable kicking (which might indicate fetal distress). So literally I was stuck between the devil and deep blue sea. I couldn't go to the hospital, and the pain would go down only to come back in a matter of hours (changing the position is supposed to reduce false labour).

This went on until Tuesday the 18th Dec 2007 evening 4 PM when the contractions suddenly started becoming regular falling about 10 min apart. Sri called up the doc (this was when we discovered my doc wouldn't be on call that day, instead there'd be another I'd met only once earlier) only to be told to come to hospital once I hit the 5-6 min gap. Another 2 hours and I had reached the 5-6 min contraction range. We (Sri, mom, dad and I) headed out to the hospital at 6:30 PM. Thanks to the details in the childbirth classes, we were able to get registered pretty quickly and I was taken into a delivery room very soon.

Here I was told that my cervix had already dilated to 5 cm and everything was great. Still the contractions were pure torture. Each time one hit, I'd search for Sri's hand and grasp it tightly (sometimes I'd hold mom's or dad's hand too), while he'd look me in the eye and encourage me to take long breaths. I had heard about the pain, but its nothing like you'd imagine. Its like for about 30 to 45 seconds the world stops and the only thing you are aware of is the pain and nothing else. Naturally you tend to hold your breath, but you have to force yourself to breathe. You want to cry out but there's simply neither the breath nor the strength to manage that! Well, I should have managed to scare away the single women and the married-women-with-no-children-yet away by now. So remaining mommies, lets continue :).

As I said in my earlier post, I wanted an epidural. I didn't want to sacrifice myself to pain just for a natural birth (that is a fad here :-p). It poses some risks to the mom but it doesn't have any effects on the baby. But asking for an epidural doesn't mean getting one immediately. Epidural is said to lower the blood pressure of the mom. So what they do is give some fluids for the mom and then the epidural. So I was stuck with an IV and my blood was taken for some lab reports (to make sure I can adjust to the epidural). Meanwhile, my contractions and the baby's heartbeat were being constantly watched on monitors through belts tied to my stomach. And so the painful contractions went on for another 2 hours like this. I was 7 cm dilated when finally the lab reports came back and they decided that it was time for the epidural. An anaesthetist came in and after cleaning a part of my back, stuck the needle into my spinal cord and attached the epidural supply. This part was ok and it feels like a tingle in the spine :). That over with, my legs soon turned numb. There was a tingling sensation all over my lower body, I could feel everything, just not the pain. Precisely the way I wanted it :).

By this time, my water should have broken. But the labour seemed to be going nowhere. So the doc decided that he wanted to break my water (not painful, its just to get labour going). And that was that. But after a few minutes, the nurse (who was really wonderful and a great help all throughout) returned to tell me that my contractions had slowed down and they couldn't really allow that to happen as the labour might stop. And so they wanted to add Pitocin to my IV for the contractions to speeden up. And so they did. God, I think they covered everything in my baby's delivery :). By this time, it was around 11 PM in the night and I was hoping the delivery would cross 12 AM, just so that it'd be Dec 19th in India as well as US :-D.

Soon it did and I started feeling a lot of pressure in my pelvic region. The nurse said that the baby's head was in the pelvic region and it was time to push. Now pushing was not really painful thanks to the epidural, but it did take lots of effort. The nurse and Sri were the ones continuously encouraging me to push. All the while, Sri held my hand and was really a wonderful support. The baby was a bit big, so the head wouldn't come out despite several of these "pushes". Thats when the doc decided to perform episiotomy and so Snuggles came out into this world, at 12:56 AM on Dec 19th 2007.

It sounds cliched, but suddenly I was crying (obviously not due to the pain but due to seeing the baby), the baby was squalling and Sri was smiling at me with this broad grin on his face. Snuggles was placed on my belly and Sri was asked to cut the umbilical cord. Immediately after, Snuggles was taken to a warmer kept in the room to be checked for apgar while the doc did the placenta delivery and stitched me up. She scored 9/10!!

Till the epidural was doing its job (which was only for an hour after the delivery), everything was fine. After that, there were constant aches and pains all over my lower body but well, thats another story :).

Well, I forgot the camera in our hurry to the hospital. Sri got it in the morning and so thats when we started taking the first few photos of our baby. Here's one I call "The ecstatic, the tired and the superbaby" :-D.





It was really wonderful to see Sri hold the baby like a pro :).





And lastly here's Snuggles all bundled up with her maternal grandparents :).




Lessons learnt so far:

1) My respect for motherhood and mothers have increased by a million times! I mean, I love and respect my mom, but I never knew until now what she went through to get me and Darsh into this world! And she didn't even have epidural then. I was even a large baby, which made her misery all the more worse. Even when friends had babies, my reaction was "Awww thats sweet, how are you?", but I never thought beyond that. Only a woman who has delivered a child knows how it is. So mommies, you rock!

2) An epidural is a heaven-sent thing.

“I'm not interested in being Wonder Woman in the delivery room. Give me drugs.” - Madonna.

There is no point in suffering through all that pain when you dont have to and thats the bottomline!

3) An episiotomy is no joke. Yeah I knew there'd be a tear and stitches involved, but when it comes to pain in an area you use to eliminate wastes from your body regularly, its reality is something else.

4) Whoever said breast-feeding is romantic ought to have his head checked. Or maybe I should hunt and shoot him down. I say "him" because I'm certain any woman who has suffered through it would never term it as romantic. Its plain self-inflicted torture atleast in its initial phase. The only satisfaction is that your baby is getting a stomach full of food and thats about it.

5) Expect the unexpected and you'll be alright. We were discharged from hospital in just 2 days. The next day we had a pediatrician check-up in which we were told that the baby's jaundice levels had increased (the bilirubin levels were 18 and it shouldn't cross 20) and that the baby had to be admitted to the hospital again for phototherapy. I sorta broke down. I thought everything was going well, and suddenly there was this obstacle. But we had to consider the baby's health first, so we got admitted and we were discharged again after a day (the bilirubin levels dropped to 12). Though the incident did teach me to be prepared for unexpected circumstances, this is something I have to constantly keep working on..

6) Despite everything I have said in this post and more, it really does feel wonderful to have the baby in my arms. I don't have a sense of motherhood or immense responsibility but my feelings are more like a little girl's who has been given a wonderful new toy to play with ;-). And I was wayy wrong in my poem on baby blues, a baby is the beginning rather than end to more woes, but now standing at one week after I have delivered, I know that its all worth it. I know I'd do it all over again if given a choice and I somehow know that I can manage everything that comes my way :). Well so far all I have managed is the less sleep + constant feeding + changing diapers, but feels like an achievement nevertheless :).

And as for the guy who wanted to know women and asked this question:

How often do you think about sex?

Are you mad?? ##@$$#&!!!

:-D.