Haag Happenings: Rylan - A Birth Story

Caution... proceed at your own risk....

I'm documenting Rylan's birth so I don't forget some of the details (don't worry it's not too graphic)

Sunday, April 5, 2009 – 5pm started having moderate contractions every 15 minutes, only slept 1.5hrs all night, Logan and I stayed home from work, thought this was the day, contractions faded around 9am, went on a walk – contractions hard and 5 mins apart for about an hour then stopped all together

All week 5-10 hours of 10-15 min contractions during the day (and I was in all day meetings at work - miserable!)

Saturday, April 11 (38weeks 1 day) – 4pm started having harder contractions then I had been having all week, still 15 mins apart and 30-45 secs long, finished vacuuming house,

6:00 ordered pizza, took bath started needing to sit down during contractions,

6:20 finished 2 pieces of pizza, tell Logan we probably need to decide whether to call my parents to pick up Caiden,

6:30 tell Logan we definitely need to call my parents, Logan gives Caiden a bath and packs up,

7:30 my parents pick up Caiden, I have been laying down and focusing on relaxing through contractions for last 45 mins, contractions are consistently 5 mins apart,

7:40 leave for the hospital, contractions still 3-5 mins apart and 45 secs long getting hard to relax through them,

8:00 arrive at hospital, have a contraction walking in, again in the elevator, several more in triage. I can hardly lay down to be monitored, nurse decides I'm 6.5-7" dialated and actually in labor (duh!) The hospital calls Sharon (our midwife), I get in a wheelchair to go to a labor/delivery room, have several contractions in wheelchair, last contraction in wheelchair feels like I need to push. Logan and a nurse help me get in a bed. My body is definitely pushing now, I'm trying to hold back a bit because I feel like it's going too fast. The nurse says Sharon should arrive in 15 mins. I remember looking at clock, seeing 8:15 and thinking "I don't have 15 more mins!" My water breaks and nurse sees Rylan's head right behind, calls in on-call doc, her head comes out (no doc yet), next push her body comes out (doc barely arrives)...

Rylan Kenna is born at 8:18pm 5lbs 15 ozs, 19” long

Sharon arrives about 8:30 and after 30 more mins Logan cuts the cord

I got to hold and nurse Rylan for several hours before they weighed, measured and bathed her (measured 37.5 weeks gestationally) - what a huge and amazing difference from Caiden's birth!

Rylan doesn’t feed much through the night but does sleep a lot, she appears to have swallowed some fluid on the way out and has to have it drained next morning (around 9am), but once that's done she seems fine,

Sunday, April 11 (Easter) - 10am Caiden, my parents and sister, Laura, come to meet Rylan. Caiden is mostly uninterested in Rylan and very ancy (typical 19 month-old boy, I guess)