It’s been 11 days since our sweet Maren was born, and what a
crazy world she was born into. We’ve been in survival mode in a lot of ways
ever since, but I didn’t want too much time to pass before sitting down to
write her birth story. These are often my favorite posts to read from others,
and I also want to be able to reflect back on how she came into the world.
Monday, March 9th was supposed to be my first day
of maternity leave at 38 weeks pregnant. My company had just recently
implemented a policy to allow leave to begin 2 weeks preceding an expectant mother’s
due date. The plan was for me to send the boys to school, business as usual, in
hopes that I’d have some extra time to clean, organize, and maybe even treat myself
to a pedicure before the arrival of our baby girl. That is, of course, until August’s classroom
had a Flu A positive classmate in his preschool classroom the Friday before my
leave began. Plans changed. I decided to keep the boys home with me to prevent potential
exposure to them (and in turn, me) in the coming days. I got nothing on my list
done that first Monday off, but we did fill our day with walks, shopping,
eating lunch out together, and lots of playing. I had a regular OB visit
that afternoon that I had to drag the boys along to (always an experience), but had very little progress
from my previous check: I was still about 1cm dilated with baby sitting super
low. My OB decided to strip my membranes and told me that there was no way I’d
make it to 40 weeks, but estimated that I’d deliver closer to 39. I felt some super
mild cramping that night, but then crickets.
my last belly picture at 38 weeks pregnant
Tuesday, March 10th I took
the boys swimming at a community recreation center. We swam for over 2 hours,
my huge belly along for the ride. I got lots of questions on when I was due and
pats on the back for braving a swimming pool with two wild and crazy boys when I
was so close to having a baby. The rest of the day was normal as can be and we
made plans for another special day with mama at home the following day. I went to bed without
Matt that night, who stayed up late working and finishing notes. He finally
came upstairs at 12:30am, and I sat up and realized that my water had broken. Total
shock. My water had never broken on its own with Oskar or August, so it was
uncharted territory. My OB had told me to expect to deliver quickly, and since
I was Group B strep positive I needed to get on an antibiotic drip as soon as
possible to prevent exposure to the baby. I had a bag packed, for the most
part, and furiously threw in the remaining items on my list with shaking hands.
My mom sped over to spend the night with the boys, and off we raced to Magee Hospital.
Triage Selfie
The OB checked me once we were roomed and noted I had
progressed to 4cm. The plan was to start Pitocin around 7:00am once I had made
it through bag one of two of penicillin. Still no meaningful contractions on my
own. Matt snoozed off and on but I was wide awake, too nervous to fall asleep. Time
seemed to stand still, but baby was healthy on the monitors, so I tried to be
patient and wait for morning to come.
Finally, at 7am, the nurses came and started the lowest dose
of Pitocin and it was game on. The contractions came almost right away and
intensified so much that by 8am I was having a hard time talking or breathing through them and asked for an epidural. I had initially wanted an attending physician to perform my epidural (the only thing that I really
cared about since it directly affected my spine—I was fine with residents for
all other aspects of my delivery), but as it turns out, no attendings were
available for the foreseeable future. A resident came in at 8:30am and offered
to place the epidural himself, and by that point I was miserable enough to take
any relief I could get. The placement was seamless, but shortly thereafter my
blood pressure plummeted to 80/60 and I felt lightheaded and panicked, with my
blood pressure monitor sounding an alarm every time a reading was taken. After
about a half an hour anesthesia was paged and phenylephrine was shot into my IV, which
did the trick of bringing my blood pressure back up to where it needed to be. After
that, I was able to relax a little bit and eventually fell into a light sleep.
At 10:30am I woke up to intense and grueling pressure, something my
epidural didn’t mask. I had gone from 4cm to a full 10 in under two hours. I
immediately called the nurse who checked me and told me that it was time to
have a baby. The OB was paged, the room was prepared. That moment of watching
the newborn bed getting readied is always absolutely surreal—the realization
that your baby will earth side, in that bed, in a matter of moments. The agony was real in those next handful of
minutes, and at 10:50am I started to push. I screamed and cried in pain, not
knowing how I could possibly go on. It only took three pushes, but it was
everything I had in me. And then there she was. Matt cut the cord and they put
her on my chest, and we couldn’t stop crying. She was so beautiful. She looked
right at me, through me, like she had known me forever, like we were meant to
be together all along.
She was 7lbs 1oz, and 19 1/4" long, with fuzzy dark hair and dark blue eyes. She's nursed and slept like a champ from the start. We knew she'd be Maren as soon as we learned that she was a girl--the name just always felt right. She has felt so special from the beginning, and our love for her is indescribable. She's perfect. There are no words for how grateful we are for her.
Her big brothers were wide eyed with wonder meeting her in the hospital and their faces are something I'll never forget. We got discharged in the nick of time, right as the coronavirus started to rapidly spread and pose a significant threat. I never could have imagined being quarantined at home with three kids for two full weeks (and many more to come), but somehow, we've survived. And our love for this sister baby has grown every single day. The world has turned into a scary place, but I'm thankful for the laughter and light within these 4 walls and the newborn that we're all soaking up together.
Her big brothers were wide eyed with wonder meeting her in the hospital and their faces are something I'll never forget. We got discharged in the nick of time, right as the coronavirus started to rapidly spread and pose a significant threat. I never could have imagined being quarantined at home with three kids for two full weeks (and many more to come), but somehow, we've survived. And our love for this sister baby has grown every single day. The world has turned into a scary place, but I'm thankful for the laughter and light within these 4 walls and the newborn that we're all soaking up together.
Welcome to the world, Maren Josefine, the most beautiful rainbow babe and the happiest ending--and new beginning--to our story.
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