Ellie's Birth Story

 The Birth Story of Ellie Madelyn Falgout

I knew that I wanted kids close in age and felt like 2 years apart would be pretty ideal so we were thrilled when we found out that we were pregnant and due the first week of December.  My brother Albert and I are two years apart in age and growing up it was great to always have him as a friend and playmate.  So I knew that was what I wanted for my children

Overall my pregnancy with Ellie felt more difficult than it had when I was pregnant with Payton.  I guess being pregnant and chasing around a 1 1/2 year old wasn’t as easy as I thought it might be.  During my second trimester I started experiencing occasional painful contractions.  Since I had never felt a single contraction until after my water broke and I was placed on Pitocin during my previous pregnancy, this was quite a change for me.  I had one day during my second trimester where I was in so much pain that eventually I went to labor and delivery to be checked out.  Thankfully I wasn’t dilated or showing any other signs of pre-term labor so my OB just assured me that some people have painful contractions off and on throughout their pregnancy.  There was also a concern late in my pregnancy that my platelet levels were dropping and should they drop too low I might not be able to have a spinal during my c-section (meaning they would have to put me under general anesthesia instead).  Thankfully they never dropped low enough to be an issue.  All ultrasounds found Ellie to be healthy except that her kidneys were enlarged.  This is something that is still being monitored with Ellie but thankfully it has not seemed to negatively affect her health. 

At 36 ½ weeks pregnant I had an appointment with my OB who found that I was 3 cm dilated and having fairly regular contractions (though I could barely feel them).  My OB said I would likely have the baby pretty soon but since I wasn’t considered full term yet, that I needed to try to rest and keep the baby in as long as possible.  She told me if I didn’t go into labor before then, that I needed to come back to see her that Friday. 

By Friday morning my contractions had become fairly uncomfortable but not regular.  It felt like I was having bad stomach cramps.  My OB let me know that she would be out of town for a week starting the next day and she was pretty certain I wouldn’t make it further than a few days before having the baby.  She told me to go home and rest and if my labor progressed to go directly to labor and delivery.  I spent the weekend with fairly regular, uncomfortable contractions.  A few times I was nearly convinced I was going into active labor and kept debating if I should go to the hospital or not.  My parents came for the weekend in case I did go into active labor.  I guess all the rest stalled my labor because by Sunday evening my contractions had slowed and become less painful.

I had set up an appointment with a different OB (since my OB was on vacation) for that Tuesday.  That OB told me to time my contractions and if they ever got to be 5 minutes apart for an hour straight, that’s when I should go to labor and delivery. 

Charles had joked all along with me that our baby would probably arrive on Thanksgiving Day, just when we were about to sit down and enjoy our turkey and when the hospital would be running on a skeleton crew.  Early in my pregnancy I didn’t really think this would be the case since Thanksgiving was just over 2 weeks before my due date and I thought I might make it a little further along like I did with Payton.  But once I was in early labor I knew the baby would be coming sooner rather than later. 

Thanksgiving Day arrived and around 9:00 a.m. I started having the same kind of contractions I had had the previous weekend.  They were uncomfortable, somewhat painful and inconsistent.  We figured that if I rested they might go away as they had over the weekend.  As the morning progressed, so did my contractions.  But they were never very consistent.  I might have 3 right in a row and then 20 minutes would go by before the next contraction.  I started timing the contractions using an app on my iPhone and found on average they were occurring 12 minutes apart.  Around 1:00 p.m. I pretty much knew the baby would likely arrive in the next 24 hours.  But since I figured I was still hours away from giving birth, I decided to eat a small lunch.  We also made the decision to go ahead and cook our turkey.  It was a small turkey and would only take 3 hours to cook.  We then informed my mom that we did think there was a chance the baby would make her appearance soon.  She left the Thanksgiving meal that she was preparing for my dad, Kyle, and herself and hopped in her car to make the 4 hour drive to be with us.

Less than an hour later my contractions suddenly became much more close together and extremely painful.  I started timing them at 5 minutes apart and rated them as “extremely painful”.  We made the decision to turn off the oven, with our undercooked turkey left in it, and got Payton up from her nap to head to the hospital.  By the time I got checked into labor and delivery my contractions were about every 4 minutes.  I was checked and found to be 4 cm dilated.  I was told that an OB was being called and also that anesthesia would come and talk to me.  Anesthesia showed up first and asked when I had last eaten.  I told them I had eaten a small lunch at 1 p.m.  They told me that unless the OB deemed it in the better interest of my baby and I, that they would recommend I wait 8 hours after having eaten before having a c-section.  I said, “8 hours?!  Are you kidding!  Can I have an epidural in the meantime?”  They told me I could only have an epidural if I was going to try for a VBAC.  My doctor and I had already discussed the option of me trying for a VBAC and we both agreed that if I tried I would likely have the same results I had the last time—which was laboring for 32 hours and pushing for 3 hours only to not be able to fit the baby past my pelvic bone and the end result being a c-section.  There was no way I wanted to endure all of that again so I told them, “No, I’m not interested in trying for a VBAC.  I’m pretty sure this baby is as big as the last one and she’s not going to fit.”  I was offered narcotic pain killers but I had a really bad experience with them when I was in labor with Payton so I turned them down.  Instead I just suffered through my contractions and I could hear the nurses outside my door discussing how I needed to just be given a c-section sooner rather than later because of the amount of pain I was in.  I prayed when the OB showed up that he would agree with them.  My biggest concern was that Payton was in the room and could see the pain I was in.  During contractions I tried to turn away from her so she couldn’t see my pain and I tried my best not to yell out in pain.  I didn’t want to scare her and in between contractions I reassured her that I was okay.  She would occasionally say to me, “You okay Mama?” and I would tell her, “Yes Baby, I’m okay”.  Thankfully she didn’t seem upset by this and was mostly distracted by other things in the room.

My mom showed a little before 5:00 p.m. and was able to take Payton.  Right after she left the OB showed up and announced they would perform the c-section right then.  I was so relieved and so very thankful.  The timing couldn’t have been more perfect either because if my mom hadn’t gotten there in time, Charles would have had to stay with Payton in the waiting room because she wouldn’t have been allowed in the OR.  Instead he was able to be with me during the birth of our second daughter and Payton was able to go eat McDonalds with her grandmother for their Thanksgiving dinner. 

The c-section went well and Ellie Madelyn Falgout was born on November 22, 2012, at 5:28 p.m.   As soon as I heard my baby start crying, I was so extremely happy.  Charles said when they showed her to me I had the biggest smile on my face.  With Payton I was honestly too exhausted and out of it from medications to feel such immediate joy so this was a different experience.  I saw my baby’s little face and she looked just like her big sister did when she was a newborn.  Then they told me she was 8 pounds 1 ounce and I was surprised she was even bigger than Payton.  I know 8 pounds is an average sized baby but I’m a small person so to me that’s a big baby!  She was also a bit taller than Payton, measuring 19 ¾ inches.  I can’t imagine how big she would have been if she had stayed put the entire 40 weeks instead of being born at 37 weeks, 6 days.

I’m pretty sure my least favorite part of having a baby by c-section is that they take the baby away from you and the baby goes to the nursery while you go to recovery.  When I had Payton at Clear Lake Regional Hospital, they acted like it was a mistake that I had to wait 4 hours in recovery before seeing my baby again.  But, here I was at a different hospital (UTMB) and they told me it was policy that my baby would be kept in the nursery for 4 hours before being given to me.  During this time I was kept in recovery.  Just like with Payton, I had uncontrollable shaking that they told me was due to the morphine they put in my IV during the c-section.  I also was super itchy all over my body which was also from the morphine.  A couple hours after the c-section the numbing from the spinal tap wore off and I started to feel a lot of pain.  By the time they transferred me from recovery to a regular room, I was in intense pain.  I remember when they had to transfer me from the stretcher to the hospital bed and I just screamed in pain. 

I was crying and in so much pain, but then they brought Ellie to me and all the pain just left my mind.  I held her and she was so beautiful.  I put her to my chest to nurse her and she latched on right away and nursed like she’d been doing it for months already and knew exactly what to do.  I was so happy and yet remained in so much pain for days.  In the hospital I couldn’t sleep at all.  I had a problem with dehydration, I got where I couldn’t eat due to a bowel issue, and just like when I had Payton my blood pressure began to spike.  But the main problem was that I was just in so much more pain than I was when I had Payton and the pain killers did little to help.  Ellie, on the other hand, was born extremely healthy and had no problems whatsoever.  Which is the way I would want it!   If one of us has to have problems after the birth, I would much rather it be me than be my baby.

We could have gone home on Saturday, after just two days in the hospital, but I was in so much pain and couldn’t eat solid foods that they talked me into staying an extra night.  However on Sunday I was definitely ready to go home.  Unfortunately they couldn’t get a hold of the OB until later in the day so we didn’t actually get to leave until about 5:00 p.m. 

We arrived home to a house full of family and a meal of chicken noodle soup that my mom had prepared.  I was starving since it has been over 24 hours since I had eaten anything. Payton was so excited to have us home and to have all of our family over while Ellie, being a newborn, pretty much just slept through her “homecoming” celebration.

The next several days (and nights) were pretty miserable.  I was in so much pain that not only could I not lie down, but I couldn’t even recline.  My body would only allow me to sit up straight which caused me to have intense back and chest pains.  And because I couldn’t lie down and was in constant pain, I went days with pretty much no sleep.

Two days after being released from the hospital, Ellie had her first doctor’s appointment.  She wasn’t back up to her birth weight yet but they said she had grown an inch and that she was probably too busy growing to gain weight.  Otherwise everything looked great with her.  No jaundice or anything. 

Before Ellie’s appointment I had checked my blood pressure at home and knew it was too high.  At Ellie’s appointment I asked the nurse if she could take my blood pressure with her manual cuff.  She confirmed it was too high and advised I call my OB.  My OB office told me I needed to go back to the hospital to labor and delivery.  So, just like after I had Payton and ended up back in the hospital, I returned to UTMB.  Thankfully this time around my blood pressure issues didn’t seem to warrant the need for a Magnesium IV so after monitoring my blood pressure for a few hours, they sent me home and had me follow up with my OB the next morning.  My OB prescribed blood pressure medication and thankfully after a couple of weeks my blood pressure returned to normal on its own.

At my doctor’s appointment my OB mentioned that my incision looked like it might be starting to get infected.  Two days later I was again in excruciating pain due to an infection.  It was the weekend so I wasn’t able to see my OB but thankfully my dad was with us and was able to prescribe an antibiotic.  It took the entire full 10 day dose of the antibiotic for my incision to improve but thankfully after those 10 days it was no longer infected.

Ellie was the perfect newborn.  She slept the majority of the time and rarely kept her eyes open for long.  But she also woke up every 2-3 hours around the clock to nurse.  Sometimes it almost seemed like she must have had an alarm clock hidden in her crib because she never missed a nursing session, even in the dark of night.   She was such a good and efficient breast feeder which I was so thankful for because at times it was painful for me to sit in one position to feed her. 

About 2 weeks after Ellie was born I finally was able to lie down in bed.  It was such a relief but I was still in a lot of pain and taking pain medications around the clock.  I couldn’t believe how much more difficult this recovery was than my c-section recovery after having Payton.  About a month after Ellie was born I decided I might just survive after all.  Of course every single time I held her, even in those early painful days, I knew it was all completely worth it. 

My sweet Payton is in love with her baby sister.  She is constantly trying to help take care of her, giving her kisses, talking to her, etc.  She has not acted jealous on even one single occasion and when I tell her I can’t do something because I’m taking care of Ellie, she is understanding of that.  She is always saying sweet things to Ellie (in her cute little toddler voice) like, “Good morning, Sunshine!  You’re awake!” and “Don’t be a sad baby, be a happy baby”.  I definitely hope that the love they have for each other only continues to grow.

I love my sweet girls and could not be happier.  All the pain is such a small price to pay for my beautiful girls and all the love and joy they bring to our family.  

Ellie,

I love you with all of my heart and I am so very happy that I am your mother.  You have brought me such amazing joy from the very moment I lay eyes on you.  You are blessed with the sweetest big sister and I know you will be equally as sweet and loving.  You are so very loved and are an incredible blessing to our family.  You are the little “Sunshine” of our family and you make our world even brighter than it already was.  I thank God every day for you.  I love you very much.

Love,

Your Mommy