February 28th found Dustin and I getting up bright and early (I was up at 3:30am) to get all checked in to the hospital, monitored and ready for a C-section at 7:30. Dax spent the night with Gigi and Papa since we had to be out the door so early.
Once at the hospital the nurses got us all checked in and put me on the monitor. Very fun to hear our baby's heartbeat one more time on the inside. I thought I was having contractions, not regular or anything but enough to register--- not really. Apparently baby girl was just pushing around so much that it felt like a contraction to me. So weird! The next couple of hours were pretty slow, started my IV, and I got a super lovely catheter (extreme sarcasm). The catheter caused me to kind of go into shock, drop my blood pressure and almost pass out. NOT the best experience first thing in the morning, especially before major surgery. My nerves were going a bit crazy.
Took a fantastically cold wheelchair ride to the OR and we got to hang out in the recovery room for a little bit while they finished getting the operating room ready to rock. We had THE BEST nurse with us for the day- her name is Melissa and she really, truly was AWESOME! She also knows Dustin-- which became a theme of our stay. Everyone knows Dustin. ;)
I got to go in the OR by myself and Dustin waited with Melissa for me to get my spinal block and finish getting prepped for surgery. I didn't realize how nervous I was for the spinal until I was 'alone' in the OR. I really wasn't alone, I had a very sweet nurse that was just focused on me and my own doctor was in there. He has a very calming way about him BUT neither of them were Dustin and I had kind of hoped he might be in there with me-- was pretty sure he wouldn't be but ya know. The anesthesiologist was very nice. Dustin and I told him ahead of time about what happened with the epidural when we had Dax (I jumped at the first prick and then he ended up hitting bone) and I think he talked me through it a little more because of that ( or it's just what he does). I remember curling up around the pillow, holding my nurses hand- and apologizing if I squeezed too hard- and closing my eyes. It took him a bit to get it placed which then had me starting to tear up a bit. My sweet doctor was right there though and put his face really close to mine and whispered things like "you're doing great" "you're so strong" "almost done" All reassuring phrases which did help. Once I felt a tingle in my leg, they laid me down to get the medicine to start moving in the right direction. This started a long process of pricking me to find out how numb I was. It took a LONG time for the medication to move up high enough to be considered 'good to go' AND THEN my anxiety and blood pressure got the best of me and I felt very light headed and nauseous again. It didn't last long but just long enough to freak me out. I remember the anesthesiologist saying " you feel anxious don't you" and then my doctor chiming in "she has an anxiety issue" Like he was saying SHUT UP you're going to make it worse. ;)
Once everything was ready to go, Dustin got to come in. This was when I REALLY realized how much I needed him. As soon as he held my hand, I started crying. Just the relief that I wasn't alone and that he was there to take care of us. I grabbed onto his thumb mostly and just held on until the end of surgery.
In a C-section, Mom basically just feels a long of tugging, pulling and pressure. The doesn't sound SO bad, right? It's horrible. Pain would have been much worse, of course, but this was not pleasant at all. I much preferred my exhausted, slightly drugged state of mind I experienced when going through all of this with Dax. With Ellie, I was wide awake the entire time and very aware of what was going on. Don't get me wrong, I wouldn't trade it for being put to sleep and missing out on my baby's first cries but just not fun. I kept my eyes closed for most of the procedure, I don't know why I do that but when I get freaked out I definitely close my eyes and try to be 'somewhere else.' Dustin was so sweet during all of this, he rubbed my hand, my whole arm and shoulder when I really started to get upset and kept trying to make me laugh. Just like with Dax;s birth, he was all I needed.
I remember hearing one of the nurses saying, "there's the head, a full head of hair too" and then hearing a LOT of suctioning. All of sudden this butt comes over the curtain at us and another doctor asked Dustin what we had. I think he was a little bit surprised to have this baby coming at us over the curtain and announced that we had a girl. I cried. Relieved that she was here and shocked that she was a girl.
This is when a mini roller coaster started. I had been told ahead of time that the new procedure at the hospital was that they'd clean baby up and bring her over immediately to me to hold. This didn't happen. Our sweet little girl was in respiratory distress. Basically, she had a lot of fluid in her lungs and belly when she was born (all the suctioning I heard) and she didn't adjust very quickly to life on the outside. She couldn't hold her oxygen levels up at acceptable levels without help. We have a family friend, Terri, who is one of the respiratory specialists at the hospital and I remember thinking, after Dustin told me she was there, that I was so thankful that the baby wasn't by herself and was with someone we knew. So silly because Ellie wasn't ever alone and she was actually in the same room we were in. Terri tried a lot of different tricks to get our sweet girl to cry but they didn't really work. She just didn't really care to take really deep breaths. I wasn't SUPER concerned until our doctor mentioned that if Ellie's stats didn't come up he'd have to think about calling people 'down south,' meaning Spokane.
So our little love got her first chest Xray in the first hour of life and some serious monitoring. Her stats started coming up once they took her out of the OR and into the recovery room to get some extra attention and her Xray. I hadn't seen her yet because of all of this and Dustin hadn't gotten to get any closer to her either. That was hard. It was hard to know that neither of us had touched her and she was struggling.
About this time I was all done and got to go into the recovery room where she was. I remember very clearly being wheeled in and being SHOCKED at how much hair she has and how little she was. (we always forget that they start out tiny, right?) The chest Xray came back and our doctor came in and reported that it looked clear- maybe a touch of fluid but nothing that should be affecting her stats like it had. This was when they decided to put her on my chest and see how she did. I love that when she was cuddled up with me, her oxygen levels climbed into the 90's. This was when she really started to stabilize but they were still floating the idea of giving her a nasal cannula just to give her a little extra help. Thankfully, we didn't even have to do that. Sweet little girl maintained her oxygen level and temperature and we just had to be tethered to the oxygen level monitor for a few hours (they turned it off that evening and then took the little probe off her hand in the middle of the night).
I remember being in the recovery room and saying that she needed a name. I was not a fan of the fact that she was struggling and didn't have a name OR that we started referring to her as a "lazy girl" because she wouldn't take those big deep breaths. Lazy was her first nickname. She's is this absolutely precious and completely beautiful little girl being called "lazy."
We got up to the hospital room and I got my phone out as soon as possible to start a name search. Nothing seemed to fit. I'd think "oh that's a pretty name" then look at her and shoot it down myself. I threw a couple of names out at Dustin but he didn't like either of them. Dustin had our lazy, sleeping girl tucked in his arms and said "What about Ellie?" It fit. It was that simple. Put his daughter in his arms and her name came to him. I was so relieved and so grateful that he named our little girl. So grateful she had a name.
And so started two more days in the hospital with lots of cuddling and love. Our sweet Ellie is so very laid back, sweet and fits perfectly with our family. She has a wild full head of black hair and her Daddy's chin. She looks a lot like Dax did but definitely has her own features. We are all madly in love and adjusting well to our new addition.
God is good and I think gave us a slightly rough start to remind us to appreciate life and not take a minute with our kids for granted. They really have our hearts in their hands.
