Several people have asked about Cohen's birth. Since Carson was a C-section due to his trying to come out butt first (breech) instead of head first - most people assumed I'd have to have another C-section with subsequent babies. But I really didn't want another C-section, at least not without at least the opportunity to try labor first. Unfortunately there were no hospitals at the time we got pregnant with Cohen that allowed VBACs (Vaginal Birth After C-section) in Monterey county (Natividad hospital in Salinas is now doing VBACs!), so we found a new doctor and birthing center in Santa Cruz that was allowing and supportive of VBAC patients. While the 30 minute trek back and forth to the doctor's office was not fun, especially when it came time for weekly appointments, it was totally worth it! Dr. Klikoff was wonderful and I honestly don't think we could have asked for a better experience than the one we had at Sutter Maternity Center.
Cohen was born 10 agonizing days after his due date of July 4th. I started having what the doctor terms "nonprogressing contractions" on Saturday night (July 11th) and we thought we would have a baby by Sunday midday. But despite having contractions that were 10 minutes apart and about a minute long, no such luck. Come morning, the contractions had lost strength and were only occurring about once every hour. But then they started up again Sunday night, again getting to be 10 minutes apart and about a minute long. Surely, this was it, and again we were disappointed at the end of a long night of working through contractions to have them stall out again. I had a doctor's appointment which included an ultrasound to check on amniotic fluid levels and a non-stress test. Baby and I passed the tests with no problem, and were sent home knowing I was dilated to about 3 cm and 90% effaced. Once again, the contractions regained strength Monday night. But we didn't get too excited this time, figuring it was likely just more of the same. Boy were we wrong! Within 30 minutes my contractions went from being 20 minutes apart to being just 2-3 minutes apart.
In a mad rush, on the only night of the last 2 weeks that we weren't ready for the big event, Chris packed up the car and we were off! It's a 45-60 minute drive to Santa Cruz and we were seriously concerned with how fast things seemed to be progressing. Chris did a great job of driving us safely to the hospital, denying my requests that he pass the people driving under the speed limit on the shoulder if necessary! (Laboring in a car is really not any fun. I don't recommend it.) We arrived at Sutter Maternity Center around 10pm on Monday night.
Despite concerns that the labor seemed off to a fast start, I was only dilated to a 4 at check-in. They got us to a room right away and we got to work with the contractions. After a couple hours of intense work though, I was exhausted (after already spending the last two nights up with contractions) and decided to get an epideral. I was dilated to a 5 and well into active labor when they gave me the epideral. But we were in for a long night. Labor progressed slowly and we had several moments of stress when Cohen's heart rate took a dive. We soon discovered that whenever I moved onto my right side, his heart rate would plummet. We assume that the umbilical cord was being crushed, so I had to lie on my left side for the remainder of the labor and was put on oxygen. This seemed to make the baby happy, for which we were all thankful. I have to say that I was really impressed with the staff at Sutter during these stressful moments. Sutter keeps a one-to-one ratio of nurses to patients in active labor, so I had a nurse by my bedside throughout the entire labor. Thus when Cohen's heart rate went down, there was an immediate response, which although scary, was also reassuring. 4 nurses and a doctor would be in the room within seconds, all ready to do whatever was needed to insure that baby and I were ok. They were awesome.
Despite the excitement, Chris managed to get a couple of hours sleep and I some rest during the night - definitely the upside to the epideral. But the doctor had some concerns when at 7am the next morning there was still no baby. We spent a long time discussing whether to give the baby and I a little more time (my water had broke during the night - so the clock was ticking so to speak), talked about the risks of using pitocin to try to pick things up (infant/mom death and brain damage - it was a serious discussion) and at what point we'd have to seriously discuss having a C-section. After this long conversation, the doctor decided to check my cervix. To everyone's joy and amazement I was dilated to a 9! We could have just skipped that whole pitocin discussion had she just checked me first!
So the we gave my body a little more time to dilate up to 10 cm and then started pushing. After about an hour of pushing - at 9:53am on Tuesday morning - Cohen made his way into this world! He was crying and alert and scored an 8 on the 5 minute APGAR test and a 9 on the 10 minute APGAR test. He lost a few points due to color and respiration because he had internalized some meconium that was present in the amniotic fluid (not uncommon, especially in post due date babies). We were able to have some immediate skin-to-skin contact while they cleaned him up - which was something we didn't get to have with Carson due to the C-sections - but they did have to take him to the nursery for a few minute to suction the meconium out of his lungs and stomach. But he was back before they had me stitched up and he was ready to eat!
Cohen is already a great eater. He has taken to breastfeeding very naturally and I am so very thankful for that! So far he has been pretty easy going, eating and napping regularly. He doesn't like sleeping on his back, but he's slowly getting better about it - it just takes time.
Carson is home now and seems relatively unimpressed with his new baby brother. It will be fun to see how their relationship evolves in the coming days and weeks. But it so wonderful to have all of my boys home. We're a family of four now! How cool is that!
Blog info:
Because there is just no way I can manage two separate blogs for the boys, I've started a new one for both of them: www.carsonandcohen.blogspot.com. Please check it out for the newest pictures and videos. I'll do my best to update it regularly! Facebook is also a great place to find out what we're up to.
And just a word about Sutter Maternity Center - we highly recommend it! The nursing staff was excellent. They were really good about helping us to sleep and working around our schedule instead of theirs (they even took Cohen a few times and walked the floor with him so that we could both get a couple of hours of sleep!). I couldn't believe that we had a nurse solely dedicated to us during active labor! And even the postpartum nurses were very responsive to our needs. And most of all they all seemed to really love their jobs! Sutter's policies are VERY breastfeeding friendly. I honestly didn't even need to have a birth plan, almost everything I requested (immediate skin to skin contact, no episiotomy, delaying vitamin K shot & eye ointment for 2 hours, etc.) are all standard procedure for them. Not to mention the food was actually good and they had WiFi access!
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