Saturday, October 17, 2009

Jonah and Silas' Birth Story Pt. 1

First, Jimmy got back from KS on Tuesday evening. We had moved our biweekly OB appointment to Thursday so that he could go with me. My regular OB was on call, so I saw a different doctor. They didn't do much and as we were leaving Jimmy asked if it was ok for me to be having a lot of Braxton-Hicks contractions. (We had learned in our childbirth class that the doctors don't even want to know about them.) I told this OB that I had been having about 40 a day. She said, "I can check your cervix if you want." We said, "Sure, why not." Well I was 2 cm dilated and she felt Jonah's head. I guess they were a little more than warm-up contractions!
She wanted me admitted right away. Jimmy rolled me over to labor and delivery. At this point we thought it was a little silly... since everything seemed to be going smoothly and we were not planning on giving birth before 36 weeks!
This is me still in denial. I thought I would be sent home on bed rest, but when my regular OB came in I had dilated to 3 cm. They went ahead and gave me a steroid shot to help the babies lungs develop in case they did come early. They gave me a shot of terbutaline to make the contractions stop and moved me to a real room.
My mom came to check on me and I reassured her that there was no way I would be giving birth in the near future. Then my nurse came in and gave me another shot of terbutaline that seemed to do nothing but raise my heart rate. This is the point where I start to get concerned. I am supposed to relax so the contractions would stop, but my heart rate is going up and my OB is telling me that 31 weeks for twins is a very bad thing! I have 9 tubes and wires coming out of me, 40 extra pounds of weight on my bony hips, and I am supposed to relax on this hard bed. Then they started me on Magnesium sulfate. I thought it was helping... me in denial again. It makes you very hot. My sweet nurses turned my room down to 60 and I still felt that when I closed my eyes, my eyeballs were boiling. Jimmy was in a sweatshirt, freezing sleeping on a bench in my room. We were at this stage overnight. I did not sleep at all. I was so concerned about what I was doing to my poor little boys inside me. I couldn't make the contractions stop. I felt horrible and helpless.
These 2 ladies, Kim and Robin, were my WONDERFUL nurses. They kept me calm. God had the perfect ones on duty. Robin was there when we arrived and then requested us again 12 hours later on her next shift... I am so glad!
At 4AM I woke my doctor up because I knew it was getting worse, not better. I was 4cm by that time. He tried one more drug, procardia. I think that one would have worked, but it was too late. When the next OB came in at 7AM I was 5 cm and 100% effaced and station -1. Jonah was head down ready to go, but Silas was transverse (relaxing across the top). He didn't want to take a chance with Silas, so he scheduled a C-Section for us at 9:15.
I had never met this OB before. He is part of the group that I go to. His name is Dr. Tom Virtue. Again God worked it all out for us. We want to have more children in the future, so we were really disappointed when he explained to us that due to Silas' position he would have to cut me vertically which means I would never be able to give birth vaginally. Your uterus can only handle so many C-Sections. We trusted his decision since we knew he was fighting for Silas. He prayed with us before the surgery. God had the right man there at the right time for our sons.
Here is Jimmy all decked out in his scrubs. He sat next to me during the C-Section and watched the entire surgery over the little sheet they had in front of my face.
This was right before our sons were born! We were very scared, but knew that God had brought us this far and that His timing is perfect. We had seen Him work out every detail up to this point.

5 comments:

  1. God is so wonderful, He is the great physician! We are glad He is in control! We know mom and twins could not be in better hands.

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  2. May God receive all the glory during this time...Psalm 139. He has formed them to His perfect design and will love and care for them as no other.

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  3. I am so thankful that God has taken care of you and your precious boys. Jeannie Shaffer

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  4. Congrats! We hope the babies continue to grow strongr and we look forward to seeing them soon!

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  5. Thanks for sharing this! ~ Dara

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