Now that I have a six-month-old
baby girl, I need to get her birth story written out! Jillian’s pregnancy was
much harder on my body than John Charles’s pregnancy, but it turns out that I
progressed almost exactly the same. Had you told me earlier in July that I was
going to make it to my due date again, I would not have believed you because of
how uncomfortable I felt all summer long. At the 35 week appointment (July 24th),
Dr. Wilson said I was dilated a fingertip and “high.” At the 36 week
appointment (July 31st), Dr. Wilson said I was still dilated a fingertip, but
was 70% effaced. I wasn’t able to schedule a 37 week appointment with school
starting back, but we had to have another ultrasound on August 9th because my
belly wasn’t measuring where it needed to. Everything looked wonderful, but Jillian
wouldn’t show us her face. The ultrasound technician said she was measuring
around 8 ½ pounds, slightly bigger than her brother. At the 38 week appointment
(August 13th), Dr. Wilson said I was 2 cm and 80% effaced, which made Brandon
very excited, until I reminded him that I was at the same position almost with
John Charles at the same time in my pregnancy. Brandon was (again) so ready to
meet this sweet new baby, but I wanted to make it to her due date a few weeks away.
At the last appointment at 39
weeks (August 20th), I was dilated to 2-3 cm and 80% effaced. I begrudgingly
scheduled an induction for Monday, August 27th because Dr. Wilson wasn’t going
to be in town later that next week. Dr. Wilson knew I was praying for not being
induced, but I also didn’t want to wait too long and be induced by a different
doctor while he was out of town. We also made plans with Brandon’s parents to
keep John Charles on Sunday evening, but I don’t even remember the “excuse”
Brandon gave them. Everything was going as planned for an induction on August 27th,
two days after my due date, just like with John Charles. At this point in my
pregnancy, I would have bet money on her being delivered on the 27th because of
how similar everything seemed at each check-up!!
Saturday, August 25th (Due
Date)
We woke up and enjoyed
breakfast at home just like any other Saturday. Around 10:00, I began having
contractions every 20-30 minutes and they continued throughout the day. They
weren’t terrible and mainly just made me pause when they happened. I had
decided earlier in the week that we should go swimming at my parents’ house if
I hadn’t already had Jillian, since I wouldn’t get to swim with John Charles
again for the summer. Even though I was still having contractions, we headed
over to their house. My Aunt Judy and MamMaw were both there, and I got to open
a gift from Aunt Judy. She had two outfits monogrammed for Jillian! Aunt Judy
asked if I was showing any signs of labor, since it was my due date. I lied and
said NO! I didn’t want people at the hospital while I was in labor, so I wasn’t
divulging that I was having contractions to anyone.
We enjoyed swimming for a bit
with family where I felt like I was able to hide my contractions fairly well.
We sat down to eat supper with my parents. By this time, my contractions were
beginning to get more painful. I had one pretty painful contraction towards the
end of supper. At 8PM I told Brandon we needed to head home, but somehow he
missed that I was having lots of pain and it was another 30 minutes before we
headed home! As soon as he loaded John Charles in the truck and we started to
drive away, I began timing my contractions. They were coming every 3-5 minutes.
Before we even made it home, the app told me it was time to head to the
hospital! Brandon put John Charles down for bed because at this point, it was
well past his bedtime. As soon as he walked out of John Charles’s room, I told
him the app said I needed to head to the hospital, which of course confused
Brandon as to why we even put John Charles to bed if we were needing to leave
soon anyway. I reminded him that we still all needed to pack our bags and I
wanted to shave and wash my hair before heading to the hospital.
Brandon packed John Charles’s
bag and I began to get myself ready. Lolli and Pop came to get John Charles
around 9:30 and then we began to pack our own bags. Before we left, I made
Brandon take my 40 week picture (and last bump picture!) between contractions,
which was harder than I expected. We checked in to the hospital around 11:30
and the nurse took me to an area to hook me up to monitors. She said we would be
in this area until I had progressed enough to go to one of the delivery rooms. Before
she hooked me up to the monitors, she decided to check to see how dilated I
was, just to know. We were all surprised that I had already made it to 6 cm! I
hadn’t expected to be that far along because I wasn’t in
nearly as much pain as I’d been with your John Charles’s contractions.
I got the epidural around midnight, and it helped
let your daddy take a nap! They checked me at 1AM and I was at 7 cm. At 3:15AM
my water broke, so they checked me and I was at 9 cm. At 3:30AM they called the
doctor on call. The epidural wasn’t fully working, so they said I could get
another dosage, but I had to show I could still push. I halfway tried one push
and she said I needed to do a better job or they couldn’t give any more
medicine, so on the next one I gave it all I could! The nurse immediately said
Ok that’s good, I don’t get anything extra for delivering a baby!
When Dr. Petty arrived at 4AM, she asked how
everything was going and I said great! Looking back, I realize now that the
nurse never did leave her position until Dr. Petty was ready to take over. Apparently,
Jillian was ready to be delivered, and they wanted to make sure she didn’t come
too quickly with no one there. Jillian was born after 3 pushes at 4:10AM. Dr.
Petty was literally in the room for less than 10 minutes, so it all happened quickly!
We got to enjoy our hour of skin to skin with our sweet girl. She scored a
perfect 10/10 on both APGARs and everything looked wonderful.
After Brandon walked her down
to the nursery, he came back and asked me to guess her weight. I felt like she was
slightly bigger than John Charles, so maybe 8.7 lbs or 8.8 lbs but she ended up
being 8.15 lbs and 21.5 inches long (same length as both John Charles and
myself!). While she was in the nursery, we called our parents and siblings to
let them know she had arrived. We made plans for John Charles to be brought
around 8AM to meet his new sister. I asked the nurses for breakfast, but of
course the kitchen doesn’t make food until 9AM on Sundays, so thankfully Mom
sent Dad with some food for us to eat and it was delicious! Since he brought me
food, he took a little sneak peek at Jillian in the nursery.
We decided that John Charles
would get to visit with us for a few minutes, so he got to sit next to me in
the bed and we talked about his morning at his Lolli and Pop’s. The nurses
brought Jillian in the room in her little basket and Brandon handed her to me. I
talked to John Charles about how this was his new baby sister, Jillian and he
stared at her with sweet wonder and kept looking at her face. All of a sudden,
he leaned over and kissed her belly! It made me tear up to see him immediately
willing to love on his sweet sister. He was so excited to get to hold Jillian,
too! Nana and PapPaw came to visit and they took some pictures of our family of
four. John Charles could NOT stop grinning while holding HIS baby!
That night, when they came in
with Jillian around midnight, they said she was down to 8.7lbs. Her jaundice level
was 3.8, which was good! The next night, she was down to 8 lbs exactly, which was
very concerning. I texted my parents, who brought a 6 oz bag of breastmilk that
we had planned to give to John Charles later that morning and we gave it to
Jillian 1 oz at a time over the next few days. Thankfully by the time we had
her 5 day checkup, she was gaining weight like she needed to.
People told me that even
though John Charles’s delivery went as I had hoped, that Jillian’s probably
wouldn’t. I wanted to go into labor naturally (no induction), and I wanted it
to be just Brandon and myself at the hospital (no crowd waiting in the waiting
room), just like with John Charles. Thankfully, besides it not happening on the
day I had expected, it happened pretty much exactly as I had hoped! I enjoyed
getting to spend time with Brandon and we didn’t have to worry about updating
anyone while I was in labor. After about 18 hours of labor (14 of which were
without an epidural) almost the exact same as with John Charles, we had our
perfect baby girl in our arms.
