Their Birth! The little arrivals are here.....
They have arrived and I can say with a sigh of relief, all healthy! They are in the NICU and all testing well. All three are receiving some help with their breathing and are on a feeding tube, but they are healthy, tiny little individuals and A is doing well. So now I have a lot to catch up on...
We went to the hospital on Monday night. I was in our bedroom at the computer when A asked me what time it was. I responded with a simple, it is 10:20 and went back to what I was doing. It was Oct. 17th and we had just got our oldest into bed a couple of hours ago and A was lying on our bed. She is pretty tired most of the time now and finds it hard to get comfortable. She asked me again exactly 10 miniutes later, "can you see the time?" I stopped what I was working on and suddently paid attention to what was going on here. "Are you having contractions I asked?". She was, but they weren't real hard contractions and we were waiting to find out if they were consistant. If A had more than 6 in an hour, we were to call the doctor. She continued to have them every 10 minutes and after the fourth, we called our friends to come and spend the night and get our oldest to school. IT was now into the evening and our friend Michelle answered the phone in a droggy voice repeating, it is time?! okay.. it is time.... we will be right over." We then gathered up our stuff and A hopped into the shower as we waited for our friends to arrive. We then got into the car and drove to the hospital. A half expected to be home again the next day. False labor and labor delays were pretty common with mulitple pregnancies and the attending check in nurse was surprised we hadn't been there before. They took us up to a secured floor and we saw our doctor after nurses admitted A and ran a few tests. It was approx. 2:30 when our Doctor said he didn't expect we would be leaving the hospital still pregnant.
I felt good about where we were. I was nervous, of course. But A was healthy and had carried the babies for just over 32 weeks - which was our ultimate goal. Longer would have been better, but we had made it pretty far and now it just had gotten to a point where it had gone on long enough for them. They gave A an IV to suppress the labor, but they wouldn't use it longer than 48 hours because it suppressed muscle activity, which can start to effect the heart and lungs. All three babies and Mom were hooked up to a heart monitor and we could hear a fast and consistant bump bump bump bump bump bump.. chiming from three different machines. She was given a steroid to aid in the lung development and the doctor we able to give two shots in 48 hours. They admitted there was no real evidence that with multiples that this helped move the babies lungs along, but it certainly woudn't hurt and just might help. The babies lungs were not fully developed. Between 34-36 weeks of gestation, babies start to develop a fluid in their lungs called surfactant which helps open the air pockets in the lungs. The importance of this was explained to us using the analogy of a person blowing up a balloon. When you first blow into a new balloon, it is difficult to get the air in but once the balloon has been opened, it is easier. Our babies would have to work much harder to feed the air in and out of their lungs.
A and myself sat in the room with nurses coming in and out for two days. I drove A's Mom up to visit and picked up our oldest from school to spend one afternoon in the room with us. Neither of us had slept much and A was pretty uncomfortable and getting mild headaches from the medicine. She wasn't allowed to eat or drink anything and could only sip on a tiny bit of water.
After the last steriod shot on Wednesday afternoon they cut off the medicine to suppress the labor. A immediately went back into contracting at regular intervals . That evening around 9:00 PM our doctor came in and suggested we go ahead and schedule the c-section. I was tired and nervous and suddenly I realized that soon Baby A, Baby B, and Baby C - all of which had been very real with personality in our minds, were about to join us. For every time I nearly fainted during a simple ultrasound, suddenly I was excited and completely confident we were going to come out okay.
They took A back to the OR room and I was given scrubs to wear. They escorted me to the OR which we shared with an entire team of people, including several nurses and doctors. They were there ready to bring each infant directly into the NICU for tests. It all seemed to happen in record time and when Samuel was born it ran like an assembly line. His umbillicle cord was cut and he was rushed over to A and I for a quick look and then was gone. One minute later came Olivia and then the next minute, Benjamin. All with 10 fingers and 10 toes.
Their Neonantoligist came into the room as they were stiching A and reported all in good health. Samuel was 4lbs 6 oz, Olivia was 4lbs 6.5oz and Benjamin was 3lbs 14 oz.