Lydia's Arrival- Part 3

It wasn’t long after checking in arriving at the hospital in Winnipeg that the nurses and doctors came into our room rather bewildered.  “Your baby looks very happy,” they said.  “We’re not sure what the big panic was in Red Lake.”  What?  We were confused.  (Looking back now, we see the difference:  in Red Lake you are hours from a c-section and neo-natal intensive care.  You have to look ahead and be cautious.  In Winnipeg, c-section is minutes away.  You don’t have to anticipate hours ahead.)  The doctor told us, “If you are worried about needing a c-section, you can stop worrying.  It’s not going to happen.”

The nurses in Winnipeg strapped the monitors to my belly and sure enough, Baby was looking fine.  A relief, but we wondered what would happen to us now.  The test for amniotic fluid in Red Lake had been inconclusive, so the doctor took another sample.  She told us that if it was amniotic fluid, I would be induced because I had been leaking for a couple days and would be at risk for infection.  If it wasn’t amniotic fluid....  Would we be sent back to Red Lake?

Soon the doctor came back and said that Yes, it was definitely amniotic fluid!  Kendall and I high-fived.  So relieved that Baby was looking good and that we could go ahead and deliver her.  The wait was over.

Soon, however, the nurses and doctors started expressing concern about the read-outs on the monitor.  Maybe Baby wasn’t doing as well as they thought.  Baby’s heart rate was dropping too much with the contractions.  My amniotic fluid was very low.  The fluid serves as a cushion for the baby.  However, with so little fluid in there, Baby didn’t have that cushion.  Every time I contracted, Baby was squeezed and the cord, with its supply of blood and oxygen, was squeezed.  They explained it to us this way:  If someone ducks their head under water for 5 or 10 seconds every few minutes, they are fine.  But if they duck their head under water for 20 seconds at a time, they will get very tired and weak.  That’s what was happening to Baby.  The word picture was very helpful, but it traumatized Kendall.  He told me later that every time he watched her heart rate go down, he would picture himself under water, unable to breathe.

My labor was induced around 8:00 pm and soon I started feeling my contractions get more painful.  I felt okay, but it was slow-going.  I was oh-so-tired.  Sometime around midnight, the doctor came in and said they would turn down the pitocin for awhile because they would be busy in the Operating Room doing a c-section.  There was enough concern about Baby that they didn’t want things progressing or turning into an emergency while they were occupied and while the O.R. was full.  When the c-section was done, the doctors checked back in with us.  They decided to continue backing off on the pitocin because Baby wasn’t doing well with contractions.