The hospital Part 2

Well this story is a little more scary than “the birth” but has to offer just as much hope and happiness as the birth in some form or another.

It started on Halloween night (I have actually always wanted to use that opener for real, and I just did, guess who just got to check something off of their bucket list?), and Brandon and I were cuddling with our daughter and watching trick or treaters come and go from the den in our house.

It happened so suddenly. Without warning I found myself shivering uncontrollably. “Is it cold in here?” I asked. “Not particularily. Can I make you some tea?”

Well about 10 or so minutes went by and I could not warm up. So I decided to take this opportunity to use our families new thermometer. “It’s probably nothing I just want to be on the safe side.” I told Brandon.  The thermometer read 99.6 degrees F. Oh boy, I thought to myself, it is just a slight fever, but I had better be safe. So I called the midwife on call. She told me that it sounded like maybe a touch of the flu and that I should take some Tylenol, try to get a good sleep and see what was going on the next day.

I didn’t feel right about that answer. I didn’t like that I didn’t feel right about it, because truthfully, on our first full day back from the hospital I just wanted to go to bed and cuddle with my husband and daughter.

I took some Tylenol as she instructed me. After 20 minutes I felt the urge to take my temperature again.

This time the thermometer read 102 degrees F. I phoned the midwife back. “I am going to abby hospital.”

Before we left I once again got a blessing. After which I felt much more confident in my choice to leave for the hospital.

So we loaded Belle and everything she needed and Brandon and I into the car, and his Mom drove us to the hospital. I prayed on the way that there would not be a long wait in Emergency. The ride there was completely different than the ride we had taken to Abbotsford 2 nights previous. Last time I was fairly confident that my urgency to get to the hospital was to have a baby. This time I didn’t know what to think, and I couldn’t stop shivering, and I had a hungry little baby along for the ride whom I wanted to take care of, not be sick for.

When we got to Emergency my prayers were answered. Never before had I seen a waiting room so empty. One other couple of people were ahead of us. I was seen right away. After they had taken my vital signs and information I decided it would be a good time to feed and change a crying Belle. She was content.

In the ER about 10 minutes later a male nurse, whom I will always remember came in to assess my situation.

“I hope you don’t mind that I am breastfeeding.” I joked. “Oh I don’t mind, I have seen much worse than a breast.”

Much worse than a breast? What an interesting fellow.

What he said next interested me further. “Are you normally tachy?” He asked. I must once again this week have been in a delirious state because I was under the impression he asked me if I work on the telemetry floor at chilliwack hospital.

“Yes, I work there sometimes.” I replied.

He looked at me as if I was the strange one.

“no, do you normally have a high pulse?”

“no.”

“I am going to go talk to the doctor I will be right back.”

So when this nurse gets back he informs me that I have to have an EKG and a chest X ray. He then begins to prepare an IV. “whoa. What are you doing with that?” I asked. “We are starting an IV for you.”

Well, thank you for telling me and not just trying to stick something into my uninformed self.

This part I found the most upsetting yet. An IV indicated to me that I was going to be at the hospital for more time than the next 30 minutes or so. What I should have said was “hey buddy, when I got in here I expected to be healed in about 30 minutes, I have a new daughter and a room full of things to unpack.”

But instead I said “oh, an IV… nice!”

I had never had an IV before, and as a cringing Brandon turned away in disgust (his worst fear is needles- a fear which I don’t completely understand as one will never be in the wild afraid of attacking needles hanging from trees), the needle was inserted into a trembling left hand of mine.  I looked up at the bag of fluid they would dump into my body. It had potassium in it. I felt sick.

I stood up to use the bathroom. I was feeling irritated that this nurse was doing so much to prevent me from going home. I am not sure why I expected an easy solution, now that I think back to it. And it was for the best that they were taking these safety measures, but in these next few hours I didn’t care about my health. I just wanted to ignore it, go home and take care of Belle.

My health was getting more difficult to ignore. As I stood up to go to the washroom my legs were like jello and felt like they were going to give out. I got to use one of those cool wheelchair inventions again.

After they had wheeled me off to different rooms for more tests, they got me to lie down in a bed and put these sticky cups all over my chest to monitor how frequently my tummy growled. Hmmm it was either monitoring that or my heart, I can’t remember which.

The part I disliked the most was how much I was shivering. I could feel my body shaking uncontrollably and that really scared me. It wouldn’t have scared me as much 10 months ago when I wasn’t pregnant and I didn’t have a little bambino to nourish. But I was probably the most scared this night than I have ever been my entire life. I could hear the doctor bringing up all sorts of possibilities. They knew there was an infection, but without results from all of my blood tests and my urine test they could not know for sure. So all I could do was lie in this bed and pray it was nothing serious.

My main concern was to make sure they didn’t give me anything that would prevent me from breastfeeding. And it seemed like I couldn’t tell enough people that I was breastfeeding. I was being Ultra Paranoid Woman (that’s right, she is a new superhero)!

It was here in Emergency that we had the pleasure of meeting my second nurse. She was a young girl who was very warm and friendly and made the experience at the hospital a better one. We also suspect it was she who advocated for us to get back up into maternity as opposed to being sent to medicine (where I would not have been able to have Brandon or Belle with me which would have been unbearable).

So results came in and the doctor announced that I was sporting a kidney infection, which had traveled into my blood. We further learned that my white blood cell count was low. My white blood cells decided to take a vacation rather than fighting for me. Thank you guys, I appreciate it. Send me a postcard from wherever you wind up.

They immediately started a really strong BREASTFEEDING SAFE  :) antibiotic called Meropenum and informed me that I would need to be on it for about 24 to 48 hours. I was so relieved that it was safe for breastfeeding Moms, I would be readmitted back onto maternity, and Belle and Brandon would be with me every step of the way.

It seems as if I hadn’t had a lot of luck, but these things that mattered to me, God had taken care of, and I had to see the good in that. It wasn’t easy every step of the way. But our family was definitely seeing some huge miracles this week.

Next we had to wait to be taken to maternity. While we waited Brandon and his Mom watched as my heart rate was maintained at a steady 130-150 beats per minute. A great way to burn calories… right? It wouldn’t come down from 150 beats for the next day and a half.

We had to wait about 3 or 4 extra hours in emerg that night before they took us up to maternity, but it was completely worth it.

Even though things felt scary and everything Belle did great at what she could do. She ate and would go right back to sleep. Brandon was also super tired but snuggled her anyways.

By the time we got up to maternity I had more people looking at me and telling me new plans for procedures and tests I would have to undergo. I was really confused and pretty frustrated through this process because the emerg doc had told me with confidence it was a kidney infection. But I guess my new assigned medical doctor wanted to be confident that it was nothing else.

One of my nurses kept coming into the room when I was tending to Belles empty tummy and told me that my body needed to rest. It sounds great, but I have a newborn that is hungry and my plan is to breastfeed. So, what could she say to that?

Later when I went to the bathroom I glanced into the mirror and was very taken aback. I was super swollen. I could hardly even recognize myself. Everything to me was puffed up, and red. I looked desperate. Needless to say that night there was no rest. Every time I would drift off, either Belle would need to nurse, or someone would have to come in to check my heart.

The next day is remembered as a blur. Brandon and I managed to nap between more and more tests, and Belle continued to seem unaffected and doing well.

It was this day that I learned we would be here at least one more day.

I was very grateful for the food that was brought in for us to eat. The hospital food was disgusting. I always checked the meals out in curiosity and only once was there anything worth eating. The toast served for breakfast is by far the furthest thing from any edible bread I have ever had, and resembles more of a soggy cardboard. This is saying something, as anyone who knows me well enough, knows I am not a picky eater.

Over the next two days Brandon and I were told we would be able to go home soon. Finally soon came. I was puffy and tired of antibiotics and tired. Both Brandon and I had our share of the hospital this week and were ready to go home.

The next day we had a visit with a doctor and learned that I would need IV antibiotics for the next 4 days. So in and out of the Chilliwack hospital would wrap this week up. I can honestly say that I have never been so tired in all my life. But I came out of this week with my health, and my husband and daughter.

The birth

It all started around one o’clock in the afternoon on Saturday the 29^th of October. A cool and clear sunny day, one in which Brandon and I thought a walk to our favorite used bookstore would be quite appropriate.

So off we walked (I waddled… Brandon walked) I was greeted by an interesting cramp (“Braxton Hicks again” I sighed to Brandon, “don’t worry I am fine… this baby is never coming out I think.”) So we continued our walk, had a nice time at the bookstore where we read about many different things, and soon we were on our way home. Suddenly the cramps were coming steadily and it was more difficult to walk through them.

“Let’s time them just in case.”

They were everywhere some were 10 minutes apart and lasted 40 seconds some were 9 minutes and lasted an entire minute. I was very skeptical that anything “real” was going on.

So our arrival at home found us playing a wonderful first-person shooter game called “Borderlands”. I was very distracted by it for a while, but then…

“can we pause it? I am having another pain.”

I couldn’t aim my shots at people through these so-called contractions… maybe they were real? Maybe I was in labor…. True labor.

Part of me wanted to be in labor because I didn’t want to wait another day to hold this baby of ours growing inside of me. And now that I was starting to feel some really heavy pain a whole different part of me was quivering in the corner of a room shivering and saying aloud “maybe tomorrow would be a better day for this.”

So we continued pausing and timing the contractions until around 730 pm and I was actually beginning to shed some tears.

“I think now would be a good time to call the midwife.” I said to Brandon, “ I think that this really must be happening.”

So I got on the phone with the midwife and tried to sound as cool and collected as possible (which she explained later was the reason why she didn’t tell me to rush into the hospital then and there. Just a tip… don’t try to hide the pain when you live 30 minutes away from the hospital and you are on the phone with your health care provider trying to make a decision.).

My midwife told me not to worry, and that I should use this time to take about an hour long shower with Brandon just to help in the whole dilating process and pain relief. I unwillingly got into the shower (I think Brandon was pretty scared at this time too because my contractions were now starting to feel (for me) and sound (for him) pretty serious). 30 minutes into the shower, however, I couldn’t do it anymore. Even standing was a chore… and now that I know how it feels I was definitely having the urge to push.

Brandons mom arrived home around this time and I heard her, through the bathroom door, telling him that I was in “hard labor”. This to me, at the time made so much sense that it scared me… why wasn’t I at the hospital?

So after receiving a blessing from Brandon’s Dad and Brandon I decided now would be a good time to call the midwife and head into the hospital. This time on the phone with her I couldn’t get through a sentence and Brandon had to talk. The plan was to head through triage (the main hospital was shut down at this time of the day) and meet her right up in maternity for a check up to see if I was really experiencing labor.

I had so much doubt in my mind. Was I really in labor? It seems like I always hear about false alarms. Could this be a false alarm? So much of me was hoping this was it. If it gets much worse than this, I thought, then I don’t know if I can handle it… I just don’t think I can manage.

The car ride was interesting. And by interesting I mean the most painful and longest drive we have ever taken from Chilliwack to Abbotsford. To me it didn’t even feel as if contractions were letting up anymore. It seemed it was one after another, and my back pain was excruciating. Brandon’s parents took us to the hospital. It was a good thing Brandon wasn’t driving; I needed to squeeze his hand the whole way there.  Also, I was probably stressing him out something awful.

Brandon’s Mom, Tami took this opportunity to play my favorite music… Christmas. This helped a great deal. I tried to sing a little through the contractions. I am really glad we do not have any of this night recorded… have I mentioned that? I definitely would not be getting a Juno for the singing that took place this night. But perhaps had it been a full moon a pack of canines would have been interested in joining me.

When we arrived I had a very tough time getting out of the car. Someone brought a wheelchair for me to get into. In retrospect if it hadn’t been for that wheelchair I never would have made it in to the hospital. And there was no way I would have let anyone carry me.

Now it is here in the story where my memory is a little fuzzy. I think perhaps it was because of the extreme amounts of pain I found myself in my brain must have gone into autopilot. My true colors began to emerge in a series of meetings with some interesting people on the way up to maternity. So be warned that this next part of the story includes small tidbits from my memory pieced together by the testimony of my family present this night.

As we entered emergency I remember feeling confused as to where we were to go. I remember asking some patients that were sitting near the door smoking where I was to go. They wound up assisting us in our quest for the main lobby to get to the main elevators. At this point my memory was that these people were all on our team and everyone was there to help me through this tough time. And so naturally I felt that since these people were on our team it would be alright to trust them. A man and a lady who had eben smoking outside showed us the way. As we entered the elevators with them I could hear Brandon and his Mom explaining that I was in labor and we didn’t know how to get to maternity. It was at this point I turned to the lady and I said “if I have this baby in this elevator YOU are the one who will deliver it.” And then I turned to the man and as I pointed my finger at him in my delirious state said, “Because you have no experience.” I must note that this was brought on by the fact that the lady had mentioned that she had a baby. And so, it hadn’t just been me stereotyping the fact that she was a woman she had to have had a baby.”

As we got out of the elevator we said goodbye to our new friend and she wished us luck. We were finally on maternity floor and all we had to do was sign in. Brandon couldn’t find my care card in my wallet. I remember trying to explain to him that it was behind my driver’s license, but I think all that must have come out was “behind the picture!!!” And now that I think about it I can’t believe he found it at all. Into the heart of the maternity floor they wheeled me. We met a very nice nurse named Leona. She let us know that Laurie, our midwife hadn’t made it there yet, but she could start my assessment. What seemed a few minutes later Laurie arrived, and (I think) kept reminding me to take deep breaths. I didn’t want to at the time, but they really do help.

After my blood pressure and heart rate and everything were checked the moment of truth was approaching. Was I dilated? How far was I along? Would I be sent home? Would I be here for hours and hours longer trying to withstand this torture?

Laurie checked… “I usually like to approximate less than people actually are when I do this,” she said “but I would say you are probably 7 or actually probably 8 cm dilated.” Wow. Wow. I was going to have a baby… tonight. 

So the plan was to get me in my wheelchair and off to a room. You see, at Abbotsford Hospital the labor delivery and recovery all stay in the same room. Room 18 had our name on it. So that is where we went.

When we got to the room I changed into a gown, I suppose. I can’t remember this… but from the pictures I clearly see that I was wearing a gown, which leads me to believe I changed into it. I then got someone taking blood from my arm (I can actually remember the blood guy warning me that there would be a poke. Are you kidding me? I am not even going to feel it.

Laurie then instructed me that the next part would be the toughest and I shouldn’t push yet even though my body wanted me to. I told her I thought she might need to reassess my situation because I thought I was ready.

10 cm. Ready for action.

She told me I was allowed to push. I guess normally first time Moms didn’t go this fast. But I guess after all of our daughters prep talks and training meetings the message sunk in that we wanted her here. She just thought in terms of minutes.

In the next hour and a half or so the process of delivery really doesn’t need a whole lot of attention to detail. It included myself inhaling gas, a husband with a sore hand (and apparently I snagged his hair at one point too), a room full of grandparents (gma and gpa tami and glen, and papa and nana Rob and Robin), and then… a baby.

When she came out it was such a relief in every way. Physically the hard part was over, emotionally we could now hold our hot little bundle and cuddle her, and everything was good.

Belle Antoinette Sallenbach was born 1203 am on October 30^th 2011. Brandon almost got his Halloween baby. This was definitely the happiest moment of our lives. As she cuddled against me there was a sense of peace. The room, which once had a crazy lady in it and a team of people helping her, was now an oasis for this baby. She cried a little on the way out but was then silent and sleepy.

We took note right away of her full head of dark hair. If the old wives tale about acid reflux meaning your baby will have a full head of hair applies to anyone, it definitely works here.

Her skin was a cherry red and velvety smooth, and her eyes were a dark dark blue. Both her hands and feet were the crinkliest things I have ever seen (which says a lot because I have worked geriatrics), and were a little bit purple. Also she was born with a bit of a cone head, which gave her the nickname “peanut” for a few days. 

6 pounds 15 and half ounces was her weight. We were so proud of our tiny little bundle for all of the hard work she had done to be here. 

As soon as everything else had been dealt with (some stitches etc.), they cleaned Belle up a little and checked her out a bit and then bundled her up like she was going out into a snowstorm. A hat for newborn that they give out on the unit was much too big for our little peanut, but looked great on her anyways.

Soon the grandparents left and it was the three of us and Laurie still left.

I now had to get up and shower (which sounds a lot easier than it was), and I also had to learn how to breastfeed.

Laurie stayed with us until about 4 in the morning assisting us with these things and everything went really well.

Belle latched perfectly as if she had been practicing, and that was a huge blessing. And Laurie helped an exhausted shaky me with cleaning up and all of that.

This was the best experience of my life. To have loved ones supporting me, my husband next to me every step and an incredible midwife (who kept calm and helped me through everything was both smart about things and warm), I would have to say that Belle was really blessed to have the birthday that she had. There is no way that both Brandon and I (and everyone who was there that night), won’t recommend getting a midwife to everyone we possibly can.