Friday's child is loving and giving....

I'm so happy to announce the birth of our beautiful son, Mazen Andrew Gray on Friday, January 29th, at 5:39pm. He weighed in at 9lbs, 14oz (4.485 kilos) and 52 cm. His APGAR scores were 10 and 10 (which, as you'll see in a few minutes, is a really wonderful thing given the birth situation).

We came home on Wednesday, Feb. 3 and are recovering well. Mazen is a very peaceful baby-- eating, sleeping and pooping just the way he's supposed to. He actually sleeps on his back, and we can put him down now and then, unlike his older brother! And speaking of his older brother, Geo has been thrilled with the baby so far, telling me "Mama, I love our baby" and giving him lots of kisses and pats.

And now, I'm going to write about the birth itself, so if you aren't interested in this kind of thing, skip to the end of this post.

I went into labor on Thursday night (or rather, early Friday morning) at about 2am. The contractions weren't strong, but they were enough to keep me awake so I got out of bed to time them. After spending a few hours timing contractions (and helping Geo go back to sleep) I decided to lay down on the couch and get some rest. I dozed for a couple of hours, until about 7am when I felt a small *pop* and a little gush. Thinking maybe my water had broken, I leaped off our (leather) couch to the rocking chair. Nothing happened, so I started doubting myself. Shortly afterwards, C got up and I told him he wouldn't be going in to work-- I was in labor.

We got Geo off to school (and much to my later consternation, I realized I forgot to kiss him goodbye), and I called the hospital to see if I needed to come in. From time to time, I was having small gushes of liquid. The midwife told me I should come in to be checked during the morning, so we quickly made arrangements for Geo to be picked up from school, and then picked up by his uncle. I took a hot shower, finished getting my things together and we headed to the car.

The drive into Paris took about 40 minutes, and we got to the hospital around 11am. I went upstairs to get checked, and they confirmed that my water had broken. The midwife said the water was "tinted", which meant the baby had pooped a little, and was possibly a sign of distress. So they started monitoring me immediately, and put me on an IV. She gave me some pitocin to get the contractions to be more regular. I was given the absolute lowest dose. I labored like that for a couple of hours, sitting on a yoga ball. When she checked me again, I had progressed only a little bit. She upped the dose of pitocin slightly and right away, the baby reacted really badly. His heart rate dropped from 150bpm to 80 before coming up again. The midwife was concerned and turned off the pit. She also suggested we go ahead and do an epidural, which I agreed to.

Putting in the epidural was pretty strange and uncomfortable, so I'll spare you the details. Once it was in, it took the edge of a little. But soon, it was like I didn't have anything at all. The contractions were getting really, really intense, and as I was now on my back the only way I could manage them was by growling/vocalizing through them. I was making a LOT of noise. The midwife was surprised that the epidural wasn't working, so she tried to add another dose. Nothing. And the baby's heart rate kept going way down. And then I started having long contractions that were lasting 4, 5, 6 minutes and felt like the transition contractions I had with Geo. Except I hadn't made any progress at all in dilating. Baby's heart rate crashed for the fourth time, only this time it wasn't coming back up. Suddenly there were about 8 people all around me and they said, "We're doing a c-section." At that point, I *wanted* them to do it. I was so scared for my baby and in so much pain I knew it was the only solution.

It was a lot like a ballet. I was whisked from the labor room down the hall to the OR. I was moved to the operating table (while having massive contractions), was shaved down and painted with freezing cold disinfectant. The room was so cold and bright, people were running around shouting things and hurrying, I was crying. C was told to change clothes and come back. Someone noticed I was naked and asked if I was cold, and finally started warming me. I was still dealing with horrible pain, and the anesthesiologist was trying desperately to get something to work. Finally, someone put a mask to my face and told me to breathe deeply. I could hear the doctor saying "We need to wait for the father to get here."

General anesthesia is so weird. It's like being in a movie. One second you're in one scene, then there's a jump and you're someplace totally different. The next thing I remember is someone calling my name and patting my face. I woke up alone, on a stretcher. I started to cry because I realized I wasn't pregnant anymore and whatever had happened, I had missed it. Someone came over and told me that my baby was fine and was with my husband. I managed to ask if it was a boy or a girl (just wanted confirmation!) and was told he was a boy. Another doctor came over and asked me if I was crying from emotion or from pain, and then I realized that it hurt. I told him, both. He and another doctor did some complicated thing to ease the pain (and ended up spraying me in the face with painkiller, but frankly that was the least of my worries). Nearby I could hear a baby crying. "Don't worry, that's not your baby" someone said. I knew that already, though.

I was still unable to stop crying when someone let C come in. He was carrying a little bundle-- our baby. He helped me hold the baby against my skin. As soon as I had the two of them near me I felt much, much better. I was able to nurse him a little, and C told me what had happened.

The epidural had never worked so they'd used general anesthesia, which meant C wasn't allowed in the OR. He was waiting in the labor room for about 30 minutes before they told him Mazen was born. He went to the little room where Mazen was being checked, wiped off and suctioned, then they gave him to C and had him hold the baby skin-to-skin. The midwife who assisted at the c-section told him that the cord had been wrapped around the baby in such a way that he couldn't descend into my pelvis, and on strong contractions the cord was being compressed, which caused the heart decelerations.

The good news is that Mazen and I are healthy, and home and safe. I'm still processing what happened, it all went so quickly. It slid out of control so quickly, I'm still wondering what might have happened if just one thing had been different. I was later told that there were a couple of indications that the placenta was on the verge of abrupting (which means it separates prematurely from the uterus-- it can be fatal for the baby). One was the long, long contractions, and the other was my pain that wasn't relieved by the epidural. When they examined everything, there weren't clear signs, so they've sent the placenta off for analysis.

In my heart of hearts, I think I knew that this birth was going to be very different from Geo's birth (which was totally drug-free and peaceful). I was extremely apprehensive about labor and birth, and I couldn't bring myself to get things set up for the baby. I was having horrible thoughts about having to announce the stillbirth of our baby on a regular basis-- in fact, I was having to remind myself that everything was going to be fine. When we came home from the hospital we had to set everything up-- we didn't even have any diapers at home!

So I'm feeling so incredibly blessed. I was surrounded by a very caring, loving team at the hospital who took my and my baby's health very seriously. I have a beautiful, healthy (gigantic!) baby. I'm healthy and recovering well physically. What I am mourning is the gap in our family memory. C and I have really beautiful memories from Geo's birth, but neither of us was "present" at Mazen's. I don't know if he cried, what color he was. I didn't get to put him up against my skin right away. I totally missed the hormone rush post-birth. All of that pales in comparison to having a healthy baby, of course. But still.