Category: Pitocin

Tiffany's VBAC

4/24/2014

Storee's Birth Story:

On April 19th, we celebrated our 7 yr old's birthday party. The day before, I was put on bedrest because of low iron and fatigue. We decided to have a swim day and a movie night to celebrate, and my husband Ramar did all the work as I was bed bound for the day. That night, I joined my family in the living room for movies, pizza and popcorn. After watching the movie, I began to cramp. All of the kids were asleep, so I went to bed around 2:30 A.M. Around 5:30, I felt as though I had to pee but before I could get out of bed, it began to flow...all the while I am thinking to myself, "I know I am not peeing on myself." I jumped up and tried to run, but I felt a gush and I screamed Ramar's name to wake him up. I am screaming "My water broke!!!!" and he looks at me and asks me "How do I know?" lol Before I knew it, he was out of the bed, throwing clothes everywhere (I think our back seat was full of clothes by the time he was done) and all I could do was laugh at him.

Finally we were in the car and didn't even think of stopping for gas and halfway down the street, the car shut off!!! I can hear him now, "Tiffany are you freaking serious?" lol God was with us because I remember telling him to calm down and try it again. It cranked right up and we made it to get gas.

Finally we made it to the hospital and I get out the car and water is gushing everywhere and the panic began. Ramar was running all over the place looking for a wheelchair (again, this is all funny to me because I have never seen him this nervous). Finally he came back with the chair and I went up and checked in at 7:30 A.M. Finally, everything was calm and on its way. I was fine until around 11 A.M. and then the contractions started and I was ok. Ramar helped me breathe through them and I knew I could do it until my doctor walked in and checked and found me to still be 2 centimeters....just broke my heart. Now we needed to start a small amount of pitocin, which I was so upset about, but anything to achieve my VBAC goal. Within minutes, the contractions started to come back to back and with rage. I couldn't think, couldn't breathe, I didn't know what to do. Ramar was great and tried to calm me down and get me through each one of them by telling me the numbers were going down (even though half of the time he was lying just to make me feel better) but by the next check I was at 4 centimeters, then 6, and that is when all hell broke loose. I remember profanity, screaming and demanding, but Ramar didn't mind. He went in, found the anesthesiologist and within 30 minutes I had my epidural. Afterwards I was checked and I went from 6/7 to 10 and fully effaced and it was time to push.

It was sort of hard to push because I couldn't feel anything accept in one little area where the epidural didn't numb for some reason and that is what I focused on. An hour from the time I got the epidural, I heard my doctor say "She is out!" and I felt like God let all his angels out to bring her down to me. It was the best feeling of my life and all I remember saying is "Cry, baby, cry" and when she did, she took my breath away.

2:11 P.M. 4/20/2014, Easter Sunday, I was given another angel but this time she was mine to keep on Earth.*
Storee weighed 7 lbs 14 oz and measured 20 1/2 inches.

*Tiffany's first cesarean was performed at 33 weeks due to placental abruption. Her baby, Ramar-Dishawn, was born 6/25/12, weighing 7 lbs and measuring 22 inches. Sadly, he passed away at 4 days old due to hypoxic ischemic encephalopathy (HIE) caused by the abruption. Tiffany also suffered disseminated intravascular coagulation (DIC), which almost took her life.

Tiffany writes, "We finally got pregnant in August of 2013 after TTC 13 months. I was scared through the whole pregnancy. I went to the ER twice and was told I had suffered yet another loss, but at 12 weeks, I felt movement. I went to a free pregnancy clinic and there was my rainbow kicking away. I was terrified to VBAC because of my last pregnancy, but I knew a RCS was not what I wanted and I am so glad I did. I am now a wife, a mommy of 8 living kids and 1 angel and a VBAC success."

Tiffany and baby Storee.

Baby Ramar-Dishawn. Tiffany says, " I know God does everything for a reason and this little man, with the short time he was on this Earth, completely changed my life."

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Alysia's VBAC

3/7/2014

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*Editor's Note: I have tagged this story as a special scar VBAC due to the tearing down the LUS during the cesarean.

After 2 fairly unremarkable vaginal deliveries at 39+ weeks, one spontaneous labor and one induced for logistical reasons, my 3rd labor went awry. After being 9-10 cm, my cervix swelled and tightened. I had an emergency c-section, laceration to a uterine artery, tearing in to the lower uterine segment, required blood transfusions, and had a long and rocky recovery. Even after this trying experience, I felt I was not done having children, and strongly desired VBAC. My delivering obstetrician at the time advised against it due to the complications with my cesarean and the fact I did not have a double layer closure since my uterus was so thin at the time of surgery. However, despite varying advice for route of future delivery, I planned to wait the suggested interval to conceive and then plan to VBAC. Most importantly, I prayed to God for full healing and restoration of my uterus.

I became pregnant with my 4th child when my 3rd baby was 19 months old. I was a patient of an obstetrician an hour away from my previous delivering hospital. It was not that the original hospital did not support VBACs, it was that I was looking to change the setting for my birth.
At 39 1/7 weeks my membranes were swept. I usually had my babies about 2 days before the due date and had had my membranes swept in my 3rd pregnancy without immediate results, so I did not anticipate what would happen next.

I was restless and finally lay down at midnight that night. I felt so uncomfortable; these BH contractions were so strong! I was also used to my labors lasting quite a while. I usually would be prodromal or latent 8-12 hours and then take another 10 hours or so until delivering.

At 4 AM, I realized the contractions were every 15 minutes. My husband was working several hours away so I called him to come home so we could make the hour drive for my delivery. Two hours later, before he could get home, I realized they were every 5-7 minutes and I was going to be delivering at the same hospital as prior birth, as it was only 5 minutes away. Beside myself with pain, I called one friend to watch my kids and another for a ride to the hospital. She called my husband to meet us there as he was still over an hour away. I was no longer coherent as my pain was 10/10 at that point!

We arrived at the hospital at 7 AM. My records were transferred without incident. There was some difficulty getting an IV, but once it was in, I labored briefly in the jacuzzi. I was checked and found to be at 6 cm. I decided to go with an epidural as the contractions intensified. I was 7-8 cm when the anesthesiologist arrived.

Once the epidural was placed, my contractions weakened and I was given pitocin. Labor went well then and I was 10 cm in an hour. My 7 lb baby boy arrived at 11:30 AM on October 24th. That was a record for me, even though labor slowed for awhile! I felt thrilled and elated to finally meet my baby and I felt healed of all the fear and trauma of my previous birth. Thanks and praise to God! It was also a blessing because the nurses and doctors remembered the difficulty I'd had delivering my third child and were joyful along with me.

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Jesuis's VBAC

11/12/2013

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On Saturday October 19, 2013, I was a little stressed out and needing time for myself to relax. I was 39 weeks and 1 day pregnant, and I was getting tired of it! I had a 2 year old who wanted to be under mommy all the time, so it was kind of stressful.

I decided to take a nice warm bath around 11:00 that morning. I was in the bath for about an hour just relaxing, trying to get rid of the stress while listening to music. I got out of the bath around noon and sat down with my son and started to watch one of his favorite shows, Paw Patrol. Around 12:20, I felt my first contraction, and I just blew it off, but then another one came around 12:25 PM. That’s when I decided to time them just for fun. I wrote down the ones that came at 12:20 and 12:25, but I didn’t know how long they lasted. I wanted to time that too, so I waited for the next one. It came around 12:30 and lasted about a minute. I timed them for the next hour and they were coming about 5-6 minutes apart. I stopped timing them and decided just to relax.

Around 3:30 PM, they were getting very strong, so I started to get ready to go to the hospital, and by the time I got to the hospital they were 3 minute apart. Around 4:30 (about 30 minutes after I got there), they checked me and I was 7 cm dilated, 70% effaced and baby was at -2 station. I couldn’t believe how far I was!!

Around 8:00 PM, they came to check me again and I was 8 cm dilated, 80% effaced and baby was at -1 station. I started to get drained, but I was trying to go all natural, and I kept going with no pain medications.

About 11:00 PM, I was checked again and I was still the same, so they broke my water and left me alone for a while. At 2 AM, another check revealed still no progress. They inserted an internal monitor to see if the contractions were strong enough to get me to 10 cm. An hour later, they came back and told me that the contractions were not strong enough and they said I had a choice to get pitocin or have another c-section. I chose Pitocin and also got an epidural at that time.

Around 5:30, I started to feel a pain like I had to go to the bathroom so I called the nurse. When the nurse checked me, I was 10 cm and 100% effaced and baby was now at 0 station. The doctor had me push to see if I could get her lower. I tried but I could not push her down yet, so the doctor said to rest and she will be back. Once again, I went to sleep.

At 6:50 AM, they came in and turned my epidural off, and around 7 am I started pushing again. Every contraction I was pushing 2 to 3 times. By 7:20, they started to see her head. I was so happy!! Around 7:26, her head was crowning. I pushed in, let out a moan and got her head out. They stopped me for a second so they could suction her and then told me to push again. I pushed once again, let out another moan and got her shoulders out. They told me 1 more push so I pushed once more and my baby girl was born at 7:34 AM. I gave birth to my baby girl!!!

They placed her on me while they cleaned her, my husband cut the cord and then they took her to finish cleaning her up. They told me I had a 1st degree tear, which they stitched me up. We then got our skin to skin for an hour. During that hour, I breastfed my baby girl. Once the hour was up, I was tired so I asked them to take her so I can get some rest and my husband went home to get some sleep. When they took her I had a little suprise waiting for me on my stomach... she pooped on me! She was 7lb and 9.9 oz. 20 ½ inches long. Thanks to the help of my husband and my mother I got my VBAC. I DID IT I HAD MY VBAC!!!

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Hawa's VBAC

9/6/2013

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I live in London, UK and birthed in an NHS hospital. My first baby was a planned all natural water birth at a birthing center that ended up in an emergency cesarean for failure to progress. I had spontaneous labour, followed by nearly 3 days of exhausting prodromal labour which resulted in me requesting an epidural as soon as I was 4cm and 'officially' in labour. Things went down hill from there.

Looking at my 10.5 week old baby girl Aisha sound asleep, I am struck by a sense of familiarity. It is like she has always been here, always been mine and we were merely introduced again through the process of birth. It's hard to believe I carried her for one day shy of 43 weeks. She almost didn't want to come out.

When I fell pregnant 8 months after my son's emergency cesarean, there was no doubt in my head that I wouldn't or couldn't have her vaginally. I plunged myself into research, I read birth stories and scientific publications. Most of all, I supplicated to the Almighty to guide me towards what was best for both of us.

My pregnancy was uneventful. By that, I mean I was besieged with the typical pregnancy niggles but nothing so bad as to make me never to want to become pregnant ever again. Nevertheless, I was put under consultant care because of my previous cesarean - I was considered high risk.

At my 24 week appointment, my consultant was understanding of my intention for a VBAC. She explained the pros and cons of a VBAC vs repeat cesarean all the same. However, when I saw her again at 36 weeks, she mentioned that a VBAC was too risky and that she attended one recently where a rupture occurred and the baby died.

I was too shaken by her revelation and left the hospital deflated. It was not at all what I expected to hear 4 weeks to my due date. I chucked it down to her being still shaken by the awful experience of witnessing a baby dying. In hindsight, I realise if it had been a mother who had died from a cesarean under her watch, she would not have used it as justification for encouraging me to have a VBAC!

I know ruptures are rare. Statistically they occur in roughly 1 out of every 200 spontaneous, unaugmented VBAC births. So I was not under any illusion that I was 100% safe. It was around this time when I was researching the rights of birthing mothers under the NHS that I came across the statistic stating black women were less likely to be successful at a VBAC than white women. I thought to myself, hell no, this baby is coming out of my vagina and that was that!

I saw my consultant again at 38 weeks. She checked my cervix and declared I was just 1cm, barely effaced and labour was, to use her words, "not imminent." Again she tried to coax me into a RCS but I reiterated that the only time I will consider a cesarean is if it was an emergency. I then whipped out a giant notepad with questions and it shut her down immediately.

Well, by 40 weeks my due date came and went with nothing significant happening. My midwife gave me a membrane sweep and signed me off her care. Besides Braxton Hicks which were irregular and unpredictable, I was just your garden variety pregnant woman waddling from point A to B, thoroughly fed up with being pregnant and eager to meet her baby.

I checked into hospital around noon at 40+12 weeks for an induction. My plan was to wait for spontaneous labour, but hubby and I decided the anxiety of waiting and possible stress of daily fetal monitoring with a 17 month old toddler in tow would be too much to handle.

In triage I was strapped unto the monitor which showed baby was moving but not as much as it was expected to. By 8pm I was taken to the delivery suite. I went through my Birth Plan with the midwife which was to be minimal interventions, delayed cord clamping, skin to skin, no offer of pain relief unless requested and most importantly we did not want to be told the gender; we wanted to find out ourselves.

Around 9.30pm my membranes were ruptured, baby had passed meconium but they weren't too concerned. I was about 2cm, my cervix had thinned out but baby's head was still a bit high. I was allowed to walk around for 1 hour to get things moving. Hubby and I went to pray and afterwards headed downstairs to grab something to eat. We had to hurry back to my room because I underestimated how much fluid leaks post waters breaking.

At 11.30pm, syntocinon (pitocin) was administered starting from the lowest dose and an increments every half hour. I was contracting every 10 minutes on my own prior to this and still strapped to the monitor but was sat on the exercise ball. I was able to bounce up and down and wiggle around to help baby descend.

I remained mobile and upright for most of my labour, either rocking gently on the ball or leaning against the edge of the bed. Every 30 minutes the dose was increased and my contractions got more intense. I was coping well with gas and air. It made me so high I was giggling in between contractions yet it did absolutely nothing for the pain itself. Contractions were coming hard and fast, I was having one every 3 to 4 minutes.

5 hours later I had had enough, cue screaming for an epidural. Nothing helped with the pain, plus I had a weird pushy feeling at the end of each contraction. I would scream at the beginning and then grunt against my will towards the end. I can't remember telling the midwife I had an urge to push, but if I did, nobody took me seriously.

The anaesthetist took forever to arrive and forever to insert the epidural, all the while threatening me with paralysis if I didn't keep very still. As soon as it was in, I heaved violently and nearly passed out from low blood pressure. When the epidural kicked in, hubby and the nurse piled my numb legs unto the bed. Just at that moment, the Dr was doing her rounds. She wanted to check my progress only to see a head of hair peeking out.

She says to the midwife, "deliver her." Those were the most beautiful words I had heard all day. I was ecstatic. I couldn't believe it was finally happening.

I tried to push but felt nothing. Darn epidural! I was completely numb waist down. I KNEW I was bearing down but the Dr said I wasn't. Then baby's heart rate began to drop. She told me baby was stuck and needed to come out ASAP and to push really hard. I pushed and pushed but baby wouldn't budge. So she said she was going to do an episiotomy and then use a ventouse to help baby out. Two assisted pushes later with a lot of coaching and and encouragement from hubby, our precious baby slid out. A screaming 3.589kg (7lb9oz) wriggling red lump of a baby.

She was immediately placed on my tummy, with her back to me, while they waited for her cord to stop pulsating. I was too giddy with emotions to check if it was a boy or a girl. Then hubby told me and it was as if I had always known.

While stitching me up the Dr said she was born with a nuchal hand and I received a second degree tear. If you ask me, it was all worth it. I felt and still feel incredibly blessed. It was my ideal birth, despite the pain from induction, despite it not being as intervention free as I has envisaged, despite getting an epidural 10 minutes before she was born, despite repeated warnings that I will be wheeled away for a cesarean if I didn't progress, I would do it over again in a heartbeat. I thank Allah for His Mercy and Compassion and for the wonderful blessing He bestowed on us.

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Tiffany's VBAC

Alysia's VBAC

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