We have our little girl. And couldn't be happier. We're so in love with her.
It was a long process to getting her in our arms, but WOW - God is so good and was so there with us during everything.
We were all prepared to go in on Tuesday, August 31st for the version with Dr. Shrout when on Friday the 27th we got a call that there was now an opening on the 24th instead. We were so grateful to the Lord for this, as we knew the sooner that we could try it the more likely it would be that it would be successful. We then got a call on the morning of the 24th telling us they had an opening earlier. Ryan came home from work early, we packed up our stuff, and headed off to the hospital. We checked in and I got hooked up to the IV (yuck), the monitors, and we waited.
We finally got the epidural (more yuck) and Dr. Shrout came to turn the baby. She said she might have to get up on the bed to push against the baby to get them to move, I'd heard stories about bruised bellies and it taking a long time, so I prepared myself for what was about to happen. After checking the baby on an ultrasound, she directed her assistant to hold the baby's legs in place and she found the head and pushed a little bit. She then said to her assistant "move your hands I need to push to there" he replied, "there's nothing there" and she pushed a little and leaned to me and said "they turned". I did not process this... the nurse and Ryan asked what was going on because Dr. Shrout removed her hands and was getting the ultrasound machine again. It only took her 30-40 seconds to turn the baby, she pushed a little and Evangeline turned all by herself. God was so good, no bruising, it didn't hurt, and we could move forward into labor... no c-section. Praise God.
After thanking Dr. Shrout again and again we headed off to a labor and delivery room, got hooked up to the monitor for the baby's heartbeat, another to monitor contractions, and another for blood pressure and pulse. They kept the IV fluids going and we left the epidural in, but had no medication going into it. As we waited for the midwife to arrive we saw the contractions that my body was doing itself and were hopeful that things would get moving soon. Since my body wasn't ready for labor, even though it was contracting, the midwife wanted to give meds to prepare my body more. Overnight, while still hooked up to everything we tried to get some sleep to prepare for the next day. At 8am the next morning I was allowed to eat (yey food) and then they started to induce labor and had me up to the highest dose soon. My contractions became more consistent and started getting a bit stronger and I didn't sleep well... fast forward to 9pm. Barely any changes so we shut it down for the night, gave me a different med to prepare my body more, and I was given sleeping pills.
The contractions continued in the night and I didn't get much sleep (although more than the night before) and then around 4am four nurses came rushing into the room and they adjusted the monitors, gave me oxygen, put some meds into my IV, turned me on my side, and it turns out that our sweet baby's heartbeat slowed to a bad level and alarms had gone off and they came to the rescue.
Praise God for quick nurses, their knowledge, and that our baby's heartbeat got back to normal. A little later it happened again. They started up the induction meds again and away we went (or hoped to). The midwife working with us now was Karen, who is my favorite (although Angel was so great the day and night before) and she went to talk to the doctor on call that is associated with the midwife practice (and praise God the doctor on call was one of the partners in the practice!). She came back with a new idea to try (Praise God!) and get my body further along again. Karen was great and tried several times to get this new idea to work, but she wasn't able to and the baby's heartbeat suffered each time she tried. She decided to go and get the doctor to come and do it and she also wanted to check in with him because the heartbeat was slowing more often now. Dr. Martin came and was able to do it (Praise God again!) and we started waiting more. Now the contractions picked up again and I started to get uncomfortable and actually had to work through them! (Praise God for this too!)
Then the baby made it known that labor was NOT good for her. The heartbeat was lowering several times with and without the contractions. At 3pm Karen and Dr. Martin came and spoke with us and they were too concerned with the drops in heartbeat that they wanted to get the baby out. Dr. Martin said that he was sure the cord must be wrapped around the baby somewhere and that he was sure she wouldn't be able to handle anymore labor. We were quite disappointed, a c-section was not what we wanted, but the baby suffering is so much worse. We were grateful for clear direction and the Lord had worked on our hearts during the time leading up to this - we were ready and excited to meet our baby. They said they'd get started with the process and we'd do it within the hour.
Ryan sent out the word and came and mentioned that people were praying for us (THANK YOU ALL!!!) and Karen asked if she could pray for us! I knew I liked her :o) She prayed for us and it was such a good prayer and she stuck by my side from that point on until I was in recovery with our daughter in my arms. I'm so grateful to God for Karen - he really blessed us with having her there. I'm so so grateful. By 3:30 we were heading back to the operating room, Ryan had to wait outside for a bit but praise God Karen stayed with me. She helped me through them removing the epidural and then giving me a spinal (the epidural had been in too long and so was useless at this point) and then she went and got Ryan.
4:01pm Evangeline Lily Tiren was born. 6lbs. 14oz. and beautiful.
It was hard not to be able to hold her right away, but Ryan could and held her close to me.
As soon as we were out of the OR I was able to hold her and everything that had happened for the past few days ended with a healthy baby and happy parents.
The cord had been wrapped around her neck twice, hence the problems she had with labor but everything was fine with her. She's a sweet little girl and brings us so much joy. We're so grateful to God for bringing us through and so grateful to all our friends and family for praying for us. We could not have done any of this without the strength and grace God gave us. We felt loved and cared for the whole time. Thank you all for praying for us and Angie. I don't think we can say thank you enough. We can't wait for each of you to meet her and to say thank you to each of you. God is so good.
