{A Birth Story}

The Birth of Vivian Claire

Vivian Claire is our second born, and wow we do love her so. With my first pregnancy it was pretty easy, (although I did have the joy of getting gestational diabetes) I delivered right at 40 weeks. My labor was ten hours, and only pushed for 15 minutes. So, when we received the news of our second pregnancy, I was so excited. This was going to be a breeze!

My due date was in September.  I like to stay very active in Spring and much into Summertime. I love to run, so I did up until about seven months. I had a routine doctors visit at about 35 weeks. I was feeling a lot of braxton hicks, or so I thought.

My doctor seemed pretty concerned and sent me right to the hospital. This is when it all changed. I was contracting so much, I had to stay over night to be monitored. This little girl inside of me was letting me know, something is up!

I was in preterm labor. With enough meds, the contractions slowed and I was sent home to be on bed rest. Now, I know many babies are born early and do just fine. But, this was my first experience and I was so scared. After being in a lot of pain and the contractions were not really going away, I was back in ER on the third day of bed rest.

I told my husband I knew that this was it, I was in labor! My water broke after only about 10 minutes of being in triage. I was so scared for my little baby, she was coming, but I knew she needed more time to grow. The neonatal team came in to give us the facts of what we could or couldn’t expect. I was just short of 36 weeks gestation. So her lungs could be okay, or they could be not so good. Only a couple hours later I was dilated to a four, I told my husband, this is it, she’ll be here so soon! And that is when it all changed, or I should say DIDN’T change!

We hit a stall point! Little Miss Vivian was laboring in my back. Multiple professionals could not figure out the problem. We tried every laboring position, two rounds of pitocin and nothing, absolutely nothing happened. By this time I was begging for a c-section. We were at hour 30, and I was done! Vivian’s heart rate still looked okay so we just kept waiting. The last doctor to come, said something just isn’t right. It ended up not all of my sac and fluid came out. It had slipped in front of Vivian and therefore not letting her come all the way down.

Once that issue was resolved, she quickly came 15 minutes later! What a long 31 hours that was! Vivian had a risk of infection and her sugar was very low. So low that we almost lost her! She was quickly sent to the neonatal unit. Our small 5lb 4oz baby was soo tiny, and we were so scared for her. She was a little fighter, she only ended up staying for four days. We were so happy and thankful to bring her home.

Now, she is a spunky and oh so silly 18 month old. Vivian Claire wanted to make a statement for her grand appearance, and she did just that. She just didn’t want to make it easy for her mama and daddy like her big sis did.