Raegan LeiLani's Birth Story

Baby's Name: Raegan LeiLani
Due Date: 4/18/2012
Birth Date: 3/25/2012
Gestational Age: 36 weeks 4 days
Weight: 8 lbs 2.2 oz
Length: 20.75 inches

It started Saturday night, March 24th. I was having pretty steady contractions and a lot of cramping so I decided to take the boys for a walk to see if they would get any closer together. We walked around the block and by the time we got home I was getting very sharp pains in my incision area from my previous c-section. The contractions were all but gone, but with the sharp pains I was now having I thought I better call the on-call dr to see if I should be concerned. The on call dr told me to head up to the hospital to be monitored.

We got up to the hospital, they hooked me up to an iv for fluids and then had the staff dr come by to check me out. He basically said it was just pressure from the baby’s head being so low that was causing all the cramping I was having (Duh!) and the sharp pains were probably nothing to worry about. He gave me a Percocet and discharged me. I was kinda pissed at both him and the on call dr from my dr’s office at this point because she made it seem like I needed to rush to the hospital but then made it seem like I was over reacting by what she told the staff dr at the hospital. The nurse who came in to send me home felt so bad, she could tell I was in a lot of pain and told me she didn’t think they should be sending me home. But since she was just a nurse, she had no say in it so instead she told me that my actual dr was on call the whole next day and to call her if the pain didn’t ease up at all.

We left the hospital just before 2 am and I wanted Taco Bell so bad so we stopped at Taco Bell and were stuck in line behind a cab full of drunk idiots. As soon as they finished ordering, the lights shut off. I was PISSED! Thankfully we found another Taco Bell a few miles up the road that was open, so all was well

Anyway, we get home, eat our Taco Bell and go to sleep. I ended up sleeping maybe an hour total through the night because I was still in a LOT of pain. The Percocet didn’t help at all. I finally got out of bed at 9 and decided to call my dr. I talked to her for just a couple of minutes explaining what was going on and she said that if we had the baby that day, chances are she would be fine, but there was still a risk of breathing problems since she was still a little early. However, she felt that it was better to get her out than risk more serious complications like a rupture. She told me to head back up to the hospital and we would do my c-section that day.

I went back to the bedroom, sat on the bed and Bret woke up. I asked him how he felt about having a baby that day. He sat up (still half asleep) and said “Ok…ok…” Lol. So I took a shower and we were on our way to the hospital. On the way, I realized I had only packed newborn outfits for the baby and told him where the two preemie outfits we had were just in case she was too small for the newborn outfits so he could come home and get them if need be.

We got to the hospital at about 11:30 am and they took us back to a L&D room to get me ready for the surgery. Everything was moving so fast, I was expecting a few hours of sitting around waiting anxiously for everything to start, but at about 12:55 the nurse came in and said my dr was on her way to the hospital. Bret asked what time they expected to start the c-section at and the nurse said 1:15. Holy crap! We started calling/texting everyone to let them know she would be here VERY soon!

They wheeled me back to the operating room and that’s when I started to get nervous, because the spinal they did with my last c-section was not the greatest experience. So I’m sitting there waiting, and waiting and just wanting the spinal to be done and over with and they tell me we might have to wait a little while because a mom was delivering and her baby’s heart rate kept dropping down into the 30’s and they might need to do an emergency c-section on her. Thankfully her baby was just fine and she delivered a couple of minutes later. So, the anesthesiologist does my spinal and it was so much better than last time. I barely even felt the needle.

They let Bret come in the room a few minutes later and they started the c-section. The nurses knew ahead of time that we had two names picked out, one for a dark haired baby and one for a blonde baby. My dr told Bret to lean over the screen and start taking pictures and a couple seconds later I hear one of the nurses say “Well, no guessing what her name is.” Then Bret looks down at me and tells me “Her name is Raegan”. She was born with a very full head of jet black hair. They got her out and the NICU team took her off to the side to clean her up and check her out. I was trying to focus on what they were doing with her and to make sure she was ok but all I could think about was how my stomach was starting to hurt really bad.

Bret came over to tell me that she weighed 8 lbs 2.2 oz and was 20.75 inches long. I was shocked and so was everyone else. We didn’t expect her to be so big 3.5 weeks early, lol. Guess we won’t be needing those preemie outfits after all considering the newborn outfits we have are all on the small/tight side. He also asked me if she could have a little formula. I guess her blood sugar was 41 and if it goes lower than 40 they have to take her to the NICU. I said of course and he got to feed her her first bottle right away. Thankfully it did the trick and brought her blood sugar up so she didn't need to go to the NICU at all.

Anyway, Bret asked me if I was ok because I was making a funny face I guess and I told him it hurt. He kept asking me to tell them it hurt, but I was just worried that if I told them how much pain I was in they would put me to sleep so they could finish up and then I would miss everything that was going on with Raegan. The anesthesiologist over heard us though and as soon as Bret walked back over to Raegan, he asked me how much I was feeling. I told him I could feel everything they were doing to me and it hurt BAD. He said he would give me as much morphine as he could through my iv but if that didn’t help he would have to put me under. So he gave me the morphine and I just kept my mouth shut until they finally finally finished. Longest 10 minutes of my life!!!

During this time, the NICU nurse found a tooth in Raegan’s mouth. Bret came over to tell me. I guess while they were sucking the fluid out of her mouth he saw the tooth and it had just fallen out so he grabbed it right before she swallowed it. Everyone in the room was amazed and they had to pass it around because none of them had ever heard of a baby being born with a tooth before. They put it in a Ziploc baggy for us and were joking how we’d have to have the tooth fairy visit us that night, lol.

My dr finally announced that she was done, they handed me my precious baby girl and took us back to recovery. I was in love with her right away.