Jensen Kinyon

Admitted after a brief stay in maternity triage to confirm water had truly broken at some time in the night or early morning when I woke up for work, we were really in labor. This is it I finally get to meet my boy!

I decided to keep things going I would just go ahead and work, I had contractions all night I was uncomfortable but I knew if I kept moving I had a better chance to keep contracting and dilating etc. 

I got done with work around noon and my family was in town from Afton so we were going to meet them for Pizza at Fong’s Downtown.  Contractions got to 2-3 minutes apart so we left and headed to the hospital.

Once we had our room the nurse T started per Dr. H’s orders; IV and Pitocin. In spite of laboring all night and all day – by now it was about 2pmish I was barely 1cm dilated.  Not much to show for and exhausting day already.  But Dr. H assured us all (by now there was a large and growing group of family and support gathering at the hospital) we would have a baby tonight, and he said Jensen’s heart rate was excellent and that Jensen was happy bouncing around and he would check back later.

Plan was to increase the Pitocin by two every once in a while so we went from a starting point of 8miliunits and by 11pm that night when I finally made it to about 2 or 3 cm, anesthesiologist was called and since I was so sensitive and experienced so much pain during checks I opted for an epidural.  We were at 16miliunits on the Pitocin, but it had to be reduced and turned down to 8 miliunits again while I got the epidural, it was a welcome break, I was exhausted and Z, who was my second nurse kept saying that Jensen was “kind of” balled up on one side.  Z didn’t know why he was not decending.  While I was busy laboring my family kept asking questions between my contractions.  “how about an ultra sound to see what is happening in there. “ Z said we know what’s happening in there “ and she explained that basically there was a second pouch or pocket of amniotic fluid trapped between Jensen and where he was supposed to go and we didn’t need an ultra sound, because as labor progresses the baby will come down and squish it. 

This is where trouble began, the baby remained balled up, there was no ultra sound to see how much fluid or how big this pocket was and the baby remained balled up until morning when Dr. H came in and ruptured that pocket and discovered the meconium staining.  He then explained that the baby must have gotten stressed (he was balled up) and had a bowel movement in utero.  He further explained that it happens all the time not to worry and there would just be a few extra people on hand at the time of delivery to help Jensen with his lungs.  At this point we said okay it’s time for a C-section as I was still dilating very slowly he said no, lets just see what happens here now that the membrane has ruptured.  We all thought it was odd but he’s the Dr right?  So I went on Laboring another hour. The anesthesiologist came in and said Dr. H was gone but Dr. S was on and checking and watching the progression of labor. We’d probably see her soon etc.  So we carried on thinking okay that’s two Dr.s who are not alarmed about the meconium staining  they are on top of it we kept laboring very slowly advancing until it was time to push, which seemed like forever. 

Dr. S came to check me about she said nothing about the meconium staining so when we finally had progressed enough she came in to observe the pushing phase and suggested to me that she was getting concerned about Jensen’s high heart rate it had come up a lot and since that happens with the pushing phase we should not worry but that she felt that she would need to use a vacuum to gently guide him out.   

She explained that I could tear etc. or I could keep pushing for another hour or two.  I was exhausted and worried about Jensen so I signed off to the vacuum method and then things got crazy.

While I was working on pushing my family watched in horror as the gentle guiding seemed more like Jensen being pulled out, the vacuum came off but she had already explained that it could not come off more that 3 times or they would then have to do an emergency C-section.  Finally Jensen was pulled out with a major push and pull a huge gush of fluid shot out with Jensen and drenched Dr. S who was already handing Jensen off to the specialists who had filled the room from every corner.  There were even people in the tiny bath room working. 

I was extremely puzzled, there was no color to Jensen, he was gray. I could not see what was happening but judging from the faces of my family their shocked faces and tears and the frenzied look of people rushing around I knew it was not good.  I could hear the them shouting out time and I could hear the Dr working on Jensen say he wasn’t breath on his own, we have to stop intubating and get him on oxygen. It was horrifying!  Dr. S was still talking to me she was explaining that I need to be stitched up and the nurse began working on me they were asking me questions making sure I was not feeling anything but I continued to search the room and the faces of my family for reassurance some kind of sign that Jensen was alright.  I got none.  Brock was comforting me saying it’s alright I was born the same way. 

Then they took Jensen away in an incubator said they were going to the NICU I told Brock to go with the baby but he was worried about me, I told him I’m fine, stay with our son. 

By then Dr. S had been called to another delivery somewhere and I was just sitting there a mess unable to do anything or even cover up because I was still needing to be stitched up.  My mom said it’s not looking good, but I knew Brock was going to be with him and I was not feeling any pain just shaking from the trauma and the hormones. I kept asking to be covered and mom said I couldn’t be covered because Dr. S was going to come back and stitch me up and they wanted to keep me hygienic until she returned.

I wanted to see my dad but again I had to wait, the room was getting empty, they began pushing out equipment and cleaning things up they removed the baby bed that was in the room.  I was getting more and more worried and upset.

 

Finally she came back and finished stitching me up.  I was finally able to cover up enough to see my dad who could help me process some things since Brock wasn’t there.

We began slowly getting updates about Jensen, he was alive but on oxygen but it was as they feared Meconium was in his lungs and stomach. He was also in critical condition

 

 

Sorry too much emotion here for caring bridge, it will need to be bulleted down to simple facts.