It was Tuesday, I had been driving to the hospital every few days for an NST since 34 weeks per my drs order after my blood pressure began to rise. He knew to look for this since I had a blood pressure problem at the end of my pregnancy with Stella. Funny thing, or not so funny thing is the entire pregnancy I stayed active, scrutinized everything I ate trying to keep my weight gain normal to AVOID this again, but nope 34 weeks came and my blood pressure shot up.
So anyway I left Stella at home with my mom that day and went to the hospital. About a half hour went by and the nurse came in with a cordless phone straight from 1995 (which is crazy because this hospital is pretty new). My dr was on the phone, when I said hello he immediately starting singing the “happy birthday” song to me (because he’s super awesome and the best dr ever 😉). I played dumb but I knew what he meant. He told me I wasn’t leaving, my blood pressure was 198/102, and that he’d be there in a few hours for my csection. I did know I’d be having a csection since that was my choice with this pregnancy after having Stella via csection after 27 hours of failed induction and labor. So of course with the thought of leaving Stella for more than a few hours looming in my thoughts for weeks I asked him if I could go home and come back tomorrow😂. He said no, I asked if I could just run home quick (the hospital is an hour from home) he said no again. Then I just absolutely lost it, I hadn’t properly prepared her for Mommy to be gone a few days and I didn’t say the goodbye I planned. I ugly cried for like an hour and pretty much once the nurses realized what I was crying about they all thought I was crazy.
The rest of the day went pretty fast, my husband arrived, we were taken back to the OR, everything went really smooth and at 5:45pm sweet baby Camreigh Holland was born. I had a “gentle csection” so we did skin to skin immediately, our families both got to come in the recovery room to visit and hold her. I had almost zero pain this time and was up and moving less than 12 hours later. I stayed the full 48 hours for Camreigh’s observation since she was born at 36w6d a few hours short of full term. I’m not trying to glamorize csections. HOWEVER I think a mom should be able to glamorize any kind of birth they want to. Was it my first choice to have 2 csections? The crazy answer is in a way yes, after years of struggling to get pregnant my ideal birth had a healthy baby at the end, however I got there and what happened to me was of very little importance.
My Best c-section Tips
1. Ask for anti-nausea meds during the procedure
2. Walk as soon as you can
3. Try to avoid long term IV if you can, for me it resulted in horrible swelling and edema days later
4. Ask for a waist wrap/support or bring one with you. I love UpSpring Brand.
5. Stay active without overdoing it
6. Think positive! Both times I just said to myself we’re healthy, I’m fine let’s move on, and besides the horrible swelling the first few days at home I recovered really fast.
I’m sharing Camreigh’s birth story for csection awareness month, and honestly mamas no matter how you had your baby, feel strong, feel accomplished, feel good about YOUR story, regardless of what that may be♥️
