Life With the Beagleys: Beckett's Birth Story

I went into the doctor on the 30th and my doctor said he would induce me on the 5th if I wanted. He wasn't scheduled to be on-call for awhile after that and if we didn't induce I would have someone else deliver Beckett. So I agreed.

The night of the 5th we were supposed to go in at 8:30 pm to start the induction. We were to call at 7:30 and check that there was room for us. I called and was told that L&D was full and that they would call later that night to tell us when to come in. They called at 1:10 in the morning and said to come in. We packed up and went in. We got there at 1:45 and were all checked in.

I was hooked up to every monitor imaginable and nothing was happening. Apparently, my blood pressure kept dropping to 80s/40s and the baby's heartrate then would fall to the 90s(normal is 120-160). Sooooo they thought that maybe they were not getting an accurate assessment of his heartrate. At 3:15, it was decided that they needed to break my water and monitor the baby with an electrode on his head. Well the other heartrate measurements were correct, his heartrate was really low.

It was decided to skip the cytotec that was planned and to start pitocin. They started it at 4:30 and told me to get some sleep. I laid down but was woken up because my blood pressure and baby's heartrate were again really low. The pitocin was halted and they had me try laying different ways, my right side and my back. Then they had me lay on my left and it got better. So pitocin was started again a little while later.

At 10:30 am I was dilated to a 4 and they were going to turn up the pitocin so I told them I would take that epidural whenever. Because of emergencies and such, I did not get my epidural until 12:30 pm. I felt awesome after that. At 1:30, I was dilated to 5 and by 2:30 I was dilated to 10. Of course my doctor had gone to his office at that point and the nurses were again concerned with my blood pressure so I had to wait to do anything until my dr. got back.

At 4:15 he got back and told the nurse to have me practice pushing for a little bit. I took one push and the nurse went running for him. She found him and two pushes later Beckett Max was born at 4:39 pm. He had the cord wrapped tightly around his little neck and it had to be cut before he was completely born. He was pretty blue to begin with but came around pretty quickly. He was 7lbs even and 20 3/4 inches long. His apgars were 6 and 8.

He is darling in every way. We instantly fell in love with Beckett the second he was given to me when he was born. You think you know what you will feel when your baby is first given to you, but it is so incredibly better than anything your mind can imagine. The elation, the overwhelming love and thankfulness, the relief from your fears, the awesomeness of the birth are so incredible. The minutes he was away for assessment were so long. I wanted so badly to just hold him in my arms.

Michael was amazing. He knew what I needed to hear, that Beckett was ok, that they got him to breathe, that he was beautiful. I could have not have gone through the day with anyone else. I needed him, his words, his encouragement, his presence.

We had a good first night in the hospital. Both sides of Grandparents came to visit as did the new big brother. Our dear friends the Burchetts, Carrillos, and Morgans all came by to visit. We were moved to the Mother/Baby floor and crashed. We did surprisingly well with getting sleep. Beckett woke up at 11, 2, and 4:30.