Tylee’s Birth Story at Madison Memorial Hospital | Jessica Calderwood Photography

I’ve been wanting to add more of personal life to this blog, and what better way to get really personal then my daughters birth story! So if you aren’t into details of my labor and delivery than feel free to skip over this post but I did add some fresh new baby pictures at the end. I can still imagine the smell of her newness all over again…..

Tylee’s Birth Story
A little preface – My previous three labors have been 30-45 minutes so being that we live an hour away from the hostpital I deliver at, we had decided to stay the night in a hotel before being induced the next day just in case because I was already dilated 5 cm, and I had hopes that I would go into labor on my own.
September 21, 2016
We leisurely woke up this morning and had breakfast. I had set in my mind one last thing that I wanted to do before going to the hospital, and that was to get a pedicure. For whatever reason, having to schedule when this baby was going to be born was hard for me to mentally accept and so I had these little things in my mind that I had to have done to be ready to go to the hospital and pedicure was my last thing on the checklist then there was no other excuses I could come up with. I thoroughly enjoyed my pedicure and then called the Dr.’s office to find out the plan. They had me come in to be checked again and then they would send me over to the hospital. Even after a night of no contractions, I had progressed to 6 centimeters and the nurse said the baby was super low. So the call was made and we had an hour to kill before heading to the hospital. I said lets go for another walk as a last ditch effort to go into labor on my own. Chantz decided he wanted to walk around BYU Idaho campus since he hasn’t seen all of the new upgrades. We pretty much walked from one end of campus to the other. It was comical being in this phase of life walking on our old college campus when life was very different. I was definitely moving a lot slower by the end and having a lot of pressure and constant tightness in my stomach but no real contractions happening.
We made it to the hospital finally! They got us all checked in, hospital gown on, IV placed and ready to get things going. I couldn’t believe we were actually here again having another baby. The smells and sounds and being in the delivery room brings back so many memories and it feels so weird but not weird at the same time being back in this, almost sacred place, to have a baby. Dr Merideth came in and broke my water at 2:30 pm and again commented how low the baby is sitting. I stayed laying on the bed to relax for a little while and until the contractions started up. With my last induction it took about 2 hours for the contractions to kick in and get labor started, and I figured it would be the same this time as well. Well 2 hours came and went with very little contractions, and the ones I had were not intense at all. So I got on the birthing ball to try and get things moving. Still just a couple random contractions, nothing real. They said I should try to go for a walk, so we walked for a while, and again hardly any contractions. I was slowly starting to get concerned but not too bad. I was hungry though and was able to have some toast. It was weird I would start to get a couple that felt more intense and I would think, alright this is maybe it! Then they would stop. The Dr came in a couple times and was also confused why it wasn’t kicking in, but said sometimes it can just take some time, but it will kick in. He also offered to start me on pitocin and said that would for sure get things going and that I would go fast and it would be done with. I REALLY did not want to go that route but I’m sure he was starting to get impatient and it was getting late. It was 10:00 pm and besides the random couple hard contractions, nothing was going on and Dr Merideth checked on me again offering the pitocin. I asked him if I could walk around one more time and then make a decision after that. He said that was fine, but that he was going to go lay down until then. We got back up and started walking again. Chantz was such a good sport through all of this and was really patient and was willing to keep walking every stinking hallway in that hospital. So I finally started to get some good contractions kicking in! I kept praying, please let my contractions kick in and get labor started, I was so scared to have to get on Pitocin. I had a couple really good ones I had to stop walking and breath through, so we made our way back to Labor and Delivery just in case so we were closer. And of course they slowed down as soon as we got back, so I said I’m going to go keep walking the halls if that is what I have to do! They slowly kicked in again and were somewhat regular, but I was getting tired!
September 22, 2016
It was now midnight so I sat down for a minute and of course no more contractions. I went to sit up after a couple minutes and I felt like I was starting to leak some fluid, so I slowly moved again and it felt like I was going to leak a lot of fluid! Chantz told me to get off the chair so I didn’t leak on it! I stood up and I felt a huge gush of liquid, it was like my water had broken again! I stood there trying to at least keep what I could on my shoes and keep my legs together to not leak anymore. Chantz went to grab the nurse and they brought me some towels. I was so surprised by how much water came out again!! The nurses said it was possible that there may have been another water sack in there! Which would totally make sense, my body still thought I had my water intact, of course that’s why I’m not going into labor! So at 12:30am labor started and it started quick! I got on the birthing ball to work through my contractions. I loved the ball with my last labor, but this time it just didn’t seem to be making very much of a difference. There was SO much pressure in my back and my hips and I couldn’t get any relief from it. After just a couple intense contractions, I started getting hot and light headed like I always do and told the nurse we are probably getting close. Chantz grabbed my little fan and I asked for an ice pack and wet washcloth. This was when Chantz was so supportive and helpful. He kept the fan on my face and was pressing my lower back with the ice pack. The ice pack brought a good amount of relief and Chantz kept pressing it all over my entire back, it helped so much. I think I went through transition quickly after that and then there was no more relief at this point. It was constant pain and pressure through my lower back and my hips and it felt like something was moving down towards my butt, so the nurse finally said she needed to check me and to get on the bed. I couldn’t even fathom moving at this point, I probably dragged it out a good 10-20 minutes sitting on the ball and saying ok after this contraction I’ll get up, which at this point I couldn’t even tell the difference if I was having contractions or not, it was just constant presssure! I finally got on the bed but then I was afraid to lay down because that would hurt even more on my back so I swayed back on forth on the bed for a while too. I should have just sucked it up and gotten it over with. I laid down and she said don’t move that baby is right there! I turned on my side and just rocked back and forth to distract from the overwhelming pain and pressure I was feeling. At 1:30 am I started pushing. As usual I can’t really feel much when I’m pushing and if I’m doing anything, but they said she was moving down. And again I could hardly tell when I was even having a contraction so the nurse was pushing on my stomach to feel for when I was having a contraction again. I kept pushing and Dr Merideth realized the baby wasn’t coming down very quickly anymore and checked and said it was transverse, or twisted sideways. He asked if he should use the vacuum and I said sure. But to my learning, this was a different vacuum than he had used in the past, it looked huge and I soon felt that it was huge. I have never felt so much pain in my life! I couldn’t even contain my yelling while he was placing it. I can’t even explain the amount of pain I was in but he was able to twist her while I was pushing and removed the vacuum. I was yelling and pulling at Chantz, it was almost unbearable, but I made it through it. I told Dr Merideth he wore me out and I needed a minute to breath after that. I may have said this baby already needs a spanking too! ☺ The baby was now twisted the right direction but was posterior, so he got the smaller vacuum and said let’s get this baby out. With one or two pushes her head was delivered and one more push and they laid the baby on my chest! We had another baby! At 1:52 am our little baby was delivered! I even said “we just had another baby!” And Dr Merideth said when they laid the baby on me, “well that’s not a very big baby.” Earlier he had mentioned this will probably be my biggest baby. Thank goodness that wasn’t the case. Then I realized we didn’t even check what it was! They had covered the baby with a blanket and was rubbing her down, when I said “hey wait, what is it?!” Everyone leaned in as they moved the blanket and announced it was a girl!! I was SO surprised!! I didn’t even think it could possibly be a girl!! I just smiled and laughed! They placed her under my gown for some skin to skin as I stared at our new baby girl taking in all of her features! Her hair was dark and her tiny nose and lips and we immediately noticed how much she looked like Whitley. She wasn’t crying very much and I kept saying they could take her if they needed to, but they said she was fine. They eventually took her and did all the assessments, and to my surprise she was 5 lbs 6 oz!! The OCD in me was so excited that all my kids had the number’s 5 and 6 in their weight!! And she was 18” like all of my babies were too! We are so in love with this new baby and so blessed to have her come to our family.