Our second child has a mind of his own and made his arrival 3 weeks before his due date. It was quite the eventful few days leading up to his birth, but in the end both of us ended up being doing well and not having major complications. We are so thankful that things were smoothly for his delivery and we all got to go home a day after his birth.
This second pregnancy for me was fairly straight forward. I have been thankful to have boring pregnancies. The most excitement that this little guy gave us was some premature atrial contractions (PACs) during the second trimester, but thankfully he seemed to grow out of those. His due date was 2/16/19, but he decided that 1/26/19 was a better day to arrive. In the two days leading up to that Saturday, I had contractions throughout both days. The night before he arrived I spent the whole night awake with contractions, but they didn’t increase in intensity, they just persisted throughout the night and then finally spaced out some during the next day. I had experienced this with my first pregnancy, but they stopped, these contractions continued and I figured at this rate, we were going to have this baby sooner rather than later. I went to the OB on Friday morning (1/25/19) and I was 3cm diluted and 80% effaced. I went to work on that day and spent the day, slowly walking around and then managing contractions throughout the entire day.
I had gotten our bags packed the night before, because I was awake, contracting and unable to sleep. That Friday night, I hung out with a friend, tried to relax and take it easy and then went to bed. I woke up around 1:50am with contractions that were stronger than the night before and they were consistently 5 minutes apart. After tracking them for 30 minutes, I woke up Chas, we grabbed our stuff, put William in the car and headed to the hospital. Thankfully Chas' parents had their phone nearby and we got in touch with them and they came over at 330am to stay with William. Chas dropped me off at the hospital, took William home and then came back to the hospital to be with me and help as we went through this labor process.
Chas was amazing through the whole process! I have such an amazing partner and I am so thankful to have him by my side. He did a great job at organizing plans for William while we were in the hospital. William got to hang out with both set of grandparents and that was amazing.
After arriving at the hospital around 245am, I was taken up to a Labor and Delivery room and then continued with contractions. We had an amazing L&D nurse, Stephanie who was so helpful when the contractions got stronger. She helped to press on my back and provided counter pressure, which helped make the contractions more bearable. I got up to try to use the bathroom some time around 630am and that is when my bag of waters bulged and then things started to progress quickly. Our little one arrived after several good pushes at 650am. There was a little excitement just before he made his appearance … he had gotten stuck and they realized that he had a nuchal cord x2 (the umbilical cord was wrapped around his neck twice). They were able to reposition him slightly to get that cord from around his neck and then he came right out! The NICU team was called, because they weren’t quite sure why he was stuck and they came right away to check out the baby. His initial apgar measurement was 1, which is quite low and he was floppy, but thankfully he perked right up and then had apgar’s > 7 after that. He didn’t need any oxygen support and was doing well and I got to nurse him and hold him within that first hour.
We named him Samuel John Busenburg. He ended up weighing 5lbs and 13oz and was a small little guy compared with William, but that is what happens when you arrive 3 weeks early. The healthcare team at Women’s was amazing! From the security guy who took me up to triage, the OB resident who actually delivered Samuel, our L&D RN and Postpartum RNs (both named Stephanie) and all the staff were fantastic. Samuel gave us a little cause for concern prior to discharge, because he wasn’t pooping. After some rectal stimulation and a glycerin chip, he ended up passing meconium, which was slightly plugged. He has stopped pooping since!
I truly believe that God knew that Samuel needed to come early, because of his nuchal cord. If he had waited and grown more, he would have had a tougher time coming vaginally and who knows, I might have needed an emergency C-section. Thankfully everything worked out and we are so thankful for a healthy, strong baby boy who joined our family a few weeks early!
