On Feb. 23, we went to the doctor to have our 38 week check up—a routine check-up with the usual ultrasound peep show, and fetal monitoring. However, this time, we had the joy of sharing it w/ Stephen’s mom. So Grammy got to see peanut in utero!
During the ultrasound, the doctor noted that the amniotic fluid was again, lower. She flipped on the Doppler to listen to his heart beat and it was also low, not in a range we like to see. After short deliberation, the doctor said that it was time to induce! The low amniotic fluid posed a threat mostly to the umbilical cord and we were encouraged to take action. So we agreed. The good news is we were mostly prepared for such an occurrence. The bags have been packed and in the car for about 3 weeks now, so I checked in and Stephen got the bags.
First stop was Labor & Delivery (L&D) for monitoring. We spent 30 min. on the monitor during which time the baby’s heart rate dropped 3 times – one of those times was while I was getting an IV inserted. There were two possible induction methods: internal hormonal stimulation or pictocen drip. While in the doc’s office, she was leaning toward the hormones, however, the monitoring showed that we needed to start a little bit slower with a “Pic Test”. This consisted of hooking me up to a very low dose of Pictocen and increasing the dosage every 30 min. for two hours.
The test went smashingly. I started having very gentle and regular contractions at 1.5 hours, but seeing as this was only a test (and a potential way of jump starting my body gently) when we reached the 2 hour mark the drip was stopped and we were monitored for another 30 min. w/o drugs. We returned every 2 hours for a 30 min. monitoring throughout the evening until our last session at 11pm. Finally, they told us we could go to sleep.
Stephen and I blearily ambled back to our room, got into bed and couldn’t sleep. We had both been nearly asleep in the final monitoring session, but now we couldn’t even think of sleep. Finally, hours later we both fell into a shallow state of sleep. New beds, new location, new sounds…these things all add up to not so excellent sleep. But we caught a couple of Zs
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