Yeah, so it's been 2 months or so since the last episode, but I really wanted to get this all down so you'll have to bear with me. In case you are curious, the first two sections are here (scroll down).

Ok, so they had me hooked up to a zillion hootchie monitoring devices and were promising good things once the meconium was rinsed out. I could now officially tell that I was having contractions. They didn't hurt or anything but they made me kind of pause to think.

Somewhere in here Megan went to the car to get our crap because we knew we weren't going home.

Rather shortly after they broke my water, our doc (Dr. K) arrived. We saw her and all was glorious. We were SURE that she would tell them to back off and leave us the hell alone. We were SO wrong. She checked my dilation (maybe 4 cm?). She glanced at the contraction chart and announced that we needed to get in for a C-section "right away." We were stunned. Then she did it. Something I never thought she'd do. Something that I bet she wouldn't ever do unless she really meant it.

She played the dead baby card.

It went something like this: "Well, we can let you labor, but I'm not sure this baby can survive delivery."

NOTHING trumps the dead baby card. We asked for a few minutes alone to mentally prepare. They left to prepare the surgical stuff. We cried for a while and then called my parents to let them know that there would be a baby pronto.

They wheeled me to the surgical room for my epidural or whatever the hell they put in my back and told Megan they would send someone for her. NEVER, EVER let them separate you. Once the separate you, you can only be reunited by Them and They have other things to worry about.

The surgical room was one that none of them had ever used before. Apparently there were two other women getting sliced up at that exact time and they got the normal rooms. This room had a crazy loud fan that made them all have to yell. All of the little tubey hook-ups and stuff were in weird places too, which meant that people were having to do the Mission Impossible walk to get through the room. It was very stressful for everyone. There were also conversations like this throughout the next couple hours...

"Where are the (whatever)?"
"I think they are in that case in the corner."
(a little annoyed) "Can you get me some?"
"It's locked and nobody knows where the key is"

They had a tough time with my epidural. The guy seemed to have trouble finding the space between my bones. Here was the worst part:

(following what (I suppose) was supposed to numb me)
Me (to the woman who I'm hunched over on because my wife has been told to stay behind): "Ow"
Woman: "She felt that"
Anesthetist: "Huh?"
Woman: "She felt that"
Anesthetist: "Oh, I must be hitting bone. Sorry about that"
(repeat 2 or 3 times)

Then I'm laying down and the big curtain is up. Megan STILL isn't there. I keep asking for her and they keep saying that they've sent someone to get her. I think we're waiting (can't feel or see a thing). Apparently we weren't because when Megan DID make it to the room*, I was already either cut or being cut right then. She does the crazy walk above and below tubes to get to me and sits on the little seat by my head. She was warned several times by several people that the seat wasn't really connected and that it and she could fall if she didn't pay attention. She was annoyed why so many people felt the need to tell her this. What she didn't know was that the one on the other side had fallen right before she got there and made a bad noise. There were enough bad noises in the room with the fan going and all the shouting that nobody wanted any more bad noises.

Anyway, very shortly after this Dr. K announced, "I see an ear" and then after that "It's a skinny baby girl!" There was simultaneous baby wailing with this second announcement. Did I get to see the baby girl? No. I think maybe Megan could, but she couldn't get to her (because of all the tubes and wires everywhere). We find out that the crew of people were "working on her" and that we could see her in a minute. Then I couldn't breathe.

I don't mean that it took my breath away, I mean I COULDN'T BREATHE. I started wheezing in Megan's general direction and she quickly informs that staff that I was suffocating. They kept asking if I needed to vomit. I was immobilized and smothering and they were offering me a puke tray. Isn't "holding your throat" the international symbol of "I can't breathe?" Did they change it??? Anyway, they tell me that I COULD breathe and that I WAS breathing, but that I just couldn't feel it because my epidural had gone up too high and made my lungs numb. Basically they were asking me to have a Peter Pan moment where I just had to BELIEVE that I was breathing. I wasn't sure I trusted them. They showed my O2 level on a machine that said I was 100% oxygentated. God it was scary, but I really couldn't argue with that. They told me to just act like I was breathing and I would be. Weird, but it worked.

Oh, while this was going on, they made Megan leave because they blamed her for getting me riled up. I bet they just didn't want TWO people knowing they screwed up my epidural. Anywho, the good thing is that they took Megan to where Quinn was! She was perfect and scored a 9 on her first apgar. When they were working on her, I guess they must've been trying to do a lot of suctioning (remember - lots of meconium and this can cause infection). Technically you are supposed to do this before they take their first breath. I can only assume that they did.

Somewhere around here, I actually got to see her. I believe my first thought (besides LOVELOVELOVE) was, "somebody shrunk my dad."

Dr. K did a lot of stitching on me. She double-stitched everything so that I would be able to do a VBAC someday if I wanted to. Throughout my stay at the hospital, I received numerous compliments on my stitching. I guess she did a good job. I am told that my placenta was separating and that was why I was bleeding. Nobody suggests why this happened. I'm told my placenta is being sent to pathology.**

They wheeled me to a recovery room and I actually got to HOLD her. Then they brought my parents in who had driven the 2 hours up since I had called. They were smitten. Then the lactation consultant came in and got us started on nursing. I really don't remember much from the recovery room except for my mom making my (exceedingly shy and private) dad take pictures of me breastfeeding and saying phrases like "Zoom in." I also remember shaking so hard that I was afraid that I would drop her, but knowing that I really wouldn't.

I stayed in the hospital until Sunday. I was told that my room sucked and that all the other rooms were better, but I was fine. We were a bit too close to the helipad, but hey...

I hope that in waiting this long to write this out that not too many things were forgotten. I'm so relieved to finally have this down. I thank you for reading this massive tome.

* I found out later that they had left Megan alone in the room for an HOUR without telling her where I was or what was going on....
** The pathology report came back that it had separated (duh). It also said that it was in the 95th percentile for size. My baby was in the 3rd percentile. I'm sure this difference somehow is important, but there don't seem to be many placenta experts.