Ronald’s Birth Story – Part 2

A couple weeks ago I shared Ronald’s birth story, you can read that here. I also introduced him on the blog here and shared his newborn photos here. Today I am sharing details of the complications I encountered post labor & delivery, I’m sharing to document the details, to help me process the situation, and because after it happened to me I had a really hard time finding others who went through the same so I want to put my story out there in case someone else it looking for someone to relate to, this is going to be a long post so bear with me…

I shared that my labor was the most powerful thing I’ve ever done, truly I have never felt better about something in my life. I was overwhelmed with Ronald’s arrival and we were soaking him in! We had immediate skin to skin and he even nursed within the first few minutes too <3 That said, my labor did not go exactly as I had imagined but that is OKAY, mainly I wish I could have gone into labor on my own without needing to be induced, but I’m choosing to focus on the positive and embrace the experience for all the greatness that it was! Plus, it is what brought us our little boy and I couldn’t ask for anything else!

After delivery things didn’t exactly go smoothly, I needed to deliver the placenta, my midwife did “massage” my stomach a little as I remember other women talking about how awful that pain is and she had me push a few times more. These things hurt so much worse than labor itself, I think because my baby had arrived and I was upset to have to devote energy to anything but him. Finally my midwife and also an OB that was brought in told me that 30 minutes had passed and my placenta had still not detached, which was concerning. (I have since learned that what I had was a retained placenta, more specifically mine was considered Placenta Adherens – in which the contractions & interventions were not enough to expel the placenta) They explained that since I did not have an epidural they could not attempt to remove the placenta then & there as it would be excruciating, so they said I would need to go to surgery to have it removed and they would also repair my episotomy along with another tear. The rush of adrenaline and hormones in general from delivery had me a little bit in a fog and I wasn’t super concerned about going to the OR, I remember my husband asked more questions about the risks and details in particular, he was rightfully nervous. My family was told that it would be about a 30 minute procedure so I’d be back fairly soon.

I was wheeled away up to the OR and left my husband behind with our new baby. My midwife stayed with me the entire time, she was the last person by my side before I entered my operating room and the first person I saw when I woke up – she was an incredible help to me during labor and I will forever be grateful for her staying with me even after! As I sat in the prep area while an OR was prepared & I talked with my midwife calmly – she told me how incredibly impressed she was by my strength during labor and that I had done so well, she said that my husband was one of the most supportive she’s ever seen, she asked about our love story all while I was also having to answer various questions for the staff prepping the OR. During that time I also felt a gush of fluid leak out of me so I told my midwife and she again calmly said that it wasn’t alarming but then soon I felt it two more times and told her again. The staff lifted the blanket draped over me and one of them frantically said “Okay, we’re sitting in a pool of blood” – and this was when I got a little nervous and honestly I felt like I was in an episode of Grey’s Anatomy. The OB physician started to get frustrated asking why it was taking so long to get in an OR and pushing the staff to get it together. Soon after that I was rolled into my OR and my midwife let go of my hand and said she’d see me when I woke up. In the OR they had me scootch myself from the bed I was on that I had delivered in to the OR table and I thought that was just cruel. A few people did help support & move me but OUCH it hurt having to move. Then after I moved I noticed that one of the staff had collected the puppy pad type things that were under me on the bed to weigh the blood I had lost, that was truly scary seeing all of that. But then very quickly I was out & fell asleep!

I awoke to my midwife by my side & holding my hand. It took me a bit to fully come around, I could tell I kept kind of drifting in and out but then finally once I was completely awake I asked what time it was and realized it had been so much longer than I remember them telling us it would be. My midwife briefly told me about how things went and that she was trying to get me back to my family ASAP. The attending physician then came over to review everything with me. She told me that I actually ended up losing over 2 liters of blood and that they had given me 2 units of blood transfusion while I was in the OR. She explained that I lost nearly half the blood in my body, so very scary! The placenta was good and attached and they actually had to scrape it out a little bit (TMI, but those were her actual words). Because of my blood loss they also inserted a Bakri balloon in my uterus to further control and prevent hemorrhage following the procedure – that stayed in place for at least 12hrs post op while I was monitored. I was in shock of everything and prayed so hard, just very thankful for life & modern medicine

While I waited to be able to leave the OR floor and get back to my family my midwife explained to me how very rare my complications were. She said less than 5% of women experience a retained placenta and that those at risk would be those who smoke, give birth before 34 weeks, are older than 35 or obese, have a long labor, or deliver a stillborn are more at risk for a retained placenta. Literally none of those are me! She also said that having it once does not make me more likely to have it happen again. She really did her best to make sure I understood that there was nothing I did to cause my situation and nothing I could have done to prevent it. My midwife wanted to make sure that I could seperate the positive labor experience I had from my traumatic post delivery experience and that the latter shouldn’t take away from the former.

During the time that I was away my husband went with our baby to the nursery. He changed his first diaper, have him his first bath, and took pictures as he could since I missed all of it. He also had to make the decision to supplement with formula, even knowing that I really wanted to breastfeed, since our little man was in the 7th percentile and was also struggling with blood sugar levels. My parents were basically dumped in a hallway since they couldn’t go to the nursery. But the absolute worst is that my family could not find me. They tried calling the OR to get an update on me only to be told that I wasn’t there, even though I was, it was like I wasn’t in their system. My sister even went up to the OR and they still said I wasn’t there. Then somehow they were told I was in a room but obviously upon arriving to that floor I wasn’t actually there. For far too long my family went without an update or knowing my location – I’m sure you can imagine that they were only thinking the worst had happened to me.

I picture my husband sitting with a crying fresh newborn, distraught thinking he may have lost me, his wife. Every single time I think, type, or say today words I break down in tears because I literally can not imagine that feeling. Eventually my parents got to join my husband & son in a room so they could be together thankfully. And then they did get an update and the physician came to tell my husband how things went in the OR.

We were reunited around 1a and all got very emotional upon seeing one another, though of course at that time I hadn’t yet known the fears my family had faced in not being able to find me. It was all a very scary experience. Honestly one I’m still processing that doesn’t feel like it actually happened. But we’re here today, one month later, all doing so very well and thankful every day ️