Welcome Hazel and Hudson

I have been absolutely terrible about documenting my pregnancy! I will post my birth story as many of us girls love to hear about it and it is fun to go back and read later. I'll put this sections for those who just want to read about the actual birth.

33 Weeks to D - Day (36 weeks) 
This entire pregnancy I flipped and flopped between natural vs medicated birth (if babies were head down). One thing that I've learned this pregnancy/labor/delivery/postpartum is that mother nature made your body a certain way and to do certain things. That being said, we are so lucky and privileged to live in a time of modern medicine, which does save millions of babies a year (and women too). After much thought, prayer and discussion I decided that I would in deed get an epidural. For the record, I want to write this not to defend my choice, but more so to capture my feelings for when I read this in the future.

First of all, I will back up a bit. Up until 33 weeks of pregnancy I really thought I'd make it to 38 weeks and then have to be induced. My little cervix was handling pregnancy beautifully and I was not having any contractions. At 33 weeks I all of a sudden felt my time was coming to an end. My doctor had checked me at 32 and I was high, hard and closed - he even said he thought I had a chance at going to 38 weeks. That weekend I just felt things change. I got to the point where everything was giving me MAJOR braxton hicks and I just felt different.

I went to the doctor at 33 weeks and had him check me and sure enough I was at a 2 and Hazel (baby a) was SUPER low. I was freaked out. I had not mentally prepared myself for all of a sudden being done and having NICU babies. I went and got the steroid shots to get their little lungs ready and prayed I could hold them in until at least 34 weeks, which was still 6 days away. I held on and in fact I felt like things went back and that delivery was not hours away. I had him check me again and sure enough, while still dilated (actually to a 3), Hazel's head had gone back up. Blessing number 3,478!

The Day I Started Labor
At 35.6 weeks I went to my appointment and he told me I was at a 4. However, my blood pressure was starting to get much higher than he was comfortable with at 140/100 and he wanted to see me at the hospital the next morning for a possibly/likely induction. I was really ready to be done and knowing that I was going to make it to 36 weeks, albeit by hours THRILLED ME. He event told me it was quite likely I'd go into labor that day. He was right!

**I have to mention that I have loved my doctor. I saw Dr. Oldroyd and he was the best choice possible for me. Seriously, a wonderful man who took lots of time to care for me and my twins! Totally night and day difference from my first experience (great doctor the first time around, but this was amazing). **

As mentioned previously there was one reason that I opted for an epidural this time. I decided that it was in deed in the best interest of the twins! Like my doctor and many L&D nurses told me, things usually go well but with twins things can go bad and go bad FAST and they need to be able to get the babies out within 4-5 minutes if necessary. If that happens then I am under general anesthesia which is rougher on both the babies and I. Not worth it to me AT all. 

The afternoon after my doctor's appointment I began to have more frequent "braxton hicks." To me they aren't contractions unless they are consistent and progressing your cervix forward and you are in labor. I was not sure if I was starting labor or just having an irritated uterus (wouldn't blame the poor thing, it was measuring 34 centimeters).

Going to the Hospital
That night I realized that I was indeed in labor and headed to the hospital at 7:30 pm. I checked in and they checked me and I was still a 4. Again, I would have loved to have stayed at the home to labor, but at this point my goal was to make sure the twins were both handling labor well. The nurse told me that most likely since I hadn't progressed I was not in labor but that they doctor didn't want me leaving because my blood pressure was still high. Well, by the time he got there (30 minutes later) to check me I was a 5. They still didn't think I was in labor. You know, I always assumed that once you were contracting every 3 minutes and your cervix was progressing that was labor. I knew I was in labor, but the monitor for some reason was not picking up my contractions. Finally, as the doctor as standing there he could literally see my uterus contract and said, "maybe you are in labor." By 10:00 pm I was at a 7 and they decided I was in labor! I was not angry or frustrated by any means because like I said, I knew I was and I knew babies were on their way and the doctor would figure it out soon enough.

Let's just say I could have SOOOOOOOOO gone natural because by the time they checked me again I was a 7 and in complete control. It was actually hard for me to hear I was so far progressed because I thought, man I could do this! I was shocked. honestly, I thought I was probably still a 5. Not NEARLY as painful as getting to a 7 last time.  The funny thing was, I was laboring on my back with a pillow wedged under me to keep baby b's heart rate up. This is not optimal positioning for labor AT all but I was more concerned about the safety of my son than anything. He handled contractions better if I laid a certain way.

My doctor wanted to break my water but wouldn't until I had an epidural because he wanted me medicated in case of a c-section. I can tell you he did this out of concern for my health because I could tell he was SUPER nervous about the fact I wanted to go vaginal. He was supportive of it, but he wanted my babies out safely. **I had an L&D nurse come up to me the next day and ask if Dr. Oldroyd was nervous during my delivery and I told her he totally was. She told me he always does that with twins. I personally think that is very demonstrative of how much my doctor cares! It wasn't the incompetent nervous, but rather the type of nervousness accompanied by years of experience of seeing things go really bad on occasion.**

Broken Water and Delivery
They came in and placed my epidural so they could break my water. Honestly, getting that stupid epidural hurt worse than my contractions! I am telling ya - I could have so done this easy...oh well, I was VERY lucky to have an epidural because of what came next!

After my water was broken and the epidural placed, my labor did slow down. Finally at 1:00 am they wheeled me into the operating room because they wanted me to deliver there in case of an emergency c-section. I was at an 8 at 1:00 am and by 1:35 they told me I was a few minutes away from pushing. The doctor checked me and told me that Hazel was NOT in the right position for delivery and depending on how she came down with a push or two, I might need a c-section and I might need it NOW. He reached up there and did quite a bit of finagling (THANK GOODNESS I had an epidural) and got her moved a bit. I could feel quite a bit even with my epidural! He had me push and realized she turned enough to make delivery safe.

After 11 minutes of pushing she was here! (I pushed for 90 minutes with Saydee and made no progress so they did a vacuum extraction). 4 minutes later Hudson was born. I had to work hard to get both out. I could feel what I was doing and it HURT! The epidural numbed the contractions, but did not numb much of anything below the cervix so crowing was painful, but good because then I could get them out quicker.

Hazel Rae Oldham - Born at 1:49 am - 6 lbs 13 oz and 18.25 inches
Hudson Perry Oldham - Born at 1:53 am - 7 lbs 5 oz and 20 inches

They are Here!
They quickly passed my babies through the window where they had a team for each baby. They actually passed Hazel right back to me and I got to hold her. Hudson had some issues with retracting (breathing issue) so by the time he was ready to be held (a few minutes after delivery) I had already been wheeled back to my room. They took babies to the NICU because of the hospital policy that any baby born before 37 weeks MUST go for 24 hour observation. I was heartbroken to miss nursing, but I knew as soon as I had recovered enough I could go back. Problem was my bleeding wasn't really stopping and they wouldn't release me to women's center! I was in tears. I called Richard who had gone back to the NICU with Hazel and Hudson and he told me they were doing really well and rooting around for food. I BEGGED the nurse to let me go back but she said no.

Bless their hearts, the NICU actually let Richard take the babies out for me to nurse them! BLESS THEM!

Babies were in NICU for 24 hours of observation and released!

 Hazel and Hudson at 4-days old! He REALLY likes to be right next to her. It is very tender.

 Hazel right after she was born. They passed her back to me right away. You can see the red marks above her left eye where Dr. Oldroyd was moving her around so she would be able to come out. Poor girl!

 Hudson right after birth.

 H&H - 36 hours old getting ready to leave the NICU.

This is what it looked like when they were in the NICU. All those wires are just simply monitors for the babies. Nothing was wrong - just monitoring him.