Thank You Everyone!

Thank you everyone for being so kind. For the texts, the calls, the prayers. Oh my goodness the prayers that lifted me and Jen. For the prayers that delivered our daughter to us in three pushes.

Thank you for the gifts and the time. The love. Thank you for being Christ to us.

-liveblog out

dilated

zero stage

Jen's Contractions

Are pretty close together. Some big ones in there. And they're pretty regular. AND she was at -1 station at last check. I missed that detail. This is going to happen...sometime.

Midnight Check....

Jen is dilated further...4 cm and 90 % effaced. They'll check again in 2 hours. And if you were wondering, I did slip into a necessary coma since the last update. Apologies if you were waiting for more thrilling reporting from the frontline...

Buh Bye Katie!

Jenny to Liz to Katie to...who knows. We're on to shift 4, nurse 4. I'll keep you posted.

The Way To Look At It

Since Jen's still at 3.5 cm and same effacement, the doc will continue to increase Jen's pitocin to encourage bigger and longer contractions. Water breaking was a surprise, and the next break - changing from -2 station or another change in dilation/effacement - will have to surprise us as well.

What I"m saying is...go to sleep. I'll mind things and keep updating throughout the night. Breakfast baby? That's my guess.

Comfortably Numb

The meds are finally taking effect, which will let Jen rest up for final approach. Cervical check showed no change.

Epiidural Issues

The Epidural didn't immediately work like it should have. They pulled it back 2 cm and put some faster acting anesthesia into her line...now her left leg is numb, but the right still feels ...and she's getting hit with some bigger contractions.

They are less organized in rhythm than before. Big ones, but less regular...

Rhythm

Every 2 mins, lasting one minute. tough ones.

Joe Vs. The Volcano

  JOE
 Well, up till now I've lived
 on a tiny island called Staten
 Island, and I've commuted to a
 job in a shut up room with
 pumped in air, no sunshine,
 despicable people, and now
 that I've got some distance
 from that situation, that
 seems pretty unbelievable.
 Your life seems unbelievable
 to me.  All this like life,
 seems unbelievable to me.
 Somewhat.  At this moment.

     PATRICIA
 My father says almost the
 whole world's asleep.
 Everybody you know, everybody
 you see, everybody you talk
 to.  He says only a few people
 are awake.  And they live in a
 state of constant total
 amazement.

Not Much Room Left

To hook up any medical equipment. I guess if she wore a knee brace?

Blood pressure sleeve left arm. IV right arm. Tummy mon, internal mon. A lot going on here.

Z's pulse, a cool 127.

jen's eyes shut, breathing her way through. not much i can do in terms of coaching. the mask kinda steals that. but this is one brave chick. frankly, i have little to do.

Alrighty Then

INternal Monitor is in so we can better observe...her contractions were back and tummy external monitor didn't get them correctly.

Pain is slowly dissipating.

Jen is back to the Vader mask...

Still 3.5 cm 50-70% effaced.

C'mon baby Z....

Epidural on the way!

Yeah, this is going to happen. The real contractions are here. Epidural guy is here. JEn's at her pain threshhold right now.

Epidural is in...but meds haven't fully started working yet.

She's fighting through.

C'mon, baby Z.

It's On

Doc King went to break water but ....water was broken. -2 stage...70% effaced. Baby is in good position. We'll go epidural and get going on this.....who knows how much longer bu tthis is a mammoth step from -3 and 50%

Game Plan Time

katie's going to talk to dr. king about next steps.
jen's running out of energy. experiencing bad back labor.

Lord Vader

I just asked Jen to say, "Luke, I am your father..." with the mask on. She did not think this was funny.

Full Disclosure

I haven't been telling you that Zoe's heartrate dove to around 100. If you've been reading the blog, that was the impetus for the docs to do something like give Jen oxygen and turn off/down the pitocin.

Now she's back to a normal 129.

I wrestle with how much to share. I am sitting facing her heart monitor read out now.....

Never Mind.

Dr. King says to not take Jen off pitocin. So, the nurse came back in and turned it on at a low dose.

That's right, that just happened.

Pitocin Off. Again.

Doctor has decided Zoe doesn't like pitocin. Off it goes. And Jen is on oxygen now. Apparently they'll put her back on it.

Jen just growled through her mask at "Sound of Music" on ABC Family.

Still Nothing - 3 cm & Holding

Doctor noticed the baby's head is still not in position. So we can't break the bag of waters. So ....sooooo...so we wait. Contractions have slowed to nothing so they've decided to increase pitocin to 14 milliunits per minute.

The method here is the same method that has been employed since this morning: pitocin to make contractions, that will make baby get in position, then break the bag of waters, which will really make her body go.

The trouble is the process has proven to be excruciatingly long long long. So here we go...here we wait. Zoe does not want to get out.

Dr. King was just in and she said she'll check herself in a while. I imagine that'll be 8 or 9.