An answered prayer
Brinley Krista Little was born on November 27th, 2023 at 12:36 am at the Mercy Hospital in Des Moines, Iowa. The same hospital mommy, daddy and sissy were born in as well. I love that we all share that experience! It was a chilly fall day with thankfully no snow in the forecast ahead though it did snow a little bit the night before. That was my biggest fear having a fall baby in Iowa is the dreaded snow storms. You can never predict when they are going to happen and I did not want to give birth in the car as we had an hour drive to the hospital from small town Yale. I want to share that one morning a week or two before she was born I woke up and the first thought that came to my mind was "November 27" that's the day she will be born. I know that was God telling me and here she is, being born on November 27th! Now on to my labor story - My labor was a little bit like Taylin's in the way that it was an induction. This time it was elective so we had to wait until I turned 39 weeks and had a date scheduled for when they would give us a call to let us know if we would be able to get induced that morning. We were instructed to have the phone close by and the hospital bag packed as we could expect a phone call between 5:00 - 8:00 am. Needless to say I barely slept that night. I was so excited. Both girls I literally got little to no sleep the night before their inductions lol. Taylin moved around so much and Brinley well lets just say that kid never stopped moving in my tummy lol. We got the call at 5:45 am and told we could start at 9:00am. We were so excited that we got the day that my doctor I wanted was on call, Dr. Jenkins. My birth story with Brinley is a lot like my pregnancy with her, full of surprises! Let's start with the pregnancy - long story short I had some random challenges and unexpected problems. My first trimester I developed a weird rash on the back of my thighs that were 4 x 4 inches long on both. Those lasted 2 weeks! They burned and itched like crazy. Til this day I still don't know what caused it lol. My second trimester I fainted at my husbands grandmas burial site the day of her funeral in front of his whole family. I was so embossed. I've never fainted in my life! The third trimester I developed terrible pubic, hip, back and pelvis pain so I had to go to physical therapy for that. Once again that was a first! It was so terrible I had troubles walking at night. Towards the end I had carpel tunnel & swelling in my hands, feet & face. I felt like feet were full of knots on the bottom, they ached so bad! Thankfully through those weird issues, myself & Brinley were very healthy. Now on to juicy birth story... My labor story is wild but its to be expected because I knew if I had another kid, my pregnancy and labor wouldn't be as smooth as it was with my first and boy was I right lol. That morning I was having contractions and they felt like they were getting closer but I didn't have the feeling "this is it" also I knew we were most likely getting induced that morning so I wasn't super worried. I just thought I was having Braxton hicks because weeks leading up I was having them everyday, several times a day. When I got to the hospital I let them know and once they hooked me up to the monitors they noticed they were 3 mins a part so my body was basically going into early labor on its own. Here I thought maybe this might speed the process up. Boy was I wrong! I was in labor for 15 hours! During those 15 hours I moved around every hour because my sweet stubborn second child didn't like the positions and we needed her head to come down farther. Not to mention I was slowly dilated so that made for a loooong day! If we didn't get to the hospital on our own because of the contractions, my water would of broke on its own because the amniotic sac was starting to thin so it took some time and pain for them to pop it because they had to be careful of her head since it was close to going on its own. After pushing through some mild contractions I decided to get the epidural before the pain got worse or she came too fast and I wouldn't be able to get it in time. At first it worked great and I was relieved then 2 or 3 hours later my contractions were getting stronger and I could feel them so I asked the nurse what was going on. Apparently no one told me to push the button to release a dose every 20 mins to keep me numb so it wasn't doing the full effect. They came back in to give me a boost and the anesthesiologist left it in the IV and my nurse noticed it an hour later. Again still not giving me the full dose... By this time I'm panicking that it's not going to work in time before I have to push and I was terrified to give birth unmedicated. I have a decent pain tolerance but as I've gotten older I've become more of a wimp! So he comes back (I had two different anesthesiologist) he said they can redo the epidural in hopes it works in case something happened with the first one or keep pushing the button in hopes it numbs me by the time I have to push. I was so conflicted and honestly just wanted to be pain free so we redid the epidural... Well guess what it didn't completely numb me again and I could feel everything on my left side especially the contractions and boy did those get intense! A couple hours before I had to push, Taylin & Lynnettte (Cameron's mom) came to visit. It was my night with Tay (Sunday) so his parents helped bring her to school and back. It was nice getting to visit with them though I was a shaky mess from being in labor. An hour before I became dilated to 10 I was so exhausted from being in labor for so long and not able to eat anything I threw up lol I was so hot, shaky & in pain. Somewhere in there I was running a low grade fever so they had to keep a close eye on me. Fast forward to TIME TO PUSH! I pushed for an hour and 30 mins. I was so ready to throw in the towel so many times. It was incredibly hard to focus because I could literally feel everything and my contractions were hell! For those wondering I did put on my playlist that consist of DMX, Salt n Peppa & other 2000's hip hop. I needed music that would get me pumped enough to keep it up! My nurse was all for it! Now to the good part... It's just Cameron, myself & our nurse at this point. My doctor was doing a 24 hour shift and I was her only patient in labor at the time so I think she was catching up on her sleep in between checking on me. I hadn't made process the last time she saw me which was an hour before Brin arrived. My nurse said I was getting close and the last thing I remembered was Cameron saying "I see her head, she has a lot of hair!" That was my cue to push so hard because I was beat, in pain and ready to hold my baby! Cameron likes to say I hulked it! lol! My nurse yelled "hold on, we gotta get the doctor!" in the less than 5 mins though it felt like forever for me that we waited for the doctor I was in so much pain! I was feeling the famous ring of fire! I'm yelling and crying by this point. Finally doctor comes in I pushed like twice and bam out came our little fire cracker! Brinley weighed 7 lbs 5 oz & 20 inches. Funny thing is I guessed her weight & time of birth and got it right! We did have a scare with Brin an hour she was born. While I was nursing her and our nurse was out of the room getting things ready for us to go to the postpartum ward, Brinny stopped breathing and turned purple / gray. We could tell right away something was wrong so we pushed the call button for her come back in and help us. Thankfully she was quick and was able to get her back to breathing within seconds but boy were we shaken up. I was on the verge of tears! My baby girl who I literally just gave birth stopped breathing and I was terrified it would happen again. Thank the Lord to this day it has not happened again and the likely hood of it happening again is extremely low. The nurse said its called the gray spell, its when the baby doesn't understand the difference between sucking, swallowing and breathing on their own outside of the womb that's why its common to happen after they're born. Little Brinny girl has kept us on our toes since utero lol. I wouldn't trade this sweet little stubborn girl for nothing. After all her middle name is my moms first name, Krista and my mom was the most stubborn person I know lol.
I hope you've enjoyed my long pregnancy / birth story!
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