When we got to the OR, I was asked if I prefer the room temperature to be warm or cool. In my mind I thought, maybe we should give preference to the person cutting me open...but instead, I said cool. Surgery is wonky enough without being over-heated and waves of nausea.
They ask me to hop up on the table, and arch my back like a cat. I laughed, and said, "hopping isn't in the cards and have you seen my tummy?" We all laughed. Again, it was a fun and light-hearted feeling with the whole team.
I asked Dr. K if she would consider removing some fat or extra skin, and she politely declined.
After I received the spinal, I never feel like I am numb enough to be cut open. Mr. Workin' was brought in, and positioned at my head. He seemed really excited. The doctor ask over and over, "can you feel this?", in which I air on the side of caution and say yes. The nurse anesthetist, called BS, and gave the doctor the nod. I looked at the clock and it was 5:07. The next thing I remember was the smell of burnt human, and it seemed like quite a bit of time was going by, so I asked how things were going. Dr. K said she was encountering quite a bit of scare tissue and my bladder was distorted and pulled out of whack by lesions from the uterus. Ohhhhh, so that's why my uterus was so grouchy. Every time my bladder got full, the poor thing thought it was go time! What seemed like forever later, Dr. K, "OK let's have a baby." I looked up and it was 5:35. She lowered the curtain a bit so I could see, and when she pulled him out, she said, "look at that head and those shoulders, we made the right choice." Mac chose that moment to potty all over everything. He went to the warmer and Mr. Workin' went over to be with him. Things get kind of fuzzy for a while, I don't remember the baby crying much, and everyone seemed kind of quiet. Mr. Workin' brought the baby over and I thought he looked like Ella. His hair seemed so light. I was expecting it to be much darker. Several minutes passed and then the baby, baby team, and Mr. Workin' left to go back to our room while I was closed up.
Again, it seemed like things were taking a while and I got a strange sensation and started feeling woozy. I asked Dr. K if I was bleeding too much and she shared at that time, actually I was having a bleed they were having trouble controlling. Apparently, a vessel under my pubic bone started to bleed and there was no way to see it, so they were having trouble stopping it. Dr. K kept calling for different needles, and there was a sense of frustration coming from the other side of the curtain. At one point a piece of bloody gauze was tossed to the side and actually hit me in the face. It was funny and it lightened the feeling for a couple of moments. I said, "Hello...you just hit me in the face with that." I stopped watching the clock for a while. Those crazy tremors you get from the hormones or being in the cold OR or whatever had set in. I was grateful for the nurse anesthetist. He did a great job of keeping my mind moving and my mouth chatting. I started to feel more pressure and the more time that went by the more nervous I became that I was losing too much blood or that I was going to get feeling back! About 45 minutes after Mac was delivered, Dr. K called for the staple gun to close. She is known for not stapling so I said, "NO!" She laughed and was fine with that.
I wanted to see my baby, and kept telling the nurse to tell Mr. Workin' to not let anyone see him until I could hold him. She would call and ask about how the boys were doing back in my room. Everyone kept assuring me that daddy and baby were fine.
I had to go to recovery for about 45 minutes before they took me back to my room. Since I was open for about 2.5 hours longer than they thought I was going to be, they were concerned with my body temperature. It was 95.3 when I got out of surgery. It didn't fully recover for about 48 hours.
About 40 minutes into recovery, our friend and OB nurse, Brookie, came into to recovery. She and I are room parents together so we have become friends and she was quite familiar with my desires for this birth. When I saw her, I said, "It's never easy and straight forward with me." We both laughed. She had come to check on me because Mr. Workin' was losing the battle with bouncing his hungry baby boy.
TO BE CONTINUED...
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