unsuccessful

It is twenty days until Evie's due date.  But guess what, we get to meet her in thirteen!  I'm going to meet my daughter in less than two weeks!

We tried to turn Evelyn yesterday.  Short story: it didn't work.  Long story:

We got to the hospital at 6:30 AM.  We got our paperwork filled out and got set up in a delivery room (just in case).  The nurse started an IV in my hand to keep me hydrated, and so that it would already be there in case of an emergency c-section.  Then we just had to wait until the doctor arrived, about an hour later.  The nurse left us for a while but hooked me up to the fetal monitor so that we could hear the baby's heartbeat the whole time we were there.  I liked that, I find it soothing.

When Dr. Raley arrived she did an ultrasound to confirm that Evelyn was still breech and to see exactly where everything was.  Her head was up, a little to my left, and her feet were up by her face.  They call it the frank breech position.  They then administered a drug that relaxed my uterus muscles (it also made my heart race at about 110 bpm - I felt crazy!) and started.  Dr. Raley put one hand up by E's head, one down by her butt, and started trying to knead her in a circle.  After about a minute she would stop with one hand still holding the position and check the ultrasound and heart rate, which I appreciated.  Then back to kneading.  Kneading might be the wrong term - it felt like she was trying to touch the bed under me by going through my stomach.  After doing this for 10 or 15 minutes, it was clear that she wasn't having any luck, so they sent for some more muscle.  Another doctor arrived and it started again with all four hands.  Still no luck.  After about 20 minutes Dr. Raley called it off because the baby wasn't even budging, and she could see what it was doing to me.

I would like to say that I was strong and brave throughout this.  I had plans to be the strong, silent type.  Nope.  I have no problem admitting that this was the worst pain I have ever experienced.  I moaned and cried.  I had trouble breathing through the pain, even with Kevin coaching me through it.  I punctured Kevin's hand with my fingernails after the first two tries, so then I moved onto gripping the bed rail because I knew I couldn't hurt that.  Random part of my body wouldn't stop shaking because of the trauma, like my chin and one of my legs.  I remember in our birth class when we had to immerse our hand in a bag of ice for a minute and breathe through the pain.  Our instructor said that it was comparable to labor pain, and that if we could handle that we could handle labor.  The pain from trying to turn Evelyn was about three times worse than that.  Frustrating as well, because we could all see that it wasn't doing any good.

So we have a c-section tentatively scheduled for the morning of June 10th, one week before the due date.  I'm relieved.  Not about the c-section, but that we tried our options and this is what we're left with, so the decision is made.

My stomach is still red and painful to the touch where the doctors pushed.  Faint bruises are beginning to show up.  I can't wear my jeans because of the waistband, so hopefully the weather will cooperate and I can wear skirts for the next few days.  When I have contractions they hurt far worse than before just because of the soreness.  But Evelyn continues to be the happy, active baby she has always been, kicking and squirming away.  I feel more bonded to her after yesterday.

Plus Kevin feels bad about what I went through yesterday and is doing nice things for me, so I'm milking this for all it's worth.  ;)