The Pearce Place: May 2010

Many of you have probably heard about the "Great Flood of 2010" (as they now call it on the news) here in Nashville. Well, that happened the weekend we brought Ainsley home. I have no idea what I would have done if our house had been flooded or power had gone out like SO MANY people went through. We were so very fortunate especially considering we had a brand new baby to figure out how to take care of! We even had water restrictions get put into place for a few days. Did I abide by the water rules??? I admit, absolutely not! Too much baby laundry and bottles to keep clean! Our area was actually one of the ones hit the hardest. Luckily we live up high on a hill and we were on the opposite side of town where it was hit the worst (just by a few miles). However, we did have multiple friends affected and they all have little ones. We were glad to hear that none of them had actual flood damage, but their neighborhoods did.

All of this to say Ainsley's first doctor's appointment was supposed to be that Monday (May 3rd, the day after the flooding). It ended up getting moved to May 4th because the building the practice is in didn't have power and the parking garage underneath the high rise had been flooded. Dr. Walters, the pediatrician, called me Monday evening and set up our appointment. He was going to try to take some patients that next day and he wanted to see Ainsley since she had just been discharged from the NICU. We got to the doctor's office and had to be walked up a stairwell lit by a spotlight running on a generator. Once we got to the actual office, they were only using one room and it was also lit by the same type of light. We hadn't met Dr. Walters before, but he had been a few times to check on Ainsley while she was in the NICU. The one time we were supposed to meet it didn't work out because of miscommunication. The poor doctor walked in wearing a polo and shorts and his forehead was soaking wet with sweat because there was no a/c. He took Ainsley to get weighed, did a quick full assessement of her, and then went over some general things we needed to know. He is the nicest person and we were very pleased with him. We have already gone back a second time. He wanted her to come a week and a half later to check her weight again. I went by myself that time and he is so great at just listening to your questions and answering them. He never made me feel rushed. We got some good news that day. We had been waking Ainsley up every 3 hours (day and night) for every feeding. Because she has been gaining weight so well and eating more, he took away her night feedings! This just means we don't have to wake her up and we just wait as long as it takes for her to wake up on her and realize she's hungry. It's now been 6 nights since this went into place and the little stinker decided to go ahead and wake up on her own now...every 3 hours! Of course. I will say there have been a couple of nights where she only woke up once, so that was a nice little treat. But this just means she's getting older, growing, doing what she's supposed to be doing. Everything is going good and we are finally getting a routine established and learning how to get things done faster. That was the most difficult thing about the first couple of weeks. Ainsley is doing so great! She's still continuing to grow and really fill out. We love her to death and can't imagine if she wasn't here yet! Here are the stats from her first 2 doctor's visits:

Tuesday, May, 4th

Weight: 4 lbs. 12 1/2 oz.

*She gained 4 1/2 oz. in 4 days

Thursday, May, 13th

Weight: 5 lbs. 5 oz. (3%)

*Gained 8 1/2 oz. in 9 days

Height: 19 1/4 inches (3%)

Head: 13 1/2 inches (3-5%)

Ready to go to the doctor!

Just waiting for the doctor with Mommy

A lot of you have already heard our birth story. But I want to recall it for my own record keeping and for those of you who have not heard what all happened a few weeks ago. It's a TON of reading just to warn you. So, you may just skim through it unless you're actually interested. Here it goes!

Ironically, it all began here (Saturday, April 9, 2010):

Part 1: Childbirth Class and Triage

Brantley and I went to our Childbirth class on Saturday. It was a 2 day class and this was day 1. Our instructor, Gerri, used to be a nurse and worked at Baptist Hospital (our hospital) for over 30 years in Labor and Delivery. She was a very entertaining lady. We started our class introductions (names, where we are from, our due date, baby gender, etc.) and then moved to the actual class info. Before our lunch break, Gerri talked about the different ways it could feel like when your water breaks. She went on to discuss if you think your water is broken it's important to get checked out to make sure because there is a risk of infection for you and the baby. This caught my attention. Since around Tuesday (the 6th) I had been having some things go on that made me believe my water could have been broken and I just didn't realize it. (I will spare you the details!) So before Brantley and I headed to Jason's Deli for lunch, I went to talk to the instructor and told her what I had been experiencing. She said she would be really surprised if my water had been broken for that long and I hadn't been sick yet. She told me to go ahead and call my doctor and see what he suggested. I called and talked to the doctor on call (Dr. Burch) who was very quick with me on the phone, as if he could care less that I called. (I was glad he wasn't my doctor after talking to him!) Pretty much the 30 second conversation ended with him saying, "Well, since you're already at the hospital you may as well get admitted and checked out." After a scrumptious lunch, we headed back to class to learn a bit about epidurals and watch some "wonderful" birth videos. Class ended and we told Gerri what the doctor had said. She and Brantley pretty much talked me into going to get checked out at this point because I really didn't want to thinking nothing has ever been wrong with me, so nothing is wrong with me now. We went ahead and got admitted and put in a triage room to get tested. The first test was done with a strip and was negative. The second test was a swab test and had to be taken to the lab. About 45 minutes later, the nurse came back with the news...Yes, it appeared that my water was broken...and Yes, I would not be going home anytime soon. Here came the waterworks. I was worried, nervous, anxious, confused. But most of all I kept thinking, "I'm not ready! My house isn't clean, the nursery isn't finished, baby clothes aren't washed, etc." Then Brantley made the call to my parents.

Part 2: Labor and Delivery

After a couple of hours, we were taken to a L&R room. It was a huge room and had a little section of the room with the bed that the baby is taken to after being born to get checked out. A little intimidating in my case if I must say. I got my first IV...OUCH! They had to get one started right away to get antibiotics in me. So I had a bag of antibiotics and Lactated Ringers going at all times (important to know for later). Dr. Staggs, another doctor from my doctor's practice showed up to check on me and brought in an ultrasound machine. Ainsley looked okay, but he could tell my amniotic fluid was lower than it was supposed to be. This fluid is important because it's what keeps things sterile for the baby and without it could cause an infection that could harm both of us. We were told this is why I was here and would probably not be going home until the baby came...which could be a few weeks! Aaaahhh! Scary thought. Not only was it too early for Baby "A" (Brantley's nickname for Ainsley) to come, I also was freaked out there was a chance I would have to be in the hospital for atleast a few weeks. So, here we stayed for night 1. I could not sleep at all. The IV bothered me, I was worried, the bed was TERRIBLE, and the little section of the room where the baby crib was located was dimly lit up and that is not something I wanted to sit there and have to look at given my situation. Next step was to have another ultrasound done in the morning to check my fluid levels again and check on Baby "A". This was going to be done by a "high risk pregnancy specialist group" from Vanderbilt.

Part 3: Antepartum

Sunday morning I had my ultrasound. Baby "A" looked fine, with hiccups and all, but my fluid levels were low. (Good to see the hiccups because shows good lung function. Also the tech saw she was taking practice breaths. Lungs are the last thing to have to fully develop in the last weeks of pregnancy, so this is what we were most worried about.) She measured around 4 lbs. 11 oz. give or take 11 oz. We were told my amniotic fluid level was in the "normal-low" range. So, still in the normal range, but on the low end. After the ultrasound we went back to the room and found out we would be moving to a room in Antepartum. This is where people stay who have high-risk pregnancies, so it can be long term. Let me just tell you...the room was definitely a lot smaller, but the bed was SO MUCH MORE comfy! They put really nice mattresses on the beds in these rooms because people could be there for weeks before giving birth. This afternoon we just tried to relax and take it easy. Erin, Murray, and Cole stopped by for a visit on their way home from Pickwick. It was nice to get to visit with them for a bit. Also, Erin is a NICU nurse, so I was full of questions. She made me feel more at ease and that things were going to be okay even if Ainsley came right then. Later that day we still were not real sure what was going on. For almost 2 days I had had multiple nurses and they all kept telling us different things about why I was there, how long I would be there, etc. But here I was to stay for at least a bit. I was able to finally get some sleep and got up for my ultrasound the next morning.

Monday morning the ultrasound showed little change. My fluid level was up a tiny bit but still normal-low range. This just meant I had been losing fluid, but was slowly replinishing it. (Ainsley also had the hiccups again.) Different doctors, nurses, and the specialist kept saying they weren't 100% sure if my water had actually broken or not. Really people!?!? It had to have. We never understood that and still don't. Frustration was setting in. My hands and ankles swelling up because of the fluids being flooded into me 24-7 and because I was on bedrest. Still unsure as to what was actually going on we made it through another day. All I wanted to do was go home and be on bedrest if my fluid level stayed the same or increased. Again, different people were telling us different things and at one point we thought there was a chance of that happening. Finally, my real doctor, Dr. Draughn, came to check on me. Such a relief to see a familiar face! After describing the situation to him (which he didn't realize the extent of it from my reading my chart or talking to the other doctors/nurses) he said he's about 100% sure my water had broken. (Not that that's a good thing, but thank you!) He went on to tell me that typically people go into labor 7 to 10 days after their water breaks. I'm going on day 6 to 7 at this point. I was told by him I would be here until this baby comes because of the high risk of infection. I felt better hearing it from him even though that's not what I wanted to hear. Also, from the ultrasounds we figured out that Ainsley was Frank breech. Dr. Draughn said that since she was breech I should go ahead and be prepared to have a C-section when the time comes. Bigger and bigger my ankles got...

Tuesday...well I really don't remember much about Tuesday. A good family friend, Mrs. Lynn, came to sit with me while Brantley went into work for a little while. Erin had suggested that I ask to take a tour of the NICU that way I would know what to expect if "the time" came. Also I would be able to ask any questions I had and see babies around the same gestational age and weight as Ainsley was at that time. I told Erin and Brantley I was really worried about what she would look like because I guess I kept picturing a baby that appeared sick and was only a couple of pounds. Erin assured me that would not be the case. Brantley ended up needing to get to work and left right before the nurse came and told me we could go to the NICU. So, Mrs. Lynn accompanied me (and my wheelchair) to go check things out. I figured Brantley and I could go some other time that week because I really wanted him to see it too. While we were in there I started feeling light headed and couldn't breathe very well. We got back to the room and I kept having trouble breathing and my chest hurt REALLY bad. I've never been one to have heartburn, but I came to the conclusion that maybe that's what was happening. So, I took some Pepcid...and Malox...and drank some milk! Finally it was slowly feeling a little better. The nurses also kept saying well it's probably that the baby is high up and making it difficult to breathe. I talked to my Mom and a couple of other people on the phone and was short of breath. I felt like I had run 10 miles after I hung up the phone. My ankles continued to get bigger and bigger...

Brantley got back from work and Mrs. Lynn went home. We were told by our nurse that a suite had opened up and we were next on the list for it. It was bigger room with a refrigerator and no extra cost. So, of course we said we would take it! After eating dinner we (by we I mean Brantley) moved our stuff down the hall to the suite. It was a nice change. We relaxed and were able to watch Lost. All this time I was still having trouble breathing and felt TERRIBLE, not normal, not like myself at all. I decided I would try and take a shower after Lost so I might get a better night's sleep. During this time, I discovered I could barely move or walk. I was HUGE! I had a breakdown, took my shower and got in bed. I mentioned to Brantley that I was pretty sure I had gained 20 pounds since being there. I figured out earlier that afternoon that they had been weighing me in the hospital bed and I had no idea. I saw how much it said the last time and didn't think too much of it. But later I realized it would have meant I had gained 20 pounds if it was accurate. Brantley went to get a nurse because he could tell something was wrong. My legs, ankles, face, everything had gotten so much bigger. The nurse looked up in the computer what I weighed when I was admitted. Come to find out, they had started weighing me in kilograms and then at some point changed over to pounds. So she had to leave the room to even figure out what I actually weighed to begin with. She and a tech came back to reweigh me and...yep I had gained at least 20 pounds in 48 hours. They explained it was because of the fluids being pushed into me. This made Brantley frustrated and asked if they would call the doctor on call to see if we could turn the fluids down or stop them for a little while. So they made the call to Doctor Staggs who told them to keep the fluids going. An ever so mad Brantley was not going to have it. I could not breathe, my chest hurt, I could barely walk across the room and 2 days ago I was completely fine. It was as if I was getting worse being there and not better.

Part 4: Baby Time (co-written by the best husband ever, also known as Brantley)

First I have to say that I am truly honored to be asked to write a post for such a fine blog. I really appreciate the opportunity.

Also, I don't know if any of you have ever seen someone gain 20 lb in a couple of days but Adrienne looked like if she sneezed I would be mopping her off the floor. I couldn't even feel her ankles whatsoever. Any one who knows Adj knows she's a pretty petite girl and seeing her like that was scary. Just to clarify and keep myself out of trouble, she didn't look fat, she looked like someone had dumped 100 gallons of fluid into her. NOT GOOD.

So after Dr. Staggs declared that we had to keep all of the fluids going I got a little agitated. I called Adj's mom to give her an update. She told me that I may want to try to speak to the doctor myself. So I called the answering service and asked to talk to the doctor on call. After speaking to the woman with the answering service for a few minutes she figured out we were in the hospital and informed me that only the nurses can speak to the doctor on call if we are checked into the hospital. So I grew even more frustrated. I went back to our room and Adj looked a lot more relaxed, as if she may just go to sleep. I decided I would just so ahead and take a shower and drop the argument with the Dr. Staggs until morning when we could talk to her real doctor.

After I got out of the shower things got pretty scary, pretty quickly. Adj looked like she was having serious problems breathing and her blood pressure monitoring thingy was freaking out. I can't remember the exact numbers but it was something along the lines of 195/105, basically she was at high risk of having a stroke. Our door directly faced the nurses' station and as soon as I opened it I could see her nurse with a concerned look on the phone with the Dr Staggs.

From that point on everything moved at warp speed. All of a sudden Dr. Cornelia Graves (yes there are still people named Cornelia), one of the Vanderbilt specialists showed up. She touched Adj's leg for about a half of a millisecond and could tell something was wrong. She listened to Adrienne's lungs, then looked right into Adrienne's eyes and said, "Honey we are about to deliver this baby". Adrienne kicked into full emotional melt down and doesn't remember much of any of the rest of this. Thus you get a taste of my superb writing skills.

Dr. Graves explained that Adj had something called preeclampsia, which can only be cured by delivering the baby. This was causing her body to not be able to process fluids correctly and she was holding them all in. From what I understand this caused a lot of other things: her blood pressure became extremely high, her legs and face were swelling, protein was in her urine, and scariest of all the fluids had nowhere to go and started overflowing into her lungs. So they needed to get the baby out.

From here I let her folks know they needed to get to the hospital right away. I called my parents and had my 30 second melt down. Then returned to the room and the doctors and nurses just started multiplying from there. They started pumping Adrienne full of drugs to get her ready for the delivery. She couldn't go into surgery with all of the fluids in her body and her blood pressure so high. The drugs upped her anxiety, which was already incredibly high. Once they started the meds, one of them was to help her get rid of fluid and she lost 1 liter of fluid in 20 minutes (she continued to lose that much for about the next 24 hours).

Part 5: The C-Section

It's Adrienne again. I'm going to try to recall the following events as well as I can. After having my meds and a full blown anxiety attack I was ready to go. They explained to us that Brantley had to wait outside and could not be in the OR until the pre-op stuff was finished.This made me even more anxious. I had started shaking a lot uncontrollably. I was given a spinal instead of an epidural. I'm not real sure the difference except I think a spinal goes in deeper so it's a little more risky and also there is no catheter connected so I didn't have anything coming out of my back afterwards. It's just a one time "shot". Brantley was finally able to come in which calmed me down some. At this point I was going with the flow doing what had to be done because there was no choice. A little while passed. I told Brantley I needed to turn my head because my neck was hurting. So he stood up for a second and got a quick glimpse of my intestines. (He's very proud of this, so I thought I would share it.) If you know Brantley at all he cannot watch someone on t.v. get a shot! He had already told me he didn't think he would be able to watch. Well, from that point on he couldn't help but watch! This is so funny to me. Finally, the moment we were waiting for came. I heard a doctor say, "There's the bottom!" Brantley looked back over at that point. A minute later (2:55 am to be exact) out came Ainsley Sue with a very loud cry! I was in tears just knowing she was okay and that cry was the best sound I ever heard. That girl's lungs were working. Brantley was able to QUICKLY run over and take a picture (the only picture we have of here in the OR and came back to me. The NICU team brought Ainsley over to me for literally 3 seconds to give me a glance and then carefully RAN out of the room yelling at Brantley, "Come on dad let's go! We gotta go!" Brantley looked at me and I said, "Stay with me." I was too scared to be alone for the rest of the surgery.

Part 6: A Long 28 Hours

I was put in Magnesium (or "Mag") because of the preeclampsia. The purpose of this was to prevent seizures. I had to be on the Mag for 24 hours and was not allowed to leave the room or see Ainsley until it was finished. It was started in my IV at 4:15 when I got back to the room. This made for a long day and night. Let me just say you never want to have to be on Mag. It makes you feel like you are on drugs, have the flu, and you've eaten a box of chalk. Brantley still tells me things that happened during this 24 hours that I do not remember at all. What I do remember is my mom stayed with me that night and Dr. Draughn came in to check on me during the night and finally wrote the order that I could have a popsicle (against the nurses' advice). The nurse wasn't really happy with him about this, but I didn't care. I needed some liquid besides ice chips or I was going to go CRAZY my mouth was so dry! So a banana popsicle and some Sprite got me through the long treachorous night.

The NICU took a couple of pics of Ainsley and sent them down to the room so that I could see her. Such a good idea!

Finally around 8:30 the next morning I got to meet my precious 4 pound 7 oz., 17 inches long, head full of dark hair baby girl. Even though there were a lot of moments from the past 24 hours that I don't remember, this one I will never forget. I got wheeled down to the NICU and over to her open bed. She had "frog legs" from being breech and lots of wires attached to her. A very sad-happy moment. It was just good to see my baby was going to be okay. I was also able to hold her, which I wasn't really expecting. I was in Heaven.

Part 6: Friends and Family

All of my family was able to make it to Nashville that next day along with some of our close friends, Mrs. Denise, Erin, and Kelsey (and Cole too). Brantley's parents were also able to fly in from Dallas! We were so thrilled they could be there with us during this time. Everyone wanted to see Ainsley which got interesting. In order to get into the NICU to see her either Brantley or I had to accompany the person. What made it even worse is it could only be one person at a time (2 people total) and it was best to go 30 minutes before her feedings. So we were having to schedule it out so everyone had a chance to go back. Luckily both sets of our parents were designated passes so they could go back whenever they wanted to on their own.

Scrubbing in to go back and see Ainsley

One of our MANY visits

I was now in the Postpartum unit. This unit was very different from the other ones. The nurses weren't as cozy-friendly as the ones previously. I guess they are just used to patients being there for a day and leaving. I was stuck here for 3 more nights due to continuous high blood pressure. The on-call doctors still weren't helping my case any. Whatever they were choosing to do was not making my blood pressure decrease. I was also getting tired of random people constantly coming into the room for different reasons and every 3-4 hours to take my vitals. I was ready to be home and relax where I couldn't be bothered by strangers. Finally Monday morning Dr. Draughn came in, decided to get an internal specialist to come check me out, he came up with a plan on how to treat me and by that evening I was discharged. Why couldn't one of the doctors on call all weekend have thought of that idea? Again, I'm glad I chose the doctor I did. Being discharged was a bittersweet time. I was happy to get to go home after having been in the hospital for almost 10 days, but it was hard "leaving" our baby girl behind. We went to the NICU one last time to see her before heading home. What a DIFFICULT thing to do. I cannot even describe the emotions we were feeling at that time. But I needed to have time to recover and she needed to get stronger. There was just no way I could take care of her at that point on my own, so I knew she was in the best hands and we would one day get to bring her home when we were both better. 11 days later that was the case...Friday, April 30th we got to go pick Ainsley up and bring her to her home where she belongs. What a blessing she has been and continues to be. God is good. He has richly blessed us.

Mom bringing Bella home with "It's a Girl!" balloons. I hadn't seen Bella in so long!