Judd William Yeck - 8.10.16

On Tuesday, August 9th we went to the hospital at 6:30 am. We were all pre-registered so things went pretty smoothly.

I was brought to Labor and Delivery room 6 and started the induction process.  We were expecting Judd's arrival sometime int he early evening.

Things went well. I was handling all of the contractions really well - the nurses were surprised I wasn't asking for my epidural yet. However, the anesthesiologist came in and said she's be tied up in some c-sections for the next while and that if I wanted it, we should do it now.  So we did. She'd never done an epidural on someone my size so we upped the dose a little and changed my button configuration so I had more control. I am pretty proud to say that the local anesthetic was the only time I swore.  After that, we just slept for a long time.

After about 14 hours, I was at a 6 and already had been for a while. Dr. Johnson said he was going to grab some dinner and come back to check on me. So 2 hours later he came in and I was still at a 6 with no progress. We discussed the situation. 

Judd's head was pushing on my cervix trying his hardest to help me progress. Everything looked great but I wasn't making any progress. They believe a combination of his shoulders being  too big,and my pelvic bones too narrow, to allow Judd to push further down. In that case, we had two options. 1. do a c-section or 2. break his clavicle to get him out. He explained he's not a doctor that likes to push for c-sections unless they're really necessary (I love that he has a low c-section rate) so we'd take another hour and if there was no additional progress, we could make the choice. 

There was no way I was going to choose to have my son's clavicle broken so we were starting to prepare ourselves for a c-section. I called my mom and sister who've both had c-section for some support and we said earnest prayers that we would be making the right decision.

After an hour, and no progress, at midnight, we felt good about doing a cesarean. Mike suited up which made all of us laugh - one size fits all is not applicable for the Yeck family. The jumpsuit was hitting his mid-calf - very sterile.

I was so nervous. My anesthesiologist was great. She sat at my head and talked me through everything before and after Mike was in the room. I remember everything being very cold. I was shivering, partly from nerves and partly from being so so cold. Dr. Johnson called in Dr. Wheelwright to assist in the delivery. Mike did a great job managing whether to hold my hand or whether to take pictures. He knew I needed him but that I wanted to be able to see things later. I wish more than anything that I had a picture of Mike's face the moment he saw his son. You can hear Mike in the video but that's nothing compared to the look on his face. 

Judd's Birth (warning, graphic!)

As soon as they cleaned him off and made sure he was breathing, they brought him to me for a moment. I didn't think they would put him on me. It was amazing. He was screaming but as soon as he touched me, he stopped crying immediately. My favorite moment of his 30 second life so far.  

He was quickly whisked away to finish cleaning him while they stitched me up. The room is so cold that they don't like to keep babies there for too long. Going from 98 degrees to that cold room is quite a shock. 

Mike went with him and I laid there listening to him scream from the hallway. It was amazing! I kept asking how big he was because I could hear nurses laughing about his chunky cheeks. 

They hollered in his stats - 

10 pounds 

21 inches

Mike stayed with him while I was getting stitched and brought back to our room. I remember thinking how surreal this all was. Suddenly Mike popped into our room more elated than I'd ever seen anyone. They were finishing his bath and he wanted to come check on me. Judd needed a little oxygen but he'd be done with that in a few and we'd be together.

I told Mike to go be with him and off he went. He was so sweet, if he could have split himself in two he would have. He wanted to be with Judd but wanted to be with me.

When he came back again, he had the unfortunate job of telling me he wouldn't be coming to our room but that he'd be in the NICU. Again we thought it would only be overnight which, being already 2:30am, that would only be a few hours. 

At the time, I didn't realize how tired I was. After all, I'd only sat in a bed all day. Little did I realize, my body had worked really hard for 17 hours plus a ceserean. When they rolled me into the NICU, I was just so happy to see my boy. I was in shock from all that had happened and didn't really know how to react to anything else. We took our first family picture, I told him how much I loved him, we asked some questions that I don't remember, and we were wheeled out again. 

    

His beginning was not how we expected. Judd spent 8 days in the NICU. It was the hardest 8 days of my life. Once I was released from the hospital, I had to go home without my baby. We spent every moment we could next to his little bed - watching monitors and saying constant prayers. 

Sometimes you just have to nap where you can.

Our little guy was always fighting. It was so hard to leave him every night.

We were blessed to have so many prayers said in his behalf. He his home now, a healthy, happy boy! 

We're all at home now, adjusting to our new life. Bama is always coming to check on his brother - they're getting along quite well.