John Jay's Birth Story

John Jay was born on June 6, 1997. We lived in Weatherford, but I was seeing Dr. Clark in the city. At the end of April, I was measuring small and John's heartbeat was slower than usual, he realized he hadn't ordered an ultrasound yet and scheduled one for early the next week. Everything was fine. I was jsut small and wasn't showing much. A few weeks later I was still measuring small, so he sent me to the hospital for a non-stress test. The hospital made me stay for awhile because I was having contractions. They finally called the Dr and he told them to send me home since they weren't very strong. Four weeks before John was born I was dialated to a 2 and 33% effaced. Every week the numbers went up. At my last appointment on June 4 (on a Wednesday), I was at a 4 and was 78% effaced. We scheduled to have me induced early Monday (June 9) morning because since I am small, he didn't want the baby to get too big. My due date was June 11. On Thursday evening, I was having contractions, but they weren't painful. Duane came home for lunch about 7:40. The contractions weren't regular or painful, so he went back to work after his lunch was over. At about 8:45, I called the nurse at the hospital and since we were 80 miles from the hospital and the contractions were about 6-9 min apart, she said to come on in, they would check it out. Called Duane and he had to put gas in the car on his way home.

A little side trip here about the car. A few weeks before, Duane had gotten rammed by a Dodge Ram. The hatchback on our Colt was in bad shape. There was no back window. Duane taped a garbage bag over it. The Ram's insurance company totaled the car, but let us keep it until after the baby was born. So, to continue....

I picked up around the house until he came home and made sure I had everything. We started out at 9:30. During the drive there the contractions closed to about 2 min apart, but they still weren't painful. By the time we got to the hospital they were one min. apart. They were pretty close and they let me sit on the bed and put the moniter on me. When they made me lay down they slowed down after 30 min to about 15 min apart. They still weren't painful. So, they let me up to walk. They told us to walk for an hour. We walked and they got closer and closer. Finally 20 min, before we were supposed to go back, they got painful. It started to get hard to walk. Duane kept trying to get me to go back up to the delivery floor, but I kept walking becuase I knew once they let me lay down, they wouldn't let me back up. Well, after about 15 min of painful contract every 2-3 min, I relented. But, once again, when they made me lay down, they slowed down. They called the Dr. and he told them to give me some sleeping meds and induce me at 4 a.m. since we had planned to do it Monday anyway. The sleeping meds didn't work until after they gave me the Pitocin at 4. The contractions were painful. They also gave me an enema at the same time. At 5:30, i asked for some pain meds. Duane was out. He hadn't had much sleep the night before and I couldn't get him awake. So he wasn't any help at all this time. The meds just made me somewhat dazed and very sick. They didn't help with the pain. My water broke when I got sick the first time. At 7:30, I was able to wake Duane up and ask for an epidural. The epidural was great....for a little bit. Dr. came in at 8:30. I couldn't feel anything by then. He told the guy to turn the epidural down, all the way down, but by then it was too late. The nurses had to tell me how to push and I had the darndest time trying to figure out how. I got it right at some point, because John Jay was born at 8:42 a.m. Everyone kept telling me that he had a lot of hair. Duane got to stand at my head, but they didn't ask him to cut the cord or anything. I think it was okay though. I don't know if Duane would have wanted to or not. Dr. Clark did episiotomies as standard procedures. I guess he made mine good sized because he thought John was a pound more than he really was. I was still numb, but they laid him on my stomach and I got to look at him. They cleaned him up in the room and Duane went with them to weigh and measure him.

I actually felt fine for the first 24 hours. They let me nurse him after they cleaned me up before they moved me to another room. We had no problems nursing. The nurse checked on us, but when she saw we were doing fine and didn't look like we needed help, she left us alone. Duane left a little bit after they moved me to my room because he had no money and needed to pick up his paycheck since it was Friday. I called and called the nursery for my baby boy, but he still didn't come. Finally at about 2:30, I called the nurses in the nursery yet again. I was really getting upset because I had asked for almost four hours for my baby and hadn't heard anything. The nurse finally brought him to me. She had just started her shift. She said the reason they hadn't brought him to me before was because his temperature was low and they had him in the warmer trying to get his temp up. But she was concerned that no-one had told me this. So I finally got my baby again. I kept him with me until about 2 a.m. Then they came for him. They wanted to put him in the nursery until 6 so that I could get some sleep. They let you room in, but the first night, they put the babies in the nursery for a few hours so the mothers can sleep. The nurse did wake me up at 4:30, though because he was hungry and I told them no formula or sugar water.

When the ped came and checked John out that afternoon, he asked if I wanted him circumcised. I said yes and then I asked if Medicaid paid for it and he said no. Since we didn't have almost 200 dollars to pay for it, I told him we couldn't afford to. I have sinced found out that Medicaid would have paid for it and that I was mis-informed. But no-one said anything to me. Duane still wasn't back from getting his check and I still felt very dazed. I know thinking back that we could have had it done and just paid the hospital 10 dollars a month until it was paid off, but...

When Dr. Clark asked me Saturday morning if I wanted to go home or stay another day, I told him I felt like going home. I was feeling good. Plus, my mom and dad had just seperated two months before and both were there along with my 18 year old sister, my 11 year old brother and my 9 year old sister. Duane hadn't been able to hold John very long at all. The only reason I got him was because he needed to eat. Duane's family called to say they were at our house and was I staying at the hospital another night or was I coming home. Since I was coming home, but it would still take me several hours to check out, Duane went ahead home and let them in. They had called from a nearby store. My Dad took John Jay and I home. My parents live 90 miles to the SW of our home in one corner of our state, and Duane's mom and sister lived 90 miles to the NW in the other corner of our state. My mom met us at our house. My Dad left soon after and after another hour, so did my mother so that we could spend some time with Duane's family. By 9 that evening I was worn out and everyone left. I spent the next several days crying. Most of it was because I hurt from the episiotomy sooooo bad and John Jay wanted to nurse all the time. After a week, I finally left the bedroom and layed on the living room floor most of the day. That way I could be with Duane and have someone to talk to. After about three weeks I could finally sit up for a few hours. Duane didn't take any time off because we couldn't afford for him to. The first day he went to work was the hardest.

My beautiful baby boy had lots and lots of black hair. You can see what he looked like above. His hair gradually changed, though. He always looked fat in that first picture. I don't remember him being that fat. You can see what he looks like below. Thank you for reading all this. For the longest time I was okay with his birth....until I had his little brother. Looking back, this one wasn't very good. I got left out of a lot of the decision making and didn't know a lot of what was going on. Read my other birth story about Elijah.