Carter Thomas Hutson

Sorry I haven't posted in forever but a lot has happened.  Here is the birth story of Carter.  The weeks before Carter's birth were filled with contractions which made me think I was in labor.  The plan all along was to be induced on July 9th (39 weeks) so I was happy to know that was the latest I would have my baby. I took heparin injections throughout my pregnancy due to the losses that I had previously.  The shots were tough as I had to take them twice a day at 7am and 7pm. I had to schedule my life around giving myself these shots.  I joked that I felt like a drug addict because I would give my shots wherever I was which included public restrooms, the car, etc.  Since the heparin shots thin your blood they wanted me to be off of them when I delivered so I didn't bleed to death.

I went in to Willow Creek Women's hospital on Sunday July 8th to start the process.  I think I over packed because it looked like I was moving in and I only used a few things out of my many bags.  They got me all hooked up after letting a new nurse put in my IV who blew my vein (ouch!).  They gave me medication to make my cervix soften.  Grayson went and got me my last meal (Jason's Deli).  The doctor let me walk around the hospital and Grayson was in charge of following me around the hospital with the IV pole.  I then took the doctor up on the offer of an Ambien to go to sleep.  I figured it was the only time I would get a sleeping pill and it would be the last full night of sleep for a while.  I guess the Ambien worked because I don't even remember anything after I swallowed the pill.  When the nurse woke me up at 6 she asked me how I slept.  I said "Great!".  She then told me that she had been in my room almost every hour during the night because Carter kept moving off the monitor and she kept coming in and messing with my belly. I didn't even know she was messing with me.


At 6 am on Monday July 9th they started the Pitocin.  I started having harder contractions but it wasn't too unbearable.  At 8 am Dr. Hinton arrived.  Dr. Hinton is the best doctor I could ever have.  She was with me through both of my losses and worked hard to figure out why I kept losing babies.  Her bedside manner is incredible.  She broke my water and put Carter on an internal monitor which screws into his head since he kept moving off the belly monitor. Between 8-10am I don't remember much.  I guess my contractions really picked up because I was in the zone.  At 10 I finally gave up and asked for an epidural.  I had wanted to go natural but felt I still had so long to go that I didn't think I could make it.   It is hard to describe labor pain but I kept telling Grayson that I was dying if that gives you a clue.  It feels like someone is ripping your insides out.  I guess since I was in so much pain the anesthesiologist came really fast.  They immediately gave me my epidural and then decided to see how far dilated I was.  To all of our surprise, I was already 10cm and ready to push. If they had checked me 5 minutes earlier, before the epidural, then I would have been pushing. Since I didn't feel a thing they made me wait to push.  I sat in bed watching "The Chew" on tv and eating a popsicle. That was the best cherry popsicle I have ever had.  I think I started pushing between 11-11:30.  I still couldn't feel anything.  I tried to pick my leg up and it just fell over.  I had no control over the lower half of my body.  I kept asking if I was pushing right cause I really couldn't feel anything.  Carter's head was turned to the side so they were wanting to use forceps but once I heard that word I started really pushing.  At 12:16 pm my little miracle baby came out screaming. It was such a relief to have him in my arms.  He weighed 7 pounds 5 ounces and was 20.5 inches long.