It was actually a cloudy Wednesday morning on May 18, 2011. Mania was scheduled for her induction at 9:00 a.m. at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena. Though we didn’t get much sleep, we were interrupted by a phone call at 7:30 a.m. from the hospital stating that they needed to extend admitting her since all the rooms were full — she was furious. Not to mention, the anxiety was driving us crazy. Later, we were told to come in at 1:30 p.m. to get started with the induction and delivery of baby Nicole.
Dr. Steven Hartford had been monitoring Mania since we originally began expecting Nicole and (thank God) everything looked great without any signs of trouble. Nicole’s height, weight, heart rate, bone structure and mom’s chemistry with her were all on target while Mania experienced a very active baby during her 2nd and 3rd trimesters. The only concern that the doctor had was that she had not dropped as much as he wanted for the delivery, but still felt confident that a natural delivery was a very viable option. The chances of a cesarean was increased because of this; however, Dr. Hartford also indicated that he was scheduled to go on vacation on Friday for nearly 2 weeks (hence the reason for the induction on Wednesday).
Mania’s parents came by and picked up Joey (who’s now 22 months) and did a wonderful job watching him as we made our way to this delivery. The drive to the hospital was quick and we were admitted in less than 10 minutes.
They first put Mania on Petocin which basically gets the contractions going. I, on the other hand, was setting up tripods, cameras and other recording devices (while all the nurses thought I was out of my mind setting up for a Discovery Channel nature scene — I didn’t care)! The cramping began at 3:30 p.m. and began to escalate as each hour progressed.
Originally when Mania was delivering Joey, she decided to go on epideral during the later part of the delivery. This time around, her request was immediate and everyone down the hallway knew she wasn’t going to wait! At around 8:00 p.m., she was given her dosage and began to feel numb almost instantaneously. Boy was she in heaven!
Dr. Hartord finally showed up at 9:30 p.m. to check up on Mania as she had only dialated 2cm (delivery normally begins at 10cm). Her water had not broken yet during which time he proceeded by breaking it manually. This is where the fun began…. Nicole had only one option – to head South!
The doctor left Mania to go home to get some rest, while I was about to keep him in a “choke-hold” to make sure that he got this baby out in a timely manner. He calmly told us that he was only 10 minutes away and that getting to the hospital would only take a simple phone call by a monitoring nurse.
At about 1:15 a.m., Thursday morning, Mania had reached 9.5cm. She had rapidly dialated nearly 7 cm in less than an hour. The doctor’s sleep was interrupted and he showed up as promised (in 10 minutes) with a concerned look on his face. Each time Mania had contractions, the baby’s heart rate kept dropping (not a good sign). They made her change several positions but that wasn’t helping. While he and 2 other nurses frantically looked at monitors hoping to see a normalized heart rate for the baby during the contractions, I was by Mania’s side instructing her to breathe and to relax so that she could not sense their concern. An emergency C-Section was on standby if the baby’s heart rate didn’t stabilize as the doctor wanted.
At exactly 1:45 a.m. it was time for Mania to push. Nicole’s heat lamp was on, the doctor was gearing up as though he was going to go into orbit. It was time for Mania to start pushing. Due to the nature of Nicole’s dropping heart rate, the doctor opted to proceed with natural delivery while having Mania relax (not push) on every third contraction.
In only 15 minutes of pushing, Nicole shot out of Mania like a loose canon. She had her umbilical cord wrapped around her neck (which was immediatly unravelled once the doctor had access) — that’s what was causing the reduced heart rate during each one of Mania’s contractions. This could have been a lot worst!
Finally, she bursted out with her first cry in less than 3 seconds and turned from gray to pink almost instantly. She was as healthy as imagineable. They handed me the scissors and gave me the honors of “cutting my daughter’s cord”!
Nicole was born at exactly 2:00 a.m. on Thursday, May 19, 2011, while weighing 6lbs, 7ozs, at 20 inches tall. She had a full set of hair and looked absolutely beautiful. I had forgotten about all the apparatus I had set up while only focussing on one thing, Nicole (and of course, Mania).
While mesmerized by the experience of having a daughter with tears in my eyes, I could hear Mania saying “hurry, get some pictures!!!”….. so here they are!!!
Mania and I would like to thank you for all your support to the wonderful new addition to the Hairapetian family!
Welcome home Nicole!
Love,
Dad
