Birth Story Part 1: The Caesarean Section

I had a c-section because Baby I was breech. I asked the dr if we should attempt to flip him and she said no, he was already stressed. Then she said she was sorry that it needed to be like this and acknowledged that this wasn't quite the way I had wanted labor and delivery to go either. Her nurse called us later Thursday afternoon to tell me that the c-section was scheduled for Friday at 130p and to arrive at 1130a and no food or drink past midnight (friends advised me to eat a small breakfast, but I didn't and later regretted).

So we showed up on Friday, on time and I tried not to cry as I signed in for my primary caesarean section. Mom came with C and I to the hospital, and sister B, Dad, C's mom, and a super close family friend came along later. One person I didn't expect was sister B's boyfriend of four years, J, who came in afterwards - so very sweet of him (two hour drive each way).
They prepped me with all sorts of IVs and compression stuff and explained everything very well. In the OR, the anesthesiologist kept me talking about Harry Potter while putting in my epidural, which was kind and probably made it go way better. They explained that I'd feel everything, but that there should be no actual pain. After the meds set in, I found it humorous to not feel my lower half as they splayed my legs to insert a catheter (one of the things I'm used to after IF?). All thirteen or so people in the room introduced themselves and told me what they'd be doing and the dr came in with C. She had told us that she hoped the baby was a girl because there is less to grab between the legs when they come out breech :-).

The surgery itself was not a fun time. I apparently can't tell the difference between the sensations (pulling, tugging, stretching) and pain, or else I was actually in pain. The anesthesiologist kept asking me if I was in pain and I kept saying that I didn't know, then he just started going off my facial expressions and pushed more pain meds. C was able to look over the curtain and let me know that we had a son, then he continued to watch the rest of the surgery when he wasn't attending to Baby I. He said that I seemed to begin feeling a lot of pain when they popped my uterus onto my belly and began to clean it out. I could hear Baby I squawk once he was over with the NICU nurses at the warmer and through my pain I found this very reassuring.

C tried to hold Baby I up next to my face so that I could see him, but at that time the nausea had arrived and I remember turning away from the baby to avoid throwing up on him.  After some fabulously violent dry heaves, I am still puke-free.  I think they pushed more pain meds at this point because it gets fuzzy.  I'm sure that they finished everything up nicely and I remember being wheeled out of the OR into the recovery room.  C went with Baby I to the NICU of course, so I was alone with a nurse who kept very close track of me and they began a 24-hour push of magnesium sulfate through my IV.  The "mag" as they all called it was a precaution due to the preeclamsia, specifically the high blood pressure, and it would prevent me from having a stroke or seizures (yes, this freaked my mom out terribly, but she didn't realize what it was for until later).  Eventually, C came back to tell me how our son (!) was doing and all of the family in the waiting room began to trickle in.  C was able to tell them that we had a boy and what his name would most likely be (after confirmation from me).  I had the shakes the whole time in recovery (normal) and began feeling the effects of the mag a few hours later.

Birth story con't in another post.