Catherine's Birth Story

I was scheduled to be induced on Monday morning. Dr. Mascorro felt like an induction would be best because my last delivery was not exactly easy, and they were expecting baby girl to be not exactly small. So my parents and David's parents came to Abilene Sunday evening, ready to babysit for us.

David and I got to the hospital on Monday morning at 5 am. We checked in, and they started me on Pitocin at about 6:30 am. Labor went relatively slow for quite awhile. My doctor came and broke my water around 8:30 am. They kept increasing my Pitocin dosage until my contractions were pretty close together. I asked for an epidural around 11:30 am. The pain wasn't unbearable yet, but knowing that I was going to get an epidural at some point, I decided that it was silly to go through much of any pain! I got my epidural around 12:15 or so. My doctor came to check me at that point, and I was at 5 cm, and the baby was still at a -1 station (pretty high up). So she said she'd come back in a couple hours.

She came back at 12:30, saying that my baby didn't like the epidural as much as I did and that her heart rate was dropping too much with each contraction. So they put me on oxygen, had me change positions, and stopped the Pitocin temporarily. That seemed to relieve baby girl, and my doctor left. Within minutes - literally - I started feeling crazy pressure. The nurse checked me, and I had moved to 9 cm, and the baby was on its way out. She quickly called my doctor back in, and I pushed baby girl out in two contractions (a total of probably 3 minutes' worth!) at 1:01 pm. It was insane! With Daniel, my epidural knocked out all sensations - feelings and pressure. With this one, I could still feel quite a bit, and it was a crazy experience.

So Catherine Siena Sanchez was born at 1:01 pm. She weighed 7 lbs and measured 19 inches long.

Daniel and both sets of grandparents came right away to meet Catherine. Daniel wasn't entirely impressed and was more interested in watching cartoons, but that was to be expected. Catherine gave him a present - new sunglasses - and we're hoping that will help! He's actually been really good with the baby so far. He likes to go check on her periodically and brings her toys or other gifts. He even covered her clothes with his new stickers.

Anyway.....back to the hospital.....Tuesday morning our pediatrician came to assess Catherine. She found a heart murmur and suspected a VSD (ventricular septal defect), which is apparently a hole between two chambers of the heart. Because Abilene doesn't have a pediatric cardiologist, our pediatrician ordered an echocardiogram and sent it to Cooks Children's Hospital in Fort Worth. She said that if it was a small hole, it would most likely repair itself within the year, but that if it was a big hole, we would be on our way to Fort Worth that afternoon. She was confident that it was only a small hole because the noise was very loud, indicating that the blood was pumping through a small space. She told us that we would most likely get to go home that afternoon and that she would call us with Cooks' results at home. So we were all set to go, just waiting on orders, when our nurse called and said that the pediatrician changed her mind and we would need to wait at the hospital until we heard back from Cooks. This worried us because we didn't understand what made our doctor change her mind. Anyway, we just waited.....and waited....and waited. We found out that the pediatric cardiologist at Cooks who normally reads the echocardiograms had been killed in an accident earlier in the week and that everyone was at his funeral that day. It's hard to complain about waiting after hearing that, so we just waited some more. At 6:30 that evening, we got the call saying that it was, in fact, a small hole in Catherine's heart, and she would just have to follow-up with Cooks in the future. We could take her home that evening! Thank heavens! We brought baby girl home around 8:15 pm on Tuesday. We will follow-up with the cardiologist in Fort Worth next month to see if the hole is closing on its own.

I'll update you on our first week home soon! For now, it's nap time!