Ridge Nole Petersen

I feel like there is SO much I need to blog about. I'll probably break all of the information about Ridge into a few posts.  So to start, here's the birth story. My doctor set my induction date for Tuesday, April 14 when I would be 38 weeks along.  I went in for my last appointment on Monday afternoon and I was dilated to a 1 but there was really nothing going on.  Monday night we finished up all the last baby prep and house cleaning.  Finally around 12:30am we were finishing up our to-dos and decided to watch a show before we went to sleep.  I set my alarm for 6:00 so I could grab the last minute things before we left at 7:00.  I think I fell asleep around 1:15am.  At 1:40, I woke up feeling like someone had poured some water on me.  I sat up and told Tagg I thought my water had just broken.  He hadn't even fallen asleep yet. I ran to the bathroom but wasn't totally sure what was happening.  No more water was coming so I wasn't sure what to think.  As I got up and started moving around more it became very apparent that my water had indeed broken.  Because of my medical history and the blood thinners I'm on during pregnancy, I have been induced with every one of my pregnancies so Tagg and I weren't really sure what to do.  I have often said that while it's nice to be induced and have a set date for when the baby will come, I'm sad I will never be able to have the excitement of going into labor on my own.  What a tender mercy from Heavenly Father that I was able to go into labor on my own but it was only a few hours before they were going to induce me so I had already finished the blood thinner I was on. We called Tagg's parents to see if Gena could come stay with the boys while we made our way to the hospital.  Unfortunately their phones were turned off so we had to call Tucker, Tagg's brother, who lives about a mile away from his parents to go wake them up and tell them what was going on.  We were lucky Tucker could come to our rescue.  Meanwhile we decided to call my friend Jessie who lives close to us to come and stay at our house until Gena could get there. She was awesome for coming to our rescue also. With my previous pregnancies, once the doctor broke my water, labor really speeded up.  I just wasn't sure how much time we had before everything got really intense.  Plus the hospital I was delivering at is about 30 minutes away so I wanted to leave as soon as possible.  By the time we got to the hospital I had only had a few contractions and they weren't painful at all.  I called my mom once we were there to let her know my water had broken and she should probably start driving to Dallas soon so she could be here when he was born. At this point I was still thinking that things would go quickly since my water had broken already. Once they got the IV in me and hooked me up to all the monitors, they left me alone for a while to see what my body was going to do. Turns out my body wasn't really responding to the fact that my water broke. The on call doctor checked me at about 6 in the morning and I was dialated to a 3.  He also decided to put monitors inside of me instead of on my stomach to monitor my contractions and monitor the baby's heart rate.  Given his condition, this would give a more accurate reading.  His baseline heart rate was pretty low through my whole labor.  It wasn't a huge concern because he still had the ups and downs that they like to see to show he wasn't in distress.  They kept uping the amount of pitocin they were giving me but it wasn't really making too big of a difference in my contractions.  My mom made it to the hospital around 9:30am. My friend Paige took the boys the whole day so my mom and Gena could be at the hospital.  She was a lifesaver and my kids love being with her so it was nice to know they were well taken care of.  Gena made it to the hospital around 10ish.  We chatted for a bit and waited for things to pick up more.  Tucker also stopped by for a few minutes while he was in the area doing things for his job. They checked me sporadically throughout the morning and I think I was at a 5 when the contractions started to pick up and I got an epidural.  After that things started to progress quickly.  His heart rate started dropping as my contractions picked up so they had me wear the oxygen mask to hopefully keep his heart rate from dropping anymore.  Around 2:00 I started to feel more pressure so I called for my nurse to see if she could come check me.  She came in and checked and I was fully dilated and ready to push.  They had me do a few practice pushes to help him descend a little bit more.  They made all the calls they needed to to get all the right people there before I really started pushing.  It was at this point I got really nervous and started crying.  It was like everything was finally hitting me and I realized what was about to happen.  It had been a long 4.5 months of learning about his heart defect and how it was going to affect him and the moment was now here where it was all going to play out.  Finally everyone arrived that needed to be there for the birth.  I think there were 4 doctors and nurses there for the baby plus my doctor and nurses.  It was a pretty packed room.  My doctor had me start pushing.  I had an epidural but I didn't want it to be too strong so I would be able to move around more easily after the birth.  I could feel the contractions but they weren't painful.  Pushing however was incredibly painful.  I could feel him starting to come out but it seemed like no matter how hard I pushed, he just wasn't coming. I was starting to get exhausted and I was losing my strength. Another contraction came and I was trying to push through the whole contraction but then it was over and his head was part way out.  It hurt so bad.  My doctor told me to just keep pushing.  I was exhausted but I just kept trying to push and all of a sudden at 2:30, he was out and crying. I think I only ended up pushing for a few minutes even though it felt like forever. Also, I didn't tear at all which was awesome! Turns out he was face up instead of face down like babies are supposed to be.  My doctor was super impressed that I was even able to push him out.  I guess a lot of women can't push out a baby when they are in that position and end up having to have a c-section. I'm just so grateful that everything went well enough for me to be able to have a vaginal delivery instead of a c-section.
My doctor held him up for a minute after he was born and he looked so different to me than Beckett and Griffin.  The neonatologist took him and started cleaning him off and doing a few initial tests.  I could hear him crying which I was grateful for.

They got him all wrapped up and said he was doing well enough for me to hold him for a minute.  It was such an emotional moment holding him but it was also a little scary.  He wasn't crying anymore and I was just worried that he was going to stop breathing.  I was overcome with love for that sweet little boy that I had waited so long to see.

After I held him for a minute, I handed him off to Tagg so he could have a turn too.

Tagg held him for about 20 seconds and then the nurses took him and whisked him off to the NICU to get him settled and started on the medications he needed.  Tagg followed the nurses to the NICU while I got cleaned up.

It was such a strange delivery.  It went from being a room full of people and full of commotion to all of a sudden everyone was gone.  Tagg was gone, my baby was gone, and the only people in the room besides me was my doctor and my mom.  It kind of felt like the whole thing was a dream. I kept thinking, did I really just have a baby? Did all of this really just happen?
Tagg was able to hear how much Ridge weighed before they kicked him out to get started inserting his IVs. He was only 6lbs 10oz.  I couldn't believe it.  That was so small for what I thought he was going to be.  Thats probably why he looked so different to me when he was born.  He was just smaller than what I was used to.

I had to "recover" for a few hours before they would let me go to the NICU. My mom, Ned, Gena, Tagg and I chatted for a bit and I ate some lunch. We weren't sure what we were going to name him but after seeing him and spending the little time we were able to with him, Tagg and I both felt strongly that his name should be Ridge. Our families give us a hard time about not picking a name before our babies are born but I have had a clear moment with each one of my boys after they were born where what we should name them became very apparent to me.  And I love that Tagg and I have always agreed on what we should name them.
So there's the birth story and hopefully tomorrow I will post more about his NICU experience and the first few days in the CHSU.