{Niece}

The Marathon started yesterday at 1:30am when Brother and Oldest were kneeling down to say their prayers... Brother made her laugh and """POP"""... she was done!

I got that pic in a text from Brother at 2 am and then at 4 I got a call from him that said they were at the hospital and that she was starting the epidural... He said he didn't anticipate her delivering until about 11 in the morning so I could sleep and come in the morning.

Well it went MUCH slower than anyone expected. I went to my Book of Mormon class and at 11 headed to the hospital where she only dilated to a 3.5 when I got there. Oldest had high blood pressure, so they were watching her closely and Baby's heart rate was really struggling.

She was super uncomfortable because she could only be on her right side. Every time they rotated her to her left side Baby's heart rate dropped. Also oxytocin was given to her so that they could stimulate contractions, but that also made Baby's heart rate really drop.

So we sat in the room. Every half hour they would come check her.. tell us she had dilated maybe 1/4 a centimeter and then try to slowly increase the oxytocin in hopes that Baby would co-operate.

This was the party at about 1 or 2 in the afternoon when everyone was calm and excited... it didn't really last long.
Then came the stretch.

Once the water breaks, it starts a clock. If the baby hasn't delivered in 24 hours then it's definitely a c-section situation... So we sat in the room staring at the monitor-- watching her little heart beat rise and fall. The beep was enough to just drive you insane because anytime it slowed we all stopped at prayed it would rise again... Bro and I did our best to distract Oldest but she had really bad heartburn and she was in a lot of pain from being on her right side for like 10 hours... Her epidural worked like a charm, so she didn't feel a lot of pain, but the poor thing was so uncomfortable!

About 4 she was done. The stress of the baby and her blood pressure just weighed on her. She hadn't eaten anything but ice chips since dinner the night before... she was exhausted from having been up for almost 24 hours. Mom and Me made an exit to get some dinner and left Oldest and Brother to kinda have time together.

When we came back she was shaking uncontrollably. I guess it's normal to shake, but her muscles were so tight from not moving and then her adrenaline really started to kick in as she got more and more anxious about the baby. It was about 6 that they decided that they were going to do a C-Section because she was only dilated to about 5 cm.... The only problem was that there were FIVE scheduled before her. FIVE OTHER C-SECTIONS. Welcome to Utah right? Holy Smokes. So we waited. We rubbed her down and massaged her shoulders so that she would relax a little. About 8:45pm the nurse came in to check her and I had a call from my Aunt, so I went into the hall to answer.. then I saw a couple nurses go in the room.. 2 came out and were talking as they passed me in the hall. "Ya, somethings definitely going on in #12.." I looked again and the anesthesiologist came running down the hall and into her room. I got off the phone and ran in. They had her bed out and were unplugging all her tubes, wires, etc and prep-ing her for an emergency c-section. The Baby's heart rate had really started to drop and they bumped everyone else back and rushed her in.

I won't lie it was one of the scarier moments of my life. Oldest ALWAYS has her composure. Especially in medical situations because she sees stuff like this all the time at work, but the look on her poor face as they started to roll her out was sheer terror. It shattered my heart. I cried for almost 10 minutes solid after she left. I was exhausted.

At 9:45ish they rolled Oldest back into the room. She was cold-- shaking and shivering like crazy. They said that Baby was fine and they had her hooked up to a breathing machine that was helping to open her lungs all the way and then they had to do a couple tests... after that they would bring her out. By now the whole fam was there and we just sat anticipating the baby coming... Brother was the only allowed up in NICU. At about 11 my family finally gave up hope of seeing the little angel because they had to drive home, but I stayed and helped Oldest get situated in her new room.

About midnight Brother came down and said that I could go up with him to see her.

She was attached to a respirator and it was kinda freaky! Her little chest looked almost like it was vibrating because it was rising and falling so fast... She was pretty pale, but Brother said that she was white as a piece of paper when they pulled her from the womb, so her color was improving..

See! The top one is last night and the bottom one is from today.. she has a lot less redness and a lot more natural pigment today. Anyway I left the hospital last night at 1 and crashed. I felt like I had been hit by a train this morning.. I can't imagine how Oldest and Brother felt...

a little bit of her Strawberry Blonde hair :)

My Aunt is an NICU nurse, so when she started her shift this morning she had Baby put on her rotation. Thank heaven because there is so much comfort in knowing that your family member is taking care of her. We also found out that last night they were really down playing the situation.

Baby (she is still unnamed) had a knot tied in her umbilical cord, so she was being shut off from nutrients when she was moved into certain positions.. She had high CO2 levels, low sugar levels, fluid in her lungs, and her blood PH level was wrong. My aunt said that from reading the notes that took in her chart last night things were kinda scary for a while there, but this morning they took her off the ventilation machine and she is breathing perfectly. Her oxygen levels are great. They are concerned she might have an infection because her white blood cell count is low, so they have her on antibiotics, but other than that my Aunt said that she has made a really great turn around and looks much better today...
My mom and sisters came back up and we got to hold the little angel for a while :) Oldest is also doing really well. She is really swollen from the oxytocin they have her on (which helps her produce milk) so she looks pretty chunky haha, but other than that everything is going well. THANK HEAVEN. Well I am exhausted and going to take a nap... I know Heavenly Father was watching over this little girl because the entire supply could've easily been cut off and she wouldn't have made it.. so I guess the moral of the story is that giggling during prayers saves lives ;)