A short narrative

So yesterday morning (Thursday, four days before Peter’s due date) we have a “routine” doctor’s visit to make sure all is ok. Everything is fine and dandy until the doctor says “that doesn’t feel like a head” while inspecting Peter’s Mom. “I think we should do a quick ultrasound and make sure.” So we move to another room and out comes the cold slime for the ultrasound zapper to roll over Momm’s belly easily. What does the screen show? Peter’s head, up at the top of the womb instead of down at the bottom where it’s supposed to be. That means he’s breech. That’s bad.

The doctor explains what can be done, and terms like “c-section” and “inducement” feature prominently in the talk. I am proud to say I managed to say “I’m feeling lightheaded” before suffering the indignity of passing out then and there, and I’m prouder to say that I sat down and was fine. But the discussion went on, and the basic consensus was that we’d come in Friday morning for an External Cephalic Version procedure, but get booked for a possible c-section if that didn’t work. External Cephalic Version (AKA “Version”) means someone tries to push the mother’s belly to get the baby in the right direction, which sounds easy enough, but if the baby has dropped into the cervix he has to be pushed up, then spun, and then pushed down.

Leaving the hospital we decided, well, maternity leave starts now. We each went to our respective offices, collected whatever stuff we needed and headed for home to figure out what the hell we were going to do. Peter’s Mom was sharp enough to call our Hynobirthing practitioner to see if there’s any alternate things that we can do, and after a while she said there’s a chiropractic procedure that can help get a baby to move into a head-down position, and a previous client of hers is a chiropractor, and she talked to our group at one of the sessions about the help she got from Hypnobirthing. Writing it down now makes it all seem so convenient, but what do I know? Anyway, we called the chiropractor, and she could see us at 4:00. We went home for a little while and tried some tricks to get him to move, but he wasn’t in the mood, I guess.

We drove out to the chiropractor and we told her about what was going on. She said we should try to get any procedure postponed until Monday to let the chiropractic adjustment have some time to work. What it does is loosen up and align the pelvis so if anything is tight or lined up the wrong way the baby would have a much easier time doing his spin. And if you’ve never seen your very pregnant wife get chiropractor-ized, it’s… well, something I don’t need to see again. But we made another appointment for Saturday morning for a follow-up in case we’re able to, and the need is still there.

Mommy felt better afterwards, and she called the OB to see about what HAS to be done, and when, and what MAY be done, and when. After the talk she felt ok with doing to the version at the hospital, but if we can work around a c-section and buy some time we’d do that, too.

This morning we got up, ready for, and at peace with, whatever would come our way. Our primary concern is doing what’s in the best interest of Peter, and if it’s safest and best to do a c-section, so be it. If he can be moved to the normal position, great. So we crammed the car with all the stuff we thought we’d need in case it was Peter’s birthday and headed off to the hospital.

Mommy got an IV stuck in her arm (and it was done very well, no “oopsies!”) and the monitor tentacles strapped to her belly to keep track of Peter’s heartbeat and Mommy’s contractions. She was later given a shot of something that makes her uterus muscles relax, so it would make it easier to manhandle – er, adjust the baby in her belly. They then slimed up her tum-tum and did another ultrasound to make sure he’s not being a tease. His head was still up, so Peter experienced his first bout of wrestling. I suppose I should be proud of him, because the little guy won and the doctor admitted defeat. The down side is he’s still up.

Mommy took the lead in pursuing a delay in the c-section. One of the doctors said she’d go check the schedule. Putting it off until Monday to allow for a natural flip would not be a problem, but if labor starts while he’s still like that it would still have to be a c-section. She came back saying that the only time they currently had free was next Thursday at 7:30 AM. A week to move him? We’ll take that.

So now we have another appointment with the chiropractor tomorrow morning. We’ll be trying to figure out a way to move him until Thursday morning. We’re going to try everything we can. Everything legal, I guess.