OtterPops: Halloween Wrap Up and Birthing Emma

So we wrapped up Halloween with a pumpkin carving, sugar cookie decorating and seed cooking FHE. To be honest, Jared did all the carving at the kid’s request, my mom and I cleaned out the pumpkins (because the kids lasted all of 4 minutes before getting grossed out), but they had fun collecting and cooking the seeds and decorating/eating sugar cookies and doting over the finished products! We also carved one little pumpkin in honor of the coming baby. On Halloween morning we went to Jocelyn's kindergarten Halloween parade and had fun supporting her.

Jared being a good sport carving pumpkins, but not a good sport smiling for the camera

Nana & girls making pumpkin seeds and decorating sugar cookies

Spiderman, hello kitty, husky & goofy grin

On Halloween night we were invited over to the Woolford’s for a spooky Halloween dinner which was really great because I just brought a couple things and didn’t have to cook/clean up hardly at all. I could tell I wasn’t feeling very well Wednesday evening and even after a nap in the afternoon I could hardly walk. The induction was scheduled for 7 am the next morning so I just hoped and prayed she would come on her own (she was 3 days overdue after all), but we were closing in on the time!

Spiderman trick or treating

I got everything scheduled, packed and I showered to be ready for the next morning and got a few hours of sleep before I woke up at 1:30 feeling pretty uncomfortable with an upset stomach. By 2:15 I figured I better time contractions so I was in the bathroom with my phone when my legs started to shake and I realized the contractions were 2 min. apart. Jared woke up to go to the bathroom and asked me what I was doing up staring at my phone. I told him the situation and he got a little upset saying “What are you doing? Get in the car!! I’ll grab all the bags!” We were to the hospital 20 minutes later and they immediately admitted me and said I was dilated to an 8 or 9, broke my water and told me I probably wouldn’t have time for an epidural.

I lost it a little at that point realizing that this was happening quick and painful whether I liked it or not! Don’t get me wrong, I’d rather have fast & furious than long and drawn out but it is still never fun. After my water broke things seemed to slow down a little and I went back to being dilated to a 7. At this point I deliberated a little but decided to go ahead with trying the epidural. The anesthesiologist took almost an hour to arrive, got the epidural “patch” on and we didn’t even hook up the main drip before it felt like I was ready to push. It was really hard work and still pretty painful but within a half hour Emma was there. Jared did a great job pulling me through and it was so great to know she was here!


Baby and Cait right after birth

Emma on her birth day

Emma Lynn Otterstrom was born at 5:30 am (4 hrs after labor had started), she was my smallest baby yet measuring 19 inches. She weighed 7 lbs. 14 oz. and got an 8 and a 9 on her apgar scores. She came out with the cord around her neck so she was pretty purple, but was breathing soon and continued to cry/complain for the first 45 minutes until she finally successfully nursed.

Whole Family at hospital

That morning Nana brought all the kids to meet the baby before taking them to school and we just tried to rest up, etc. Emma had swallowed quite a bit of amniotic fluid during delivery and kept throwing up bloody junk the whole day. The nurses even had to do a “deep pump” where they sucked out fluid from her stomach with a tube down her throat. Because of a hyper gag reflex and the pumping, she had no interest in eating pretty much for 24 hours after birth (besides the initial feeding). Because of our differing blood types and because she hadn’t been eating, when Emma took her bilirubin (jaundice) test it turned out her levels were really high and they told us she had to go into a bili bed with the lights to help her levels come down. I kind of lost it again just wanting to snuggle her instead of having her in a plastic bed. Jared was reminding me they were just being cautious and preventing further risk but I had a nurse that totally sympathized with me because her own baby had to go through the same thing. I pulled it together again and after being in there all day, having a wonderful lactation consultant come and spoon feed Emma and try to work on a good feeding, etc. we made a lot of progress with bringing her levels down.