Welcome to the world, Gabriel and Zara! We’re crazy about you already!

by Amy ~ March 16, 2010

Little did I know when I wrote the last post that we were so close to having the babies! I had a regular checkup with the doctors Thursday the 4th. At first Z was not going to make it to my appointment because we had several other appointments for him to attend in the coming weeks, but at the last minute he decided to go with me.

The babies looked great in the ultrasound appointment, their heart rates were great in the non-stress test and they were moving a lot, then the nurse took my blood pressure…. Wait, that can’t be right, that’s REALLY high for me, I though. She took it a second time – still high, this was unusual. My blood pressure is normally low!

The nurse stayed with us for quite a while talking to us about breast feeding and when the Dr. entered she asked why the nurse was bothering discussing breast feeding because I would be getting a real consultation tomorrow. Tomorrow? I asked, still not understanding…. I didn’t have any appointments scheduled for the following day. The Dr. was like – yes, you’ll probably have babies tomorrow and will get a full consultation tomorrow after you deliver! What??? I said confused!

Still not understanding I said, oh, so I’ll go home and get my bag and come back tomorrow and you’ll induce me tomorrow. She laughed and said, “No, I’m admitting you right now. You’re no longer working and are on hospital bed rest from now on.”

So, I got a wheelchair ride to the other side of the hospital into my own room where we sat and waited, and waited, and waited for hours for my test results. The plan was to put me on bedrest to see if we could hold off one more week to allow the babies to reach 36 weeks.
The results of my blood test showed signs of pre-eclampsia – pregnancy induced hypertension – which is very common with twin pregnancies (and some singleton pregnancies). I was fortunate to make it to 35 wks without bed rest and no pre-eclampsia so this diagnosis shouldn’t have been a shock, I just wasn’t mentally prepared to go into the hospital!

The only cure for pre-eclampsia is delivery so the doctor took tests and determined that waiting another whole week could potentially be dangerous to me and the best option was to induce me ASAP.

They started me on one medicine to try and speed things up but after 2 doses, little had happened. They decided to hold off on more doses until the following morning when they would evaluate if my body could handle another dose of that med or if they should use petosin (another common drug)…. When the Dr. came in the AM, I had started the labor process on my own so I did not need the petosin.

I received the epidural (that was really the worst part of the entire delivery!!!!!) and had what I’m told is a very quick labor. All twin deliveries at our hospital happen in the operating room just in case you run into problems and need a C-section.

Gabe entered the world first and we quickly learned his lungs were working well! The doctors wisked him away to weigh/measure him while they retrieved Zara (pronounced like it rhymes with Car)…. Zara was breech but her brother’s delivery paved the way and she was much smaller so a breech delivery was possible.

Zara was just a few ounces too small to avoid the NICU (neonatal intensive care unit) and had difficulty swallowing and breathing at the same time (very common for preemmature babies) so after a few minutes together, she was taken to the NICU while Gabe was able to join us in our recovery room.

View pictures of Gabriel and Zara’s birthday.