Introducing... Chaya and Anjali: The big day

Didn't sleep much the night before our scheduled c-section. Had to be at Baton Rouge General Hospital around 5am. Daddy and mommy were quite excited to get the show on the road. We arrived, met all the nice nurses, mommy got hooked up to all the monitors to listen to babies' heartbeats. Then we waited a bit for the doctors to arrive. I was excited that both my doctors would be performing the c-section together, my original obgyn who also had a baby a month before (she was still on maternity leave, but came anyway because she really wanted to be at the birth of our girls), and the doctor who replaced her while she was away. I really loved both doctors a lot, so I was happy they would both be present.

They brought me to the O.R. when everyone was there, gave me a spinal and laid me back down. When they started the c-section, I freaked out quite a bit.. I wasn't aware that with a spinal, you feel no pain, but you still feel everything they do (cutting you open, moving things around in there,..). It really made me panic, I wasn't sure if it was normal, if the spinal was working.. I cried the whole time, I thought I would pass out, but the anesthesiologist assured me I wouldn't pass out. They told me to take in slow deep breaths. I was quite scared the whole time... and then they brought out the girls, and I heard their loud cries, saw tears in Prosanta's eyes, and heard how big their weights were.. it made me calm down. Chaya was born at 7:15am, weighing 6Lbs3oz, measuring 19 inches. Anjali came out next, at 7:16am, weighed 6Lbz8oz, and measured 19.5 inches. Both girls were very healthy, didn't require any special care at the NICU, and came directly with me to the recovery room. I held them in my arms right after they got cleaned off and checked out.

They wheeled us into the recovery room. Everything was going well, Prosanta learned how to change his first diaper EVER. He called a friend to announce the girls' birth. I was holding them, everyone was happy. Then I started bleeding quite a bit. The nurses kept changing pads on me every few minutes, I was losing a LOT of blood, lots of clots were coming out (which is normal, but not this fast). The nurses had to massage my uterus by pressing down on my abdomen. I've never felt that much pain in my whole life. It hurt so badly, I was holding on to Prosanta's hand so hard I'm surprised I didn't break his fingers. They had to do this to help the uterus contract and get rid of the clots. They did this for a few hours on and off, and many times a day for the rest of my hospital stay. The room was a bit hectic for a few hours. I wasn't too scared or nervous, I trusted in the nurses caring for me, they were in contact with my doctor over the phone, he was telling them what to do. Finally, it got under control, but I was left looking so pale, weak and tired..

They brought me a food tray, I was on a liquid diet at first, and once I could keep liquids down, I would be allowed to eat anything I wanted. I had some jell-o, and juice. I felt good and hungry. One of the lactation nurse came in to help me breastfeed the babies. I was so tired, I couldn't keep my eyes open, even though I was excited to experience this for the first time. She said to just close my eyes and sleep, she would hold them to my breasts to have them nurse. Prosanta was also there at my side, learning from her, how to help hold the babies, how to squeeze my breasts to help the milk (which was colostrum at the time) come out. I kept drifting in and out of sleep. I also vomited a few times while breastfeeding, guess I had those liquids a bit too soon.

We eventually were transferred to our regular room in the late afternoon (which was a little smaller than the recovery room, but just as nice). The nurses took off my bandage, took out my urinary catheter, and said they wanted me to get up and walk to the bathroom that evening, and pee at least 3 times that night, which I did. I was quite scared and nervous about getting out of bed, I remember how painful it was when I had to start walking after my knee surgeries, I was expecting it to be really bad. Two nurses came to help me get out of bed, I took it very slowly, I'm always afraid of passing out in situations like that. I did it very gradually, slowly got out of bed, holding on to the nurses, then proceeded to very slowly walk to the bathroom. They said I was doing very well, and was actually walking faster than lots of other women. Bet they say that to everyone. :) I was afraid peeing would hurt, but it didn't really. They showed me how to use the peribottle to rinse everything off after using the bathroom. They left a little container to measure my urine for the night, once I went 3 times, I was good to go.

It was quite a stressful, overwhelming and exciting day!