Baby Beckham's Birth Story

After the failed induction and a day of rest, Thursday morning came faster than I thought it would. Immediately after I got up, I started throwing up--probably from nerves, but this whole process was a whirlwind; it was just weighing on me so bad.

There was so much uncertainty.

Was he going to be OK?
Was I going to be OK?
Were we going to be able to deliver him vaginally?
Were we going to make it through all this without having a C-section?
How was I going to handle the pain?
How was he going to tolerate labor again?

There were so many unanswered questions that made me worried and fearful. It was overwhelming. I just wanted to get the ball rolling. If we were going to do this, I wanted to go for it and give it our best shot to get him out naturally.

That was my mind frame--let's get this done.

They wheeled me down about 7 a.m. or so and put another cytotec in my cervix to try to soften it one more time before starting me on pitocin.

I started contracting again, but not as much as I did the first day. They weren't bad contractions, at least not to me, just like menstrual cramps.

I started the day at a 2 and long, so my cervix hadn't completely softened yet, but I was much further now than I was two days prior, so that was good.

When my doc got me going on pitocin around noon or so, the contractions picked up and I started to dilate a little more. Things were finally progressing.

My nurse would ask how the contractions were and honestly they weren't really bothering me. They were uncomfortable and slowly getting stronger, but I kept saying "I just hope I'm a bad ass with a high pain tolerance and that's why they aren't bothering me that much."

By around 7 or so that night, my doc came down and checked my cervix again. This time I was 4 and 75% effaced, so almost fully thinned out. She knew that when I finally thinned all the way out, he would come pretty fast.

She decided to break my water. I was actually surprised with each vaginal check how much I wasn't bothered by her shoving her hand up there. I remember when she broke my water with Brody, it hurt. This time, I was like "ehh, it's not bad at all." I think it's all in your mind frame.

I knew I was doing this on my own. My anesthesiologists were planning to give me pain meds through an IV to help take some of the edge off when I wanted it.

I hadn't asked for it this whole time, because I didn't feel like I needed it. But finally they hooked me up to a PCA so I could push a button when I wanted it. But I never really pushed the button. I kept forgetting. And it wasn't helping me even when I would.

They were supposed to double my dose as I progressed and then give me some other pain med when my contractions really kicked in, but by the time this baby started coming I didn't have any of that. It was all natural.

When I started to have to really breathe through my contractions, Klay would be over there pushing that button, trying to get me meds, but I had to sit there and tell him "it's not helping." LOL. He'd say, "push the button!" He was worried, but I hadn't even gotten to the hard part yet.

I had about 30 minutes of pretty bad pain. And of those 30 minutes, 10-15 were extremely painful, but man, those last two contractions were brutal.

Not too long later, my doc came running in when she saw the baby's heart rate dip. Apparently that's a sign they are getting ready to come down the birth canal.

She checked me and I was a 6 almost 7 and she started gearing up.

That's when I really started hurting. I was turned on my side, legs clinched and grabbing onto the bed rails for dear life.

I started to think I couldn't do this if it was going to take much longer. But I could barely get any thought or words out because the pain was insane. If I could describe it, it felt like a watermelon on fire with razor blades forcing its way down and out of your body.

I started to feel the urge to push and I hollered "I gotta push!!!!" so they'd call the NICU to get them down to the room. He was coming and he was coming fast.

Everyone was telling me to wait and hold him in because NICU needed to be down in the room before Bex came out in case he wasn't breathing.

And when they tell you you have an urge to push, there is no urge about it. There is no stopping it. But somehow, I managed not to push. I literally think it was because I was on my side. Had I been on my back, legs spread, he would have shot out across the room--there would have been no stopping it.

I had that first contraction before the contraction where Bex made his arrival and I think I scarred Klay for life.

I hollered so loud I probably ignited fear in all of the women waiting to deliver down the hall.

All I kept hearing was "hold him in Cass, hold him in, don't push don't push!"

My doc had told me I was going to have another contraction before NICU made it down. About 30 seconds later the second one started.

I was still on my side, hollering "he's coming!"
"Hold him in, hold him in," everyone said.
"I caaaaaaaaaaaaaannnnn't!!!" I shouted.

As soon as my doctor flung my leg open, baby boy slid right out. I didn't push once.

He was crying, which meant he was breathing. NICU hadn't gotten there yet.

His cry was so soft though it took me a minute to hear.

I was breathing hard, shaking and relieved the pain was over; it stopped instantly.

My doc said "you did it. He's fine, he's breathing and crying and you have a baby!"

I was kinda in shock like, "I do?" I couldn't believe I did it.

I kept saying "I'm sorry" I couldn't hold him in.

Seconds later a flood of people burst into the room.

Beckham immediately reached out and grabbed my doctor's clamp when she was about to clamp the cord. She started to laugh. He is already a feisty little thing.

He weighed 3lbs 8 oz, 17 inches long and was born at 30 weeks gestation.

Thursday, November 20, 2014 at 9:23 p.m.

My doc noticed he had a knot in his umbilical cord. "He failed jump roping class," she said. But later on after Bex was being looked at by the NICU folks and I was being cleaned up, my doc said that the knot could have been fatal to him had we continued on with the pregnancy. The bigger he would have gotten, the more strain he would have put on his cord and he could have lost his blood flow.

"He was meant to come out," my doc said to me a few days later.

I truly believe that. He was meant to come out. Things could have been a lot worse, but on that day, everything went as well as it could have. It was a great day.

Pregnant with Cancer

I never thought these words would ever come out of my mouth.

I have leukemia.

That's a hard thing to truly say and know that it's not a dream, or a lie, or a bad joke. It's true. It's real. It's hard.

On top of that, I found out about my diagnosis while 29 weeks pregnant with my second child--a little boy--named Beckham Laine.

These past 12 days have been crazy and full of ups and downs. There were days I cried for a while. Times I had huge breakdowns in tears. Many things racing through my head...

"Why me?"
"Is this real? This has to be a nightmare."
"I want to wake up."
"I feel like I knew this was coming."
"Why does it have to be both? Why can't I just have cancer and why did it have to be while I was pregnant?"
"I'm scared."
"I have to be here for my kids. I have to be here for Klay."
"I can't leave them."
"I want to go home."
"I want to go home."
"I want to go home."

--

It all started off while I was pregnant and showing signs of severe anemia. When my blood work came back worse at 28 weeks than when I was 24 weeks gestation, that alarmed my OBGYN, who is incredible by the way...

The day I found out (it was the day of my baby shower--Nov. 9) my blood work was worse than before with no explanation as to why (because I had been taking iron). So my OB said go see a hematologist the next day.

I did. And the hematologist seemed to think that it was the blood pressure med I was on. I had stopped taking it that weekend due to the alarming call from my doctor, but it hadn't been long enough to be able to tell what was causing this. So I was ordered to take steroids and come back in a week.

That was on Monday, Nov. 10. On Wednesday, I started having some severe pain in my lower back. It felt like back spasms and would come in waves and be very uncomfortable. I hadn't done anything all day but relax. My mom had even come over and cooked and watched Brody, so I literally napped and just watched TV.

Eventually the pain became a constant dull ache (which was a lot less painful) and I was able to get some sleep.

The next day I decided to call my OB and tell her what was going on. They wanted me to come in and make sure everything was OK. After a sonogram and monitoring everything appeared to be fine. But they wanted me to stay overnight.

I just thought it was to be precautionary, but after my doctor came up to talk to me about the possibilities of what this could be, it became unreal.

My blood work had shown some immature cell blasts, which is most likely cancer at least I think that's what they said, and so I had to do a bone marrow biopsy the next day.

There were three possibilities:

1) It could be the blood pressure med I was on
2) It could be toxemia or the HELP syndrome, though I wasn't showing any signs of that
3) It could be leukemia

Not exactly something you want to hear.

I think I knew deep down, it was going to be the latter. But through the night I kept telling Klay that it had to be the BP med. It just didn't make sense and honestly it didn't make sense to any of my doctors either. They seemed baffled.

Monday, just three days earlier, there was no signs of leukemia and Thursday there were these immature cell blasts? It just seemed so sudden.

But no one was worried about the back pain. It wasn't premature labor and it was never brought up again.

Then Friday, they came in and said, "It's AML. Acute Myeloid Leukemia."

A wave of questions about the future and our options were being tossed our way.

Now, what to do with baby?

My team of doctors researched, discussed and talked about options.

Was Chemo with baby a safe, viable option?

I'm a rare case. It's more common to get breast cancer and be pregnant, but leukemia was whole-other-ballgame.

Then came the longest weekend from hell.

Decisions were changing constantly and we were still waiting on bone marrow results. Nothing was going to happen til Monday, Nov. 17.

Monday, the doctors decided they would wait because my blood levels were still pretty stable, but not five minutes later, they changed their minds and opted for an induction to get Beckham out, so I could get treatment ASAP.

Then the decision arose about if an epidural was an option.

Pretty much only one person was comfortable putting it in. But before that became an option, I was told no epidural. And I was OK with that. I had an epidural with Brody, so I was very PRO-epidural gal. But once it was being talked about being a possibility, I instantly got nervous and my gut was telling me to reject that idea.

The chances that something could go wrong and a red blood cell could be sent up my spine and into my brain spreading this cancer, was slim according to people, but it seemed to me to be too much of a selfish risk to take. Yes, it'd be nice to have one, but I didn't feel right about it. I needed to do this on my own. I've already got so much at stake here.

Monday around 5 p.m., I was wheeled down to Labor and Delivery in tears. This just all seemed to be unreal. As much as I wanted my little guy here and this part of this journey over with, I had just finished a NICU tour the day prior and that was tough. Seeing these tiny babies with all of these machines hooked up for whatever circumstance led them to be born before their little bodies were ready was sad and unfair. And that was going to be my little guy in there next. I know that babies are born premature all the time, but seeing it in person and not just in photos seemed to really make me realize every moment Beckham was in my tummy was precious and crucial time for him to grow and have an easier first few months of life.

Luckily on Thursday and Friday, when we found out I had cancer, I was given my doses of steroids to help the baby's lungs progress faster while he was still in the womb.

Anyway, back to Nov. 17.... they started cytotec and placed those in my cervix to soften it and get the process started. With the first one, I started contracting. By the early morning, they started pitocin. That's when the fun starts. I was having stronger contractions, but I didn't feel like it was too bad. This continued for the next several hours and by Tuesday at around 5 pm or so, I was only dilated to a 2 and long. If you don't know what that means, look it up. But basically the softer your cervix is the better and quicker you dilate.

So my doc decided to stop the induction, send me back upstairs to get some rest. Then we could start again on Thursday.

I had labored for over 24 hours. It wasn't extremely painful... felt mostly like bad menstrual cramps. But my contractions continued over the next day or so even though I was off pitocin. They just weren't happening regular.

Wednesday I took the day off and relaxed. When I got back to my room, I instantly relaxed.

Don't get me wrong, I was disappointed he didn't come that first day, but my body was worn out. I was exhausted had minimal sleep and hadn't eaten in over 24 hours. I needed a break. And it was the right option.

More to come soon...

Sick Sick Sick

Lately my days have been spent sprinting to the bathroom, throwing myself to the toilet, trying to hold something down. That's about the only exercise I've been getting lately.

Unfortunately, it seems my extremely bad nausea has resurfaced once again and keeping stuff down is nearly impossible.

I'm so grossed out by the many different ways stuff comes out of my body, it's repulsive.

I don't want to eat because nothing sounds good.

I don't want to eat because I'm scared I'll puke.

I don't want to eat because I have heartburn before I ever even take a bite of my food.

I don't want to eat because if it's not nausea, it's my stomach acting up.

I hate the idea of eating now.

Since eating seems like such a challenging task, cooking and going the grocery store is torture.

I don't want to pick out what to make for dinner because nothing sounds good. I don't want to look at a bunch of food that will most likely make me sick. And I'm damn sure tired of paying for food and puking that money down the toilet.

I honestly feel sorry for my husband. He has a wife who doesn't want to eat, cook or do anything that requires work because I feel like shit all the time. I literally feel like this everyday.

Ugh. Why am I only 23 weeks?

Everyday I wake up wishing it was December and I was far enough along, I can see the light at the end of the tunnel.

And this constant feeling like complete dog shit everyday doesn't make me a very productive person.

I'm trying to gather the strength to potty train Brody, but I fail to follow through at every turn.

I'm trying to clean out closets, the office, and get rid of a bunch of crap to make room for baby #2, but my energy is lacking.

If I feel good enough, I will accomplish something that day. The other day, I cleaned out my hall closet which took a few hours and I organized all of our medicine. I was proud of myself. It's just whatever I think I can tackle.

I also cleaned up and went through most of Brody's toys, getting rid of some he doesn't play with and cleaning his room. I still need to go through his closet and clothes though.

I have so many things on my list of To Do's, but no energy to finish them.

Beyond that, I'm trying to get ideas for the baby's room and figure out a name. We have a few we like, but none we've landed on just yet.

I just wish I was rich and had someone come and professional organize, decorate and clean up my house. LOL. I'm sure we all wish that or wish we had some minions.

Pretty much this post is again, about me feeling like poo. 

I think I may go lay down for a bit.

Someone wake me when it's December,