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Update - Doula'ing over the Phone!
I've been meaning to post this update all day but for some reason it wouldn't allow me to log in from school! But it was a VERY long night for me...Once they started the pit and my sister's contractions got more and more intense, I was certain she was going to go quickly...especially considering she progressed 2 cm in an hour...but she got stuck at 6 cm despite strong, painful contractions and despite the fact that they kept upping the pitocin by 12 every 15 mins...I swear they were torturing her!! I think the pain got the best of her so she was holding back and tensing up too much. I kept reminding her to envision her cervix opening and encouraged her to breathe & squat but once she found out that she hadn't progress in 2 hours, she gave up and got the epidural. I KNOW if I was there in person, she probably would have gone longer naturally but my mother, her best friend and boyfriend kept telling her to get the epi despite me telling them she CAN do this med-free. Within an hour after getting the epidural, she was 10cm dilated but they wanted to wait until the baby dropped some more. 30 minutes or so later, they had her start pushing and after 1 1/2 hours of intense pushing, my niece was born weighing in at 6lbs10oz! My niece started nursing right away and she hasn't been having any nursing problems as of yet, which I'm SOOO happy about!
This experience taught me just how important eye contact and personal touch is when you're a doula. Though I was able to use words to comfort her and to offer encouragement, it just wasn't the same as being there in person!
But thank you for all your responses!  |
