Jade Leighla Sorensen

I went into labor with Jade around 4pm on Sunday May 4, 2008. We got home from church and I went upstairs to take a nap and felt a little crampy. I brushed it off not thinking anything of it. When I woke up an hour later I realized that the cramps were a little stronger. I remember my mom saying that labor pains felt like the worst cramps of your life and I figured I was probably in labor. However my worst fear was going to the hospital and being sent home because I wasn't really laboring. So I decided to just watch things and wait till the contractions were closer together. I packed my hospital bag just in case. We were on our way to American Fork, to Gary Gunn's house, to break the our fast for Grandpa Gunn. We got to American Fork and my contractions were about 7 minutes apart but I held out. We started dinner and I ate a little bit but I hurt so bad by this point that I couldn't sit still long enough to eat. Finally, dinner finished and I turned to Aaron and told him I just couldn't handle it any longer. My contractions were 5 minutes apart and they were really starting to hurt. So I rounded up my Dad, Aaron and my brothers and they gave me a blessing, I said my goodbyes and we were out of there. I laid the seat of the car back while Aaron drove. I'm not quite sure how fast he was driving but we got to the IMC hospital in Murray pretty quickly. I didn't mind though because by then I was hurting so bad I couldn't sit still. The contractions were coming about every 2-3 minutes and would last for about a minute. We got to the hospital but because it was a Sunday there wasn't anyone outside to let us in so we had to be buzzed in by the lady sitting at the desk. I rang the bell and I could see the nurse looking at me but she wouldn't let me in. I stood there for what seemed like 5 minutes, doubled over in pain, until finally another nurse saw me and let me in. I then stood there for another 10 minutes waiting for the same nurse to get off the phone and get my paper work started. Needless to say I was a little angry and a few choice words were uttered. Finally I was taken back to my room. My nurse immediately came in and saw how much pain I was in. She checked me. I was dilated to a 7 and completely effaced. She looked at me in shock and said we should probably get things rolling. She called the doctor,Dr Irion, and the anesthesiologist and in about 20 minutes I was out of pain, the doctor had come down and checked me and I was getting my first dose of antibiotics. By this time it was around 8pm. The time went really quickly after that. I watched a little tv and Aaron took some home videos. My family came up and hung out while we just waited for the antibiotics to go in. I kept telling my nurse that I felt like I needed to go to the bathroom. When I finally got her to realize that I REALLY needed to go she looked at me and said that I was probably ready to push. She checked me and sure enough I was fully dilated. This was around 10:30p but by the time the doctor got down to see me it was close to 11pm. I asked him if he wouldn't mind waiting til midnight, that way Jade would be born on Cinco de Mayo, the same day as my Grandma Bills. He wasn't too pleased but finally consented. At around 12:30am, after I had my 2nd dose of antibiotics in, the doctor came down and I started to push. It took a while. The nurse said I was a rookie pusher. But by 1:30am Jade was born. Aaron says the umbilical cord was wrapped around her neck a couple of times and that the doctor had some trouble getting it off. She also had swallowed some meconium and so they called the NICU and had a nurse come to suction her out really well. She weighed 7 lbs 2 oz and measured 20.5 inches long. She was sooo tiny and adorable. Nothing like the little ogre I had feared. She did have a slightly squashed nose but other than that she looked perfect. We did have a little scare about 30 minutes after she was born. She started to struggle while breathing and her core temperature was a little low. The NICU nurse took her and resuctioned her and then they had me hold her against my skin to help warm her up. That seemed to do the trick and we didn't have anymore problems. My family came in shortly after and were able to hold her. They then took us up to our room on the 2nd floor. They took Jade and did her first assessment and Aaron was able to help give her her first bath. They then had me try to nurse her. That didn't work out so well. I struggled to get her to latch on the entire time I was in the hospital. I finally had a lactation specialist come in and help me. It gave me a little more confidence but Jade still won't latch on very well. The specialist told me it was because she was a lazy sucker. It got to the point that Jade wasn't getting enough nutrients to help flush out the bilirubin and she became really jaundice. The next morning when the pediatrican came in he told me that we needed to start supplementing her with formula. She seemed to love it but she was so jaundiced by this time that she had to go under the blue lights. Thankfully by the time we were discharged from the hospital her levels had started to return to normal. However they sent us home with lights and she had to be under them for another day at home. Aaron and I quickly learned that as new parents you don't sleep very much. But we wouldn't trade it for the world. We love our little Jadester and are so glad she is part of our family. We are so thankful that her birth went so well and that she is a healthy and beautiful baby.