Due Date +4 - We're in Labor!!!!

Amy's water broke! We're in the hospital since noon today. It's 8:00pm now, and Amy is injected with Pitocin at 48 ml per hour to speed up the contractions.

When we were at Dr. Chen's office this morning, Amy's cervix was dilated at 2cm. Dr. Chen told us that we were not progressing, and scheduled us to for a NST for tomorrow at 2:30pm, and an induction on Wednesday at 8pm. We left the doctor's office thinking... "Oh my God! Dr. Chen is going to do an induction get this Little Piggy out!"

We usually go hunt for food after our usual Doctor's visit, and this morning was just the same. We decided to go to a restaurant that we haven't been to a long time, called Mistro, at Palos Verdes. We got lost in the beginning and we later found the restaurant, all because of my good looks! Anyway, as soon as Amy got off the car, she noticed that something is leaking out of her body. We were wondering if it was the gel that the Doctor used earlier during the pelvic exam. So we decided to head to the reataurant and Amy would do some investigation at the Ladies room. When Amy returned, she told me that she believes it's really the 'water', and not the 'gel.' So we decided to skip the brunch, and head straight to the hospital.

We checked in to the hospital and it didn't take long for the nurse to confirmed that the membrane was indeed broken and the amniotic fluid is leaking! So the nurse continued with the 'real' check-in process... meaning that there were tons of paper work to sign. Amy basically signed away her life! The nurse also started an IV... along with an IV, there's also some 'happy juice' called Pitocin. Basically, it's some kind of hormone that make the contractions more frequent. It started off at 8ml per hour dosage. When I started typing this post at 8pm, it was already at 48ml per hour. Right now, it is at 54ml, and the nurse is increasing the dosage like every half an hour. The goal is to get some strong and frequent contractions!

Back track about 2 hours or so, at around 7pm, Amy also started an epideral. Before the epideral, the pain from contractions was getting stronger and stronger. It got to a point that Amy was squeezing my fingers so tight that she almost broke my fingers that are most used for playing PS2! Then, after we consulted with the nurse, we have decided to start an epideral. It is also a reason why the nurse can increase the dosage of the pitosin so aggressively, now that Amy is under pain management.

It coming close to 10pm now, and the last check on the cervix was still at 4cm. I think it's going to be a long long night. Below are some pictures that I took...


This is the Pitocin...

This is the machine that works the dosage into Amy's IV. When took this picture, the dosage was still at 18ml per hour. The latest check on this machine is 60ml per hour.

This is a picture of Amy earlier today, before the contractions were strong and painful.

The latest update from the nurse is that it is now at 5cm & 90% effaced.

Stay tuned!