Keagan's Birth Story

It has been quite some time since I have posted anything. While I have wanted to share, I also wanted to make sure I could emotionally handle the process of writing everything out. I plan to continue to post for the next few days about the days and now months following Keagan's birth, but I first want to share his birth story. (This is probably a little more detailed than some of you may be interested in reading, but I share all of the times so that other parents/families in our situation have a clear idea of what our experience was.)

Exactly two months ago, on June 3, we went to the hospital for induction. I was 39 weeks and 5 days. We had been told that the induction process could take a while for me for a few reasons - Keagan was our first child, he did not have the weight of his skull to help move the labor along, and my body had not yet started to ready itself for delivery. We chose June 3 with the idea that labor would take a few days in mind and thus with the hope that Keagan would be here by his due date of June 5. We were taken back to the delivery room at 8:15am where we decided to have a heartbeat monitor put on for Keagan and obviously a contraction monitor on me. Keagan's heart rate was steadily between 140 and 150 at this time. The silly boy didn't seem to like that monitor, as he would frequently punch back at it :) It was also interesting that the contraction monitor was registering up to 100 but I was barely feeling a thing, which gave me hope it would be an easy delivery. During this time, we went over our birth plan with the nurse. We had established some of our decisions when we met with the care team, but had also typed up some additional desires for delivery (I will share this in a later post.) 

At 10:45, a foley catheter was used to help my body start labor. This increased my contractions within less than an hour; they were recording one minute apart for a good period of time. I changed positions to get more comfortable, which caused the contractions to slow so I was given pitocin around noon. At 4:00 on Monday the foley bulb was removed. Up to this point, Keagan's heart rate remained between 140 and 150, but when I would have strong contractions, it would drop to below 100. One decision we had to make earlier in the morning was whether or not we wanted an emergency C-section if this would happen. Ultimately we decided not to do this, as we believed God would have want He wanted to happen happen and we trusted Him with that. 

At 5:30 I was given an epidural (my previous thought that it was going to be easy was not exactly accurate!) and I was feeling relief within 15 minutes. The process moved quickly after this and our doctor said we would have Keagan before the morning! At 7:30pm, the nurse broke my water and at 8:30 I began pushing. We were all amazed that instead of a few days of labor, it was less than 12 hours!

The doctor was called in and Keagan's heart rate was still in the 150's, where it had been through the whole time I was pushing. At 10:18pm on June 3, Keagan David Burton entered this world. He was instantly put onto me so that Roy could cut his cord, which was barely pulsating. When the nurse checked for Keagan's heartbeat right after birth, it was not there. She waited about a minute and checked again, but still it was not present. We are not exactly sure of when Keagan's heart stopped beating, but he definitely fought right up until, at most, a few minutes before he was born. Our precious baby boy was born into two places at once - on this Earth and into the Lord's arms. While this was heartbreaking, it was also a beautiful moment. We were in awe of our first son. We were amazed by his fight, by his beauty, and by how much our already immense amount of love grew with just seeing him for the first time! He was absolutely adorable and he was a big boy! His skull came up higher than was expected and every other part of his body was perfectly formed. He was a face presentation, which did cause bruising to his face. The bruising was not directly a result of anencephaly, but indirectly could be tied to that. Babies with this condition often are face presentation because the top of their heads are not solid enough, so instead they use their face to help push through the birth canal. Despite anything that another person may deem "different" for a baby, Keagan was so so cute and perfect in our eyes just as he was perfect in the eyes God! 

Again, even though we were hoping, praying and believing that Keagan would be born alive and live for even a short amount of time and were very upset this was not the case, we were at such peace that day as many families had told us would be the case. The hospital staff was absolutely wonderful and were willing to do whatever we wanted. They recognized it was a difficult situation and were sympathetic to that, but they also shared in our joy of having a baby and knew we wanted to cherish the time we had with Keagan. We were blessed to have my mom and Roy's sister Becky in the delivery room with us when Keagan was born as well as our amazing photographer, Jenn, from Now I Lay Me Down To Sleep.We were blessed with many, many visitors on Keagan's birthday, many of whom spent nearly the whole day at the hospital, some who didn't even get to come back and see us but came anyways and some who completely surprised us by coming and brought us such joy that they were there.  Some of my favorite memories are seeing so many people who mean so much to us see Keagan for the first time and hold him and love him with so much of their hearts.

After Keagan's birth, our families were brought back to the delivery room where Roy and Gramma gave Keagan his first bath. Keagan was then measured and weighed. He weighed 7 lbs. 4 oz. and was initially measured at 18 inches. Everyone then took turns holding our angel and getting priceless pictures with him. He wore several outfits and many more hats that are now treasured keepsakes. After getting some family pictures, several of our other visitors were also brought back. This was such an amazing time and great memory for our family. I love knowing that such a large number of people got to physically be present with us that night and got to create their own memory with baby K. (On a side note, we also know and INCREDIBLY thankful for the huge amount of people who were with us in thought and prayer!!)

With these very special people there with us, we had Keagan baptized in my arms by his Grandpa Roy. This was another amazing experience that will be forever cherished. After Keagan's baptism and more pictures, our visitors headed home. Our nurse, Gramma and Aunt Jessica worked on creating some keepsakes (hand and foot prints) while Roy, Papaw and Uncle Brian transported some of our stuff to the recovery room. After a long day we headed up to the recovery room at 1:30am. Papaw and Gramma stayed in the room with us that night and the plan was we would all take shifts holding our angel through the night. That didn't quite pan out (oops!); Gramma ended up holding Keagan all night so we all could get some rest, but I know she didn't mind that at all!

Again, Keagan's birthday was a truly amazing day. One would think we would describe the day as bittersweet. While this is true, looking back at our experience, the emphasis for us is clearly on the "sweet" side of things. We were so focused on cherishing our baby and creating more happy memories with him. We were so amazed by his presence in our arms while also knowing he was there in the room watching over us at the same time. We were just so in love with him, that all of the hurt on that day seemed minimal compared to the joy and love in our hearts!