Autumn Claire Conterio: Birth Story

 Autumn Claire Conterio

Born: October 22nd, 2020
3:16 PM
6 lbs 15 ounces
19 inches

In the Summer of 2019 I felt strongly that there was one more sweet baby ready to join our family. I prayed so hard & had many conversation with Jeremy about this since we weren't totally in agreement on this topic. In July before we ever had decided on moving forward with anything I had the feeling I needed to see a Doctor. If you read Summer's birth story you know I am not regular with my periods. I went to see my Obgyn & after some tests + multiple months of taking my blood, I was diagnosed with PCOS. I was put on Femara to help me ovulate, the first month I didn't ovulate so they doubled my dose, the second month I did & I got pregnant! In January we went to Hawaii with our kids and the third morning we were there I started bleeding & the pregnancy ended in a miscarriage. I was heart broken. I read you can ovulate between a miscarriage & getting your period back so I was taking ovulation tests during that time. Three weeks exactly after my miscarriage I ovulated on my own without any medication & I got pregnant again! This pregnancy was mostly like my others but I was sick the entire time. 

I was trying for another VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) so at 37 weeks my Doctor stripped my membranes, just like with Carter & Summer nothing happened. So on October 21st. at 38 weeks + 3 days I asked him to do it again but twice. I came home from that appointment & went on a long walk, pushed Summer up this big hill twice. Felt nothing throughout the day & went to bed that night. The morning of October 22nd. around 3:30 in the morning I woke up to contractions. I did not want them to stop so I got up & just started walking around my house. I used my exercise ball that I also had been using for weeks to bounce. They started out around 20 min apart & by 6 AM they were about 10 min apart. I went on another walk around 9 AM outside & they would come every 5-10 minutes. I knew I was in active labor at this time but I didn't want to go to the hospital until I knew I was going to be further along. The day before at the Doctors I was almost a 2 but not effaced at all. I went over to my friend Haley's around 10:30 & I kept having them between 4-8 minutes. The ones that went longer hurt a lot more than the ones 4 minutes apart. Finally around 11:30 she was like " I think you should go to the hospital" I went home but was so tired from being up so early I laid on my bed & literally feel asleep between contractions. I only took a quick power nap & a little after noon I told Jer I think it was time to go. We stopped to get lunch & while we were driving there I had the some really strong contractions. We got to the hospital just after 1, they put me in a room to check me to see if I was going to stay or not. I was almost a 4 & about 80% effaced, so they said they would be keeping me. I was a little annoyed I wasn't further along at this point but was happy we were going to be having a baby! Around 1:45 they had me walk to the room I would be having her & my contractions started getting really strong. Around 2:30 I was at a 6 & I was screaming for my epidural, I was trying to hold out as long as possible without one but my contractions were coming every minute. It was the most pain I have ever felt in a delivery by far. When the anesthesiologist came to give me my epidural, trying to hold still during contractions every minute was not easy. As I was sitting up getting my epidural my water broke & I felt like I needed to push. They laid me back down to check me & I was at a 10! My Dr was still on his way & my epidural was not working. He gave me an extra shot but at this time I just kept yelling "I'm done, I don't want to do this anymore!" Jer said after, "I was so confused why you were saying that, there was no other options" I was literally screaming & shaking with each contraction. I was just in so much pain I wasn't even thinking. Finally the left side started to go dumb but I could feel everything on my right side. They called back the anesthesiologist, he gave me another dose & had me lay on my right side to get it to go dumb. Finally I started feeling the contractions less & less & my Dr arrived. I pushed through two contractions & Autumn was born at 3:16 pm. They said I was the last to arrive that day & first to have a baby! My recovery has been the easiest & I have always had medication to help me dilate so I am wondering if getting to a 10 naturally really helped. I wanted to have a natural birth if possible but honestly the pain was unreal & I had not done any preparation to have a natural birth

Why Autumn? We had a few other names we liked, Rae, Remi & Monroe were all on our list of names. We don't really pick a name until we see our babies. My Mom had said the name Autumn a few months ago & we really liked it. Then a few weeks before having her Jeremy's brother also recommended Autumn & again we both said we liked it but we have a Summer. I didn't know if I wanted to be "that family" once we had her though, we just felt like she was an Autumn. I like that Summer was born in Summer & Autumn was born in the Fall. We wanted to name Kennedy, Claire but again about a week before having her my Mom said the name Kennedy & once we saw her we thought she was more of a Kennedy. We don't have middle names for our other girls which I regret not doing so we gave Autumn a middle name. We may go add middle names to Kennedy & Summer. If we do we plan on doing Kennedy Jean (my Mom's name & she was born on my Mom's birthday) & Summer Lynn. 

Summer Conterio: Birth Story

Summer Conterio

Born: August 26th, 2016
5:15 PM

7 lbs 5 ounces 

19 inches 

This is Summer's birth story and to have a birth story we must start at the beginning. I was breaking out super bad and I jokingly said to Jer "The last time I broke out this bad I was pregnant" I think his reply was "You better not be!" Super funny now. I was also taking Tums daily for heartburn and I was a getting a little nauseous here and there. Finally after almost falling asleep sitting up at 10 AM I decided to take a test. (To get personal here.. my periods have always been very irregular.. so that has never been a sign for me) When I went to my first Doctors appointment they measured the baby and looked at my LMP. Summer measured 5 days smaller on the ultrasound but they decided to keep my due date from my LMP. Around 16 weeks I did that test for down syndrome and it came back positive but our chances where still very low, I think it came back around 1/120. After meeting multiple times with the specialist she thought that it probably just came back positive because my due date was wrong. She thought my due date should be Sept 7th! Almost two weeks later. When you are pregnant that is never good news. After talking with my Doctors they felt the specialist was wrong and the ultrasound at my first appointment was more accurate so they kept my due date at August 26th.

Since Summer was such a big surprise we decided to keep the gender a surprise too. After multiple failed attempts to get me to go into labor "naturally" I went in for another appointment around 39.5 weeks. My Doctor told me that she thought the baby was getting big and since my last baby (Carter) was 9 lbs if I wanted to try for a VBAC (vaginal birth after cesarean) she thought it was smart to be induced. So we set the appointment on my due date of August 26th. 

The hospital called me the night before being induced and said that they were full of times but to call in the morning to see what time I could come in. When I called the next morning around 7 they told me to come right in. Well I was not ready! I thought they would give me a time.. a few hours or something! So I we rushed to get ready, get the kids settled with family and off we went!

We both had thought Summer was a boy. The night before we were talking with our friends about names and we had written down about 3 different options for boy names. I said to Jeremy "Okay lets talk about girl names." He said, "No its not a girl, we don't even need to think about it." So off we went to the hospital with not one girl name in mind.

We arrived, got checked in, and they started me on a small amount of pitocin. At 10 AM I started walking around to try to get things going but nothing was happening. Around noon they decided to break my water and continued to up my doses of pitocin. I always like to feel the contractions and be in actual pain (just for a little while) but around 1:30 they were really starting to hurt so I asked for my epidural. By 2 I had my epidural and was feeling great. At 4 I asked them to make sure the baby wasn't posterior like Carter. When she checked me I was at a 5 and she said the baby might be a little turned so she gave me this thing they call the "peanut" to see if it could help turn the baby. I called my Mom who was coming back from Salt Lake to let her know I was still at a 5, she was on her way but there had been a crash at the point of the mountain so it was taking her a while. At 4:30 I started feeling a lot of pressure. So they checked me again and I was at about a 7.5. I called my Mom again to tell her to hurry. Around 4:45 I knew I was ready to push. My Dr was delivering 4 babies around that same time so I had to wait until a little after 5 to start pushing. I called my Mom again and she still wasn't there. I started to cry knowing she wouldn't be there. This would be my first delivery with just Jeremy and I but it turned out so perfect that way.

I pushed through two contraction and they could see her head. My Doctor told me if I wanted to keep pushing I could or wait until the next contraction. I said I would just keep pushing. I pushed two more times and Summer entered the world at 5:15 PM. I asked no one in the room to tell me what gender of the baby was because I wanted to see for myself. So right after I delivered and the Doctor handed Summer to me, I was so surprised to see it was a girl. I looked at Jeremy and said, "Its a girl?!!!!?" Ohhh but it was always meant to be a girl. It was love at first sight all over again. My Doctor asked Jeremy if he wanted to cut the cord.. but Jer gets a little grossed out by that so nicely declined. So my Doctor turned to me and asked if I wanted to. I was like "YES!" So I cut the cord. Summer didn't really cry so they asked if they could take her to make sure everything was okay with her. But now we have come to know that is just Summer, she is calm, sweet and doesn't make a peep.

After they gave her back she was instantly ready to nurse. My mom was holding her (she got there minutes after I delivered) and she just kept trying to open her mouth for something. She was so easy to latch and nursed like a pro. This was by far my best delivery. Kennedy swallowed meconium which led her to being in the hospital for a week. Carter was a C-section because he was posterior and 9 lbs. I was so happy and relieved everything went okay. Third times a charm.

Jeremy started looking up names right away. He had come up with two others but I wasn't really sold on them. As soon as he said Summer. I said, "I like Summer" he said, "I like Summer too." It's weird how names almost just pick them. I have heard the name Summer before but never thought I wanted to name a kid that. I would always say I want a "Summer baby" (We have a Fall and Winter) so ideally I thought it was a good idea to get pregnant in the Fall of 2016 but I still got my Summer baby and my Little Miss Summer.

Summer you are literally the prefect baby you have slept through the night since you were a fews weeks old, you smile, laugh, and are always just content. We love you more than you will ever know. Thank you for changing our lives once again!

Carter Paul Conterio: Birth Story

Carter Paul Conterio 

Born: March 2, 2014

Time: 1:17 PM

9 lb 0 oz 

19.5 inches

This pregnancy was completely different than with Kennedy. I was a lot more sick, I gained mostly just in my belly, and oh ya the fact that I had a 9 pound baby. My stomach was huge and I kept saying I am scared I will have a 10 pound baby but everyone kept saying nooo he will be like in the 7 range. Not so. Anyways I tried everything to get Carter out. I jumped, jogged, I tried oils, teas, herbs. Honestly if its on the internet I tried it. I could have been induced in February a week early but I felt weird picking his birthday and I didn't want pitocin >>to me thats what caused Kennedy's problems<< Also, at the beginning of this pregnancy I said I wanted him to be a March baby, I was born in March and I like the month of March (nothing against February). So secretly I still wanted him to be a March baby even though I wanted him out. 

March 1st, I went on a walk with Jeremy and on the way back I said to myself over and over again. "I am going to have a baby today." We decided to go on a little last date before the baby would come. We went to a movie and during the movie I had about 3 strong contractions. We came home and around 9 pm they started to be more frequent. Around 11 we called Jeremy's Dad to come over to watch Kennedy while we went to the hospital. At midnight we headed over to American Fork Hospital (which is a street over now from us). We checked in, they hooked me up, and checked me and said I was at a 2 (with Kennedy I didn't dilate on my own so this was good.) They said they would keep me for an hour and see if I changed. At about 1:30 she came back and I was at a 3. So they kept me. I got my epidural around 3:00 AM and they broke my water at the same time. I got really sick after this. I was throwing up a lot (which never happened with Kennedy). My blood pressure kept dropping, I would get extremely cold and start shaking. My epidural wore off 4 times (this did happen with Kennedy so I don't think my body likes them) At 7:00 am the nurse came in to check me and said I was at a 9.5. She informed me that in the next hour hour-half Carter would be here! Well 8:30 came and she checked me and I was still at a 9.5. Then around 9:30 am she checked me and I was still at a 9.5. At this point they figured out that Carter was  posterior. Which means he is head down but the wrong way. The doctor tried to get him to flip and they tried some other things but he wasn't moving. At 11:45 am the doctor came back in, he told me we could wait as long as I wanted because Carter was not under any stress. He then said he didn't think he was going to move, and I would most likely have to have a c-section. I cried, actually I bawled, I had no energy left after throwing up so much and feeling the contractions but I did not want to have a c section. I told him we would wait until 12:30 pm and if he hadn't flipped then we could. During that time I thought I was dying, I even said to everyone, "I am dying." I could feel everything. I didn't want them to give me another shot of the epidural because I thought maybe that was keeping me from dilating. Well finally around 1 they came in to take me to the "surgery room" I don't know what they call it. I have never been so scared in my life, I begged them to put me to sleep. I cried a lot. I know my arms were shaking uncontrollably, I threw up all over my hair and I remembered them asking if I could feel them poking me. After they pulled him out the Doctor said he was so wedged in there he would have never flipped and the fact that he was 9 pounds I would have had a hard time getting him out anyways. 

Carter came into this world healthy though and that is what we are thankful for! He is the sweetest little boy. He sleeps wonderfully. He usually wakes up about once a night. He does have reflux and I think he gets really gassy sometimes but he still is a good baby. He does have a great cry that can be heard a mile away. Kennedy is the sweetest little thing with him. She says things like, "I love baby brother" "I want to hold baby brother" "He is so cute" He is so little" "Hes a good baby" "His hair is so soft" She just wants to touch touch touch. Which she was sick and now Carter is. Thumbs down. Recovery has been much harder than with Kennedy, and I can't take a bath for another 3 weeks. I am dying. I just want to take a bath! 

These are some pictures from my phone

This was the day before I had him

38 weeks 

I don't remember this but its right after the c section when I was back in my room

His first bath! 

He won't sleep unless he is being held. This was our first night home.

Here are some pictures from our camera