My First Delivery!

I got to help deliver my very first baby today in clinicals! The mom L. was a sweetheart, and she was a little nervous considering that during her last labor she pushed for 3 hours and 40 minutes! I watched the anesthesiologist put in her epidural, and he was kind enough to explain everything to me as he got it started. The nurse I was following let me insert L's straight cath before she had to start pushing, and I even got to do a vag exam. Disregarding the fact that I put my hand in somebody's vagina, it was crazy to feel the baby's head and the mom's cervix dilated to 10.
L. had the easiest labor I could possibly imagine. During her two practice pushes, the baby's head started to pop out. During her next contraction, the doctor asked her not to push and to let the contractions do all the work. The mom only had to push once or twice to get the baby's shoulders out. The next few minutes were pretty messy. Blood was still draining out, and the mom tore a little bit. The weirdest part was watching L. immediately after birth. From the waist up she was a happy mother cuddling her new baby. From the waist down she was going through postpartum hemorrhage and ended up with an EBL of 500mL. The doctor was shoving her entire hand up inside L. and pulling out clots. The bed pads were soaked with blood, and so were the towels on the floor. Eventually this resolved, and L. was just fine. The doctor even let me watch as she sewed up L's tear.
The baby was a girl named Emily, and her face was one nasty bruise because of how fast she delivered! Otherwise she was completely healthy and happy. She had the fattest little cheeks that I've ever seen, and was a whopping 9 pounds 15.2 ounces. The nurse let me give her 2 shots and help with her first assessment.
Watching a birth in person was both surreal and exhilarating! I was also relieved to know that I can handle seeing large amounts of blood without fainting. I'm looking forward to next week when our professor takes us to watch her get a mammogram in order to use her experience as a learning experience!