05 | Tarin Springer: Vaginal Delivery,Shoulder Dystocia,Perinatal Stroke,NICU

Brittany Belmontes
Mar 3, 2020
5 min read

Today I interview Tarin from Abbisford BC where she lives with her husband and sweet little boy, Archer. Tarin was previously a pre-school teacher who is now certifying as a birth, postpartum and bereavement doula. Soon after her and her husband got married they decided they were ready to grow their family and within the first month they were pregnant. The first few weeks she didn't have any early pregnancy signs until she hit 6 weeks and nausea set in. Tarin describes its as "all day sickness" and after a few weeks of suffering she decided to get in with her family doctor and get a prescription for diclectin that she took up until her 3rd trimester. Once Tarin found out she was pregnant she went to see her family doctor who had actually delivered her and her sister, but unfortunately her Dr didnt deliver anymore so she referred her to an OB Womens Clinic just across the street. She says next time she would like to go the midwifery route, reflecting on her care throughout her pregnancy with Archer she explains the lack of personal connection to her care provider, short appointments times, long waits and just not being heard or informed by of her pregnancy/birth choices. Tarin did some birth prep by watching some birth videos/documentaries, read some educational books and attended a child birth prep class run through a local doula group that she found very positive and helpful.

Close to the end of her pregnancy Tarin opted to have a few sweeps as she grew more unconformable but they never ended up doing anything for her and she started to feel discouraged so she tried a few tricks to start up labour and did lots of walking. To Tarins surprise her water broke while in bed on the night of her due date, she called into the main hospital in White Rock to let them know but they were full so they advised her to go into the small local hospital to confirm it was her water had broken and check in on mom and baby. Since Tarin was less than 4 cm the hospital didn't admit her and sent her on her way home to wait for contractions to start and labour to progress. She decided to go to bed and get some sleep, around 2 am she was woken to what she describes as "period like cramps" that quickly started to progress. At that time they were still quite spread out so Tarin was able to sleep through them, but around 4:45 am the app she as using to time her contractions was telling her to head into hospital. Tarin decided to call into the main hospital but they were still full, she then headed into the smaller hospital but again she was less then the required dilation for her to be admitted so unfortunately she was sent home for the 2nd time so around 6:30-7 am Tarin got home and hopped into the bath for a few hours to get some relief. Luckily her friend offered to be her "unofficial doula" and headed over to Tarin to help support her through the rest of her labour and finally the main hospital in White Rock had room for Tarin so she began her 45 minute drive. Once they arrived they offered Tarin some gas which she gladly agreed to and found some relief to help her work through the contractions throughout her entire labour. By 6 pm Tarin needed a bit more relief so he opted for a shot of morphine and from there she doesn't remember much until around 6 am the next day where she requested the epidural but because she was already so far along they were unable to give her the epidural. In the morning she learned that she had approved/been given a few medications such as Pitocin and Fenynal that she doesn't remember receiving which she was quite frustrated to find out. Tarin started to feel the urge to push but she wasn't noticing much happening, after about an hour of pushing the nurse brought out a squat bar and ended up tying a sheet on it so that Tarin would pull the other end for each push. Archer started to show some signs of fetal distress so they started to rush her with each push to get baby out, after a few pushes and some assistance they he was born and placed onto Tarins chest. As Tarin went to pick up Archer he was quickly picked up and rushed away to be resuscitated and after a few minutes they were able to get him breathing. The whole time this was going on Tarin and her husband had no idea what had happened and nobody was telling them what was going on; eventually they doctor came in to explain that Archer came out with tons of mucus, he came out struggling to breath so while they were doing chest compression's he suffered a pneumothorax and his lung needed to be re-inflated, and shoulder dystocia so he needed to be transferred to a better equip hospital as soon as Tarin was up and ready to transfer to the BC Womens Hospital with him.

Once they arrived to the womens hospital they headed up to see Archer in the isolation area of the NICU where he was put on cooling pad that was meant to help with any possible brain trauma he may have experienced. Being on this cooling protocol prevented Tarin from being able to hold or feed Archer so in the meantime she was pumping breast milk and taking it in to the NICU. She lucked out and got housed close to the hospital so they were able to walk everyday day to visit and didnt have the burden of paying for parking and gas to travel back and forth. When Archer was taken off cooling protocol they did an MRI of his brain that ended up showing he did in fact end up having a stroke. Doctors explained to Tarin that he had a stroke in the sensory area of his brain but since he was so fresh and little his brain would likely be able to heal itself and hopefully he wouldnt have any effects from that when he was older. {Thankfully to this Archer is symptom free so far and he hasnt showed any signs that the stroke as effected him in any way.} 5 days after they were able to snuggle Archer for the first time since he was born and when he was 8 days old they finally got the OK to head home! Tarin did struggle to breastfeed and she had some serious baby blues, she was able to pump and Archer was taking breast milk bottles until around 3 months.