Two deliveries in one night

Once again, this past week had a shift start off with a c-section. This mama was measuring 5 weeks behind in dates, had noticed a decrease in fetal movement over the last week and hadn't felt movement for a few hours before she came in, had very low amniotic fluid, PIH and her 35 week baby was having variable decelerations in the absence of any contractions. They had talked it over with the perinatologist and neonatologist and they decided she needed to be delivered. They were already back in the OR when I came on, so it was a bit awkward to slide my way into a delivery in progress. The baby was pretty darn small for the gestational age, but she was a feisty little one. They had worried she might need transferred to another hospital that has a NICU, but she was doing fabulous. Her placenta was also very small, and looking at it, they noticed that probably only half of that placenta was working due to an old, huge infarct on one side. Scary stuff. After that, I finally had a vaginal delivery. It has been awhile. Like I said, I seem to be the c/s queen lately. Mom came in, 4th baby, wasn't really contracting that frequently, but she said last time she did the same thing, then went from 3 cm to complete in less than an hour. She figured baby #4 would come the same way. She didn't want to deliver in the car on her way to the hospital, nor did dad want to deliver the baby. So she hung out, used the birthing ball, walked, and sat in the rocking chair. And she was right about her labor course. All of a sudden, she was moaning, making all those "birthing noises" that women make in transition, and sure enough, she was 8-9 cm with a huge bulging bag of water. Called her midwife (a former RN colleague) and she had an awesome natural vag delivery. Not only that, but this was the first delivery I had done with this midwife since she finished midwifery school. She was always an awesome labor nurse and she was definitely in her element in the delivery room. I was nice to finally add a labor and vag delivery into the mix of surgical deliveries I've done lately.