It’s midnight and Ashley (Dygert) Couillard B’18, RNC-OB, is an hour into her shift at North Memorial Health in Robbinsdale, Minn.
Working in labor and delivery, she never knows what to expect, and this particular shift has thrown her a curveball. She’s having a few contractions herself. As they’re short staffed, she focused on her work, weaving her way in and out of rooms, taking vitals, dispensing pain medication, and monitoring new mothers or mothers to be, their babies — and some anxious fathers.
She and other staff are trained on all aspects of labor, delivery, and recovery, for C-sections and postpartum. And after five years, she can tell you that no two deliveries are ever the same. But she finds each one rewarding.
At Robbinsdale, she said, she sees a higher percentage of high-risk patients, women who are from lower economic sectors, who too often get little to no prenatal care. “It’s more rewarding because we’re helping people who really need help,” she said.
Couillard is nine months pregnant. And she has three little ones at home who are 7 years old, 3 years old and 21 months old. Sleep is at a premium, and hormones? They’re real. “My nickname is Emotional Ashley,” she said. “I see a commercial, and I cry. I feel everything for everybody.”
With her job, where she is surrounded by emotions, anxiety, love, joy, pain, and loss, this can pose a problem. “I have to build a wall fast. You can’t be in a delivery and start crying. I have to desensitize myself,” she said.
One of her more difficult experiences was when she delivered a stillborn baby. In grief, the mother sought answers from Couillard. “She wanted to know what she had done wrong and how she could have prevented it,” she said.
“We don’t always have answers right away.” Couillard could only tell her that the baby would be tested and hopefully more answers would be forthcoming but that sometimes losses are a complete accident and there’s nothing that can be done.
Couillard presents counseling information to mothers or families in loss, handing them grief packets and opportunities for keepsakes.
It’s impossible to not grieve with them on the inside.
Couillard recently assisted with a baby whose mother had used drugs and was not allowed to leave with the baby, who would either be placed in foster care or with extended family. She snuggled with that baby whose future was yet undetermined.
Sometimes, like this shift, there’s a baby who needs to be under the bilirubin lights a little while for jaundice. “It required a little more emotional support for the family. They were having a difficult time and were still in shock a little bit,” she said.
Of course, there is also joy.
”The gift of delivering any of God’s precious children into this world is so rewarding, and I love every moment of it,” she said. “I think the best part of working in labor and delivery is that I get to witness the love and joy every mother and father has when they see their baby for the first time.”
Couillard said things that can happen in labor can also be humorous.
She has monitored triplets, struggling to keep up with them as they moved around in utero to determine if she was still monitoring the same baby.
She’s had moms laboring simultaneously, and despite some typical timing predictors (like one mother having an epidural, which can sometimes slow labor down) and this being the third birth for the other mother (which can often mean the baby will come faster), absolutely no predictions can be made about the timings of those births. Babies come on their own time. And they keep staff hopping.
“The things that can happen in labor, it’s a whirlwind,” she said.
And the third patient is the father, who can be quite entertaining. Couillard laughs when she says they have a wide range of personalities. “We put dads at the head of the bed,” she said. “We don’t want them to pass out. I tell them, ‘Mom is my first priority, and baby is my second. If I make it to you, I’ll help you, but if things are happening, I can’t. Sit down if you feel light headed.’ I’ve never had anyone pass out.
“They tend to be overly helpful or not very helpful. They’re either asking, ‘Do you want water? Do you want juice?’ over and over or they are just in shock and staring because they are overwhelmed.”
Couillard said because she can sometimes be with a family for an entire 8-hour shift, she really develops a bond with them.
She admits she didn’t always know she wanted to be a nurse. In high school, she knew she wanted to help people, but originally considered social work or some form of mental health advocate. Once she met her husband, he convinced her to look at nursing.
Although he thought she’d maybe consider becoming an entry-level support professional, she went full speed into a career as an RN.
She chose Saint Mary’s because she found it has a reasonable timeline. She started in the BSN in Nursing Science when her oldest daughter was 2-3 weeks old. Because it was an online program, she could balance being a new mom, going to school, and her job in pediatric homecare.
Saint Mary’s also opened the door to her future career. Because she could choose, for her capstone, where she would shadow a doctor or nurse and in what area, she chose a midwife.
“After that, I knew for sure that I wanted to deliver babies,” she said. “It is a facet of life I’ve always been interested in, and I would love to continue this work as long as I am able!”