This is the story of M's birth. Things get a little real around the time I'm talking about delivery so, if you're squeamish, you may not want to read that part. :)
On Sunday June 11th, I was 40 weeks and two days pregnant. I woke up at 5am just feeling off. I was tired, crampy, pressure 'downstairs' and had some back pain. I figured I was just having a bad day, so I spent the day on the couch. At 4pm, I felt my first contraction. I didn't believe it at first and figured I was just having some bathroom issues. I did spend a lot of time in the bathroom, but these were definitely pains that could be timed and had obvious start and end times. The contractions came and went for 4 hours until I decided to call the on-call OB. He told me, "sounds like you're in labor. Come on in to the hospital when the contractions are 4 minutes apart and the worst pain you've ever felt in your life." This guy has seriously awesome bedside manner, let me tell you. I hung up and continued to labor at home. On one of my trips to the bathroom, I got part of my bloody show. That continued throughout the evening and into the next morning. I bled a lot before her birth.
My husband and I packed our bags and decided to wait until I was admitted to call my parents who would be coming in to town when she was born. I sent my husband to bed and went downstairs to work through the contractions. The pain was not intolerable and I actually fell asleep at 3am. I woke up an hour later to pain that was absolutely awful. Yes, it was the worst pain I had ever felt in my life - up to that point. I started timing these new, more painful contractions, and found they were coming every 3-4 minutes. After 30 minutes, I went upstairs and woke up my husband. I told him this was it and I needed to go to the hospital. He was out of bed in a flash and by 5am, we were in the car, on the way to the hospital.
We were brought to triage and answered a thousand questions. Dr. Bad Bedside Manner came in and checked me. I was 4 cm dilated and 75% effaced. My contractions were just getting worse and I kept feeling like I had to poop. I went to the bathroom a few times and the triage nurse kept telling me if I felt the need to 'bear down', to tell her. Nurses do NOT like to deliver babies in toilets.
I was asked what my birth plan was. I had no idea what I had done with the piece of paper I had written it down on (turns out, it was at home on the couch) so I responded with, "I don't care as long as I can get an epidural, do delayed cord cutting and you let me hold my baby right after she's born." I think nurses really appreciate brevity and low-maintenance patients. I was definitely low maintenance, so I hope they found at the end of the day that I was a good patient. After all of my information was taken, I was started on fluids for the epidural. The bag was supposed to take about 1/2 hour to drain into me and then they could get the anesthesiologist to come in.
I was moved to my delivery room at 8am. The best thing about 8am was it meant a change of shift. My favorite OB from my practice happened to be the doctor on call that day, Dr. Awesome. I was thrilled, but still in pain. My fluids took an hour to drain into me and the pain was just getting worse. I was offered other medications but refused because one of the side effects was drowsiness. I knew I didn't need that to complicate things. When the fluids were finally complete, my nurse called the anesthesiologist but he was busy with another patient, and there were no other anesthesiologists available at the time. I was told it could be another half hour before he got there. I asked for the IV drugs at this point because I couldn't handle it any longer. The nurse called for Dr. Awesome because he had to check me before they could administer the IV drugs.
Thankfully, the anesthesiologist got there first and I got my epidural without the need of other pain meds. My husband was allowed to sit with me while they stuck me and he helped me work through a contraction while they were finishing up the epidural drip. Honestly, the epidural was not that bad. It was no where near as scary as I had made it out to be in my head. Once that was complete and my catheter (ew) was inserted, Dr. Awesome came in to check my cervix again. I was 8cm dilated!!
A happy girl with my epidural in place.
While I wasn't feeling pain, I was feeling pressure, bad pressure. I felt like I had to take the biggest poop of my life. The nurse told me to tell her when I was feeling that pressure even when I wasn't having a contraction. She left the room to take care of a few things and about 30 minutes after Dr. Awesome broke my water, I told my husband to go get her because I was feeling constant pressure. She came back in, checked my cervix and I was 10 cm dilated. Yes! Super fast dilation woman!! She removed the catheter. (Thank God, that thing was so weird and gross) and I got to start pushing at 10:15am, 5 hours after I arrived at the hospital. My delivery nurse was fantastic. She talked me through each contraction, coached me on how to hold my legs, how to breathe and where to push (like I'm taking that big poop I really felt like taking). She and the doctor also stretched me during each contraction. It was weird but at the same time, I think it really helped to keep me from tearing too much.
I spent the pushing part of labor moaning and grunting. At some point, there was a knock on the door - it was MY PARENTS. The nurse asked who it was and I heard, "It's Dad." My eyeballs about popped out of my head and I whispered, "OMG it's my PARENTS! Send them away, send them AWAY!!!" So yeah, our hospital is very family-friendly and allows families back to the labor area. The nurse told them this was not a good time and they went back to the waiting room. As I got closer to delivering her, I cursed a few times and then immediately apologized to everyone in the room who was helping me. I also apologized to the ped. team for making them stand around and wait so long. They all got a good chuckle out of that.
Finally, the baby was way down and ready to come out. I had been pushing for so long, I was exhausted. Dr. Awesome had been with me for a while now and he asked if I minded if he used the vacuum to get her out. I had no problem with it, as long as it was safe and would get.this.baby.out.of.me.right.NOW. Three contractions later, he held up our wiggly little baby, cut her cord and sent her over to the waiting team of 8 people on the other side of the room. It was CROWDED in there! I started crying when I heard her cry for the first time. When he handed her off to the team, I yelled at my husband to get over there and tell me what she looked like. I didn't want her out of our sight even if she was in the room with us. He didn't want to get in the way but one of the nurses pulled him over there so he could watch what they were doing.
Side note: I asked my husband later if he watched her being delivered. He said he did and said it was one of the most amazing things ever. He was standing my my side, holding my neck for me during contractions. He was able to see the baby coming out, though. He said he was totally freaked out at first because the vacuum sucked her head out funny and made it look like she had a double scoop of ice cream on top of her neck! I have no idea, didn't see it, but it must have gone away almost immediately because her head looked perfect when it got to me. Luckily, she didn't have a bad cone head either. She just had a beautiful little round noggin.
Side note: I asked my husband later if he watched her being delivered. He said he did and said it was one of the most amazing things ever. He was standing my my side, holding my neck for me during contractions. He was able to see the baby coming out, though. He said he was totally freaked out at first because the vacuum sucked her head out funny and made it look like she had a double scoop of ice cream on top of her neck! I have no idea, didn't see it, but it must have gone away almost immediately because her head looked perfect when it got to me. Luckily, she didn't have a bad cone head either. She just had a beautiful little round noggin.
Meanwhile, back on the delivery table...OMG THE BURNING!! For a few minutes, it felt like my vagina was on fire. Finally that subsided and Dr. Awesome told me he was stitching me up. I didn't have much tearing and didn't get cut open, I had just a few minor tears that he had to take care of. Once everything was done "down there," the nurses started the postpartum fun of pushing on my belly to help the uterus contract down.
Our beautiful little girl.
I finally got my little girl back in my arms and got my skin to skin time. We laid there for an hour and 20 minutes before we were moved to the recovery room. Having that baby on my chest for the first time was one of the most amazing experiences of my entire life that I will never forget. The pain was horrid but I wouldn't change a thing. Don't get me wrong, I never want to go through that again, but I'm so happy I experienced it once and was able to bring this beautiful life into this world.
Stay tuned in the next week or so for The Birth Story - Recovery. I had a few complications that had to be dealt with. I'll share those details in that post.
