A Birth Story Part 1

Well now that Max is 10 months old, it might be time for me to write out my birth story - dontchathink?

Honestly, the whole giving birth process was super traumatic for me and it has taken me a long time to process and accept. I literally have been terrified of giving birth since, well, forever. But ever since I found out I was pregnant I was a nervous wreck.

I remember telling my mom about how scared I was and she was told me that birth certainly wasn't the hardest part of parenthood. She said that harder moments in her life as a parent have been sending her babies off to kindergarten and college and watching them get married. Well, I haven't done any of those things yet, so I can't really compare, but giving birth to Max has been BY FAR the hardest thing I've ever done and overcome in my life.

Let's just start off by saying that I had not ever been in a hospital before September 9th. In fact, I'm not really even sure I've ever even visited anyone in a hospital. Unless you count the nursing home that we visited when I was in 2nd grade to sing Christmas carols with my girl scout troop. So yeah, going to the hospital was a whole new experience for me, and I was SO nervous.

My due date was September 1st. It came and went, and there was no sign of a baby. I went to my appointment on my due date and they asked if there had been any contractions or Braxton Hicks or anything. I wanted so badly to tell them yes, I think it's around the corner, but honestly -- Nothing.

My hospital bag had been packed for weeks, I had the contraction app on my phone and ready to start counting when necessary but the only thing that was happening was that I was getting bigger and bigger and increasingly more and more uncomfortable. At my due date appointment, we scheduled a tentative induction date in case I still hadn't gone into labor. The NP wanted it to be on or around 42 weeks, but I pleaded with her and she agreed to 41 weeks + 3 days (since they don't do inductions on weekends.) Hopefully, I thought, I would naturally go into labor, get the epidural as soon as humanly possible and be on our merry way before I got to 41+3.

September 8th came and there was still no baby so off we went to the 41 week appointment. My blood pressure was high and there was protein in my urine so we were immediately sent to the lab at the hospital to check for preeclampsia. It was a hot day, and I was just a huge ball of nerves and sweat. We stopped at starbucks on the way to the hospital to get some food and I got a venti ice water which I drank in about 20 minutes. I gave blood, and was instructed to call my doctor back if I hadn't heard anything by 4:00. When 4:00 rolled around and I called, and the nurse told me, everything was fine and that I was probably dehydrated and I needed to drink more water, especially because of the heat wave we were having.

There were still absolutely zero signs of labor on September 9th, so we went in for the induction at 8:00pm. My sister was living with us so we made a yummy dinner, had a little bit of ice cream and she sent Chris and I off. I was excited to not be pregnant anymore, but I honestly was terrified. I held it together pretty well, at least for the first couple of hours.

We got to the hospital just as it was getting dark. We checked in at the front desk and they told us to wait in the lobby so that we could be called back to do our paperwork. When we were called back we had to sign a bunch of things and go over lots of paper - it seemed like it took forever! I just wanted to get upstairs and get the show on the road!

Finally, we were released back into the lobby where we were to wait for a nurse to come get us. A few minutes later, this sweet nurse named Hope came and got us. She took us up the elevator and got us into a room. She explained everything that was going to happen, which I really appreciated and got me in a gown and got the IV line started. Honestly - that IV line hurt a lot! I wasn't expecting it to hurt so much, but it was super uncomfortable. One of the doctors from the office stopped in to talk with us. She told us that we should have a baby some time the next day, although it could take all day. Hope also hooked lots of monitors up to me to listen to the baby's heartbeat. Finally, she inserted the cervidil to start ripening the cervix and we were instructed to wait.

So we hung out for a few minutes and then I started to get really overwhelmed. I don't know why but it just started hitting me like a ton of bricks. I realized that WE WERE HAVING A BABY. And I was nervous about the induction and how the baby was doing. I just was scared. I started crying. Hope came back in and tried to calm me down, but the tears were just flowing. Finally, I pulled it together and we tried to sleep a little since they wouldn't be starting the pitocin until the morning. It was really hard for me to sleep at all, I'm not sure I did, actually. At one point I got so overwhelmed again that I started hyperventilating. Two nurses came in (I'm pretty sure they were monitoring everything from a computer right outside my room) and they offered me something - (I'm pretty sure it was fentanyl), through the IV line and they told me it would feel like I had a little bit too much champagne. It definitely did feel like that, and I was thankful because it helped calm me down a little. Hope said that they could give me a second dose just 5 minutes after if I felt like I needed it. I accepted that offer.

We continued to go through the night, trying to sleep but not really sleeping. There was a lot of beeping and noises and my blood pressure cuff kept coming on and the baby kept moving so the monitor kept losing the heartbeat. I also had to pee a lot, and it was a huge ordeal when I needed to. Later, I asked for some more medicine, but they told me they couldn't give it to me until the baby's heartbeat was better (I'm not actually sure if they were waiting for it to go up or down.) It never did, so I never did get more Fentanyl. Sometime in the early morning they decided the cervix was ripe enough and said that we could get started on the Pitocin. There was a doctor switch, so Dr. French came in and chatted with us before we started on the Pitocin. She seemed optimistic that this would all run smoothly and that we would have a baby by the end of the day! I really liked her and I was glad she would be delivering my baby! I was also starving so I begged for some food. They couldn't give me much since there was a potential for a C-Section and you can't have anything to eat before surgery. I got broth, jello, juice and italian ice. (I gave my Jello to Chris) but gobbled everything else down.

By 11am or so, I was starting to feel more and more contractions. They weren't TOO terrible yet, but I was scared of being too much pain. The nurses kept telling me I could have the epidural whenever I wanted. So after an hour or so of trying different positions and bouncing on an exercise ball, I told them I was ready. I was always going to get it, I just thought it might be nice to be able to move around for as long as I could stand it before the epidural. I have a pretty low pain tolerance so by noon I was ready.

The epidural was a scary experience, but honestly, I don't remember it hurting too much. I just remember FREAKING out because I was afraid it was going to hurt. Right after they insert it, they ask you these questions like "is you arm tingling, do you have any pain in your head" etc. I had to calm down just to think about these questions and then realize that it was fine. Seriously, the FEAR of the epidural was way worse than the actual epidural.

Once the epidural was in, things were better. At some point Dr. French came in and said that I was 7cm and then she broke my water. I didn't feel any of it - because of the epidural. So far, it seemed like things were going okay. Finally around 5pm they said I was 9cm - Almost there! We called my sister so she could come to the hospital (for the big event!) It took another two hours but finally by 7pm I was at 10cm and ready to push.

The nurse who checked me was about done with her shift so she was leaving me with another nurse. She had me do a "practice" push and said something to the effect of "Oh yeah, you've got this, you're a good pusher." I was pleased and hope that this whole thing would be over ASAP. I asked the new nurse when the doctor would be in, and she kindly looked at me said, "well, sometimes these things take time... so it could be a while." I was crestfallen. I thought it was showtime!

So I started pushing when the nurses and Chris and my sister told me to (since I couldn't feel because of the epidural.) The thing is, I hadn't really slept in 36 hours (at least) and I oddly started to feel so tired that I was falling asleep in between contractions. The epidural seemed like it wasn't working well, (although looking back, I think it was) I was feeling SO much pressure and was incredibly uncomfortable. I had the urge to get up and get into different positions, but couldn't so much because of the epidural. I tried hanging onto the bar and pushing, squatting and pushing, people holding my legs and pushing. At point I freaked out a little (are you noticing a theme yet?) and told the nurse I DID NOT WANT A C-SECTION. She was super calm and reassuring and told me she didn't see why we would and that I just needed to keep pushing. I pushed and pushed, and fell asleep. Sometimes I could only push 2/3 times in a row because I literally could not muster the energy and strength. Even though I couldn't feel everything, I just knew that this baby wasn't moving. I kept telling my nurse "I don't think he's moving!" My nurse went on dinner break, and when she came back, nothing had progressed much. After three hours of pushing, the nurse went to get my doctor.

(Check back on Wednesday for Part 2!)