Hellobee

When I was pregnant, I must have read hundreds of birth stories. Free births, planned c-sections, I wanted to devour all of it, and I did. After I gave birth, I had no time, and really, no desire, to read about any other experiences, and I didn’t think I would ever have the energy to write out my own. Then one night when Bug was a few weeks old, I forced myself to grab my phone and type it out, one handed, as he nursed and nursed until the sun came up. It is a little rough around the edges and the memories were already starting to get a little fuzzy, but here it is, Bug’s birth story.

I had a fairly uneventful pregnancy. Besides some implantation bleeding and cramping that sent us panicked to the ER (hello, first time parents!), I had no pregnancy ailments. I did nearly break my foot  with an awful soft tissue injury and got bronchitis which led to an ER trip and a cracked rib. But the pregnancy itself was easy. No pain, minimal weight gain, zero swelling, no false labor, no issues at all. That said, by the time I hit 40 weeks and still hadn’t had a single Braxton hicks contraction, I started to get worried. I went for acupuncture with my midwife on my due date, October 4th, just to get things going. I also started drinking raspberry leaf tea that day, and bouncing on my yoga ball. Nothing happened. I was pretty sure little Bug was quite snug in there. However, I had told him, since the day I found out I was pregnant, that October 8th was a good birthday; my favorite midwife would be on hospital duty that week, and it was a super blood moon.

October 6th, Monday

After spending the final few months of pregnancy wondering what a contraction felt like, I finally felt some very mild cramping after I finished up my homework for the night. It was like the lightest most mild period cramps ever and I didn’t think much of it. Mr. Jellyfish and I were in bed by eleven. I fell asleep easily, as had been the case through most of my pregnancy, cuddled up with my giant pregnancy pillow.

October 7th, Tuesday – 1:00AM

At one in the morning I woke up to go to the bathroom, just as I had 2-3 times a night for the past month or so, and as I got out of bed I realized I was leaking fluid. I sat there is disbelief for about ten minutes, and then started to make my way out of the bedroom. In the hallway my first contraction hit  It didn’t hurt, but it wasn’t exactly comfortable. I waited until a few more came before I woke up Mr. Jellyfish just to let him know. They kept coming, about eight minutes apart, and we were up for a few hours just… freaking out that this could be it! Around sunrise we turned off the lights and fell back asleep.

At noon we took the dogs for a long walk, and decided to head over to L&D. I had a secret fear that because the contractions weren’t incredibly painful, that it was false labor. I also had a secret hope that we would get there and they would tell me I was at least 5 cm dilated. Wishful thinking!

1:00 PM

I arrived to my curtained off triage room, and the monitors showed that I was contracting every 2.5 minutes. Yay! The fluid check showed that yes, it was amniotic fluid, I wasn’t just peeing on everything. Yay! The cervical check showed that I was only 1 cm dilated. Yikes. After 12 hours of contractions. Double yikes. However, due to my water being broken and the quick pace of contractions, they checked me in. Susan, my favorite midwife was only there for two more hours, so I told baby Bug to either come on out quickly or maybe wait until morning… I would regret this speech later.

The nurses wheeled me to my delivery room, which was huge! We got all set up, I had some drinks, they told me to eat to keep my energy up. Contractions became painful, I walked laps, I read books, I finally called my doula for support. We did some body work and had some lovely essential oil mist. Eventually, contractions were one on top of the other with barely a 20-second rest in between. I started shaking uncontrollably. My doula, the OB on duty, and both my nurses all assumed this meant I was getting close to transition, and assured me that we were near the end!

11:00 PM

By eleven that night, the OB headed in to check me, since Susan, my midwife, was now home for the night.  Shockingly, I was still at 1 cm. I think this is when I started to cry. I decided to get in the water and sit on the ball in the shower, where I spent the next hour and a half, really vocalizing through the contractions and hoping the hot water wasn’t hurting the baby. At this point I had only had about 3 hours of broken sleep in the last 24 hours, so I was exhausted and doubting my abilities to push, especially if I still had many hours to go.

October 8, Wednesday – 1:30 AM

At 1:30 in the morning the OB arrived to check me again. I could tell by her face that the next thing she told me would not be pleasant. Her exact words were, “I’m so sorry, this won’t sound good… you are still only 1cm.” My water had been broken for over 24 hours, and there was a fear of infection. I had 12 hours of mild contractions and 12 hours of heavy, hard contractions, and almost zero progress. The OB did a quick ultrasound, and we found that while baby was head down still (which was good, he had been breech off and on for months) he had turned, and the reason my contractions were terribly painful was because I was experiencing back labor. She told me I could go one more hour, or I could start pitocin now. I decided to start pitocin and get an epidural. I grieved for a few minutes about not having the birth I had planned for, and then I moved on, to have the birth I needed.

3:00AM

I sent my doula home to sleep for a few hours, Mr. Jellyfish went to sleep on the fold out couch, and I tried to get some rest. The beeping machines and wires kept me awake for a while, but around three in the morning I finally fell asleep. I was woken up a few hours later with a nurse peering under my blanket saying, “I see hair! DON’T PUSH!”

Everyone in the room began to rush around, gathering equipment, paging my midwife, who arrived with two very young residents, since I was at a teaching hospital. They turned on the bright lights. I did a few practice pushes and realized this baby was coming now. Susan physically lifted me and rolled me onto my right side. My doula and my husband held my feet, and my doula counted for me. I pushed 4 or 5 times, and I felt his head popping out. I looked down but couldn’t see anything at all. Then next thing I knew I felt a gush, and he was out! His cord was short but they popped my little bug right onto my chest. He looked at me, and I looked at him.

And he was beautiful. He had so much hair, and a tiny nose, and big eyes. He was pink. I can’t remember if he was crying. It is just too fuzzy. I think he cried for a moment, and then just looked at me for an eternity. Eventually, he wiggled over to my right breast, and I got him latched on. I didn’t feel the stitches, although I was told there were many.

I was so in love with him from the moment I saw him. I didn’t know it would be like that. I had no idea how I would feel. The pain did fade, and I can hardly remember it. The love is real. It gets even stronger every day.