Birth story

Reading other people's birth stories always fascinates me. Now I have one to tell! Well, John's to tell...I don't remember much about my own.  Reading other birth stories while I was actually pregnant made me all teary eyed, too.  So here we go. This is a lot of words for a 4 hour experience.

John's Birth Story

Tuesday morning, 10 am: awaken after sleeping in to more severe contractions than usual. Text with a friend after a couple hours about the intensity and decide it is real labor, but being short and far apart, I think to myself, "maybe it'll be tomorrow or middle of the night tonight." No matter what, I didn't want to cry wolf with false labor pains prematurely, so I refused to let myself think I was in pre-labor. I putter around the house, take a bath, talk to an insurance person and a financial planner...

2:00 pm. Zach and I go to the mall to take my mind off my contractions. They were a lot more manageable if I was moving when they started (as I discovered by both sitting sometimes and doing chores for the past 4 hours) so we figured a bit of a distraction would be nice. We arrived at 2:15 and started tracking their frequency and duration while we were there...to realize they were 3-5 minutes apart, but only 30-40 seconds long, based on how I was measuring them.  I insisted they needed to be consistent for a hour before we called the hospital because I was so mentally convinced labor would take forever and be false at first.  

3:15pm I made it through the hour with relativly low distress, browsing phones, Weck glass containers, window shopping with Zach. The last 10 minutes of that hour were the worst where I started making horrible faces in pain during the contractions. Prior to at as long as I was moving, they were very manageable.

We call the hospital and they say my contractions have to be a full minute long for 2 hours before I should even consider coming in. They tell me in a (condescending?) voice that first labors are long. We go home so I can suffer there.

4:00pm contractions reach a minute, or close to them.  I wander through the house restlessly for 3 minutes before the next one starts and then I hug Zach or go crazy or something...until (4:45?) FINALLY I get some bleeding (another excuse given to us as a reason to come to the hospital) and we call again. They sound a bit skeptical but they finally tell Zach to bring me in.

5:00ish we arrive at the hospital and my water breaks as we walk through the parking lot. I start crying sadly over my wet pants as we get to Labor and Delivery. We are greeted by a kind nurse who I don't think had a clue how much pain I was really in.  (At this point, contractions are bad but I'm just praying I am at least 5cm dialated to make the trip in worth it.). They've been increasing in strength (i.e. i forget how to breathe during it, and all that relaxation techniques stuff is out the window...but since i have nothing to compare it to, i just get through them...). Anyhow, I go through 3-4 more contractions before the midwife gets in to check me, as they hook me up, etc. Those two last contractions I started feeling like pushing at the end and lost more water.

5:15 they are finally checking on me. I say, "I want an epidural right away and narcotics while I wait." I'm literally crawling up the bed side bars during my contraction since now I'm strapped to the monitors and can't move around.  The midwife checks me. The words I never thought I would hear at that point in time: "You are fully dilated to 10cm. We are moving you to the delivery room to push RIGHT NOW."  

I was immediately in shock. What?! No epidural?! We walked in at 10cm? No. I'm not ready for this. We only started tracking contractions 3 hours ago!!!!! NO!!!!!

So off we go to the delivery room. 6:13pm, John was born.  I did my fair share if complaining and whining about the pain (and my lack of interest in a natural birth) but apparently was also very nice and fun in there.  The midwife and nurses were amazing. Zach was a fan-waving rock star, by my side the whole time.  They kept telling me, "he is almost here!" after a few rounds of "almost"  i finally asked... "what exactly does almost mean to you?! to me it means ONE push before DONE." They laughed at that then i "almost" delivered him a few more rounds...

We didn't even have the camera because he intended to go back to the car to get our labor bag after checking me in.  There wasn't even time to call folks to tell them we were in real labor! I don't even remember what the contractions felt like in there because having the baby coming out is a totally different kind of pain/experience. I dont remember the contraction pain during pushing, only the (painful and uncomfortable) sensation of him, coming down e birth canal. With that...you don't get a break in between contractions for the pressure...well, lots has been learned by this experience!!! 

6lbs, 11 oz 20 inches long! We are so blessed!