thejennigirl: Saxton's Birth Story
Posted
Thursday, January 29, 2009 12:31 PM
"At 2am, I went upstairs to wake DH. His response? 'Seriously? Oh, is that a contraction?! You’re in labor!?'..."
The beginning
I was just one day short of being two weeks past my estimated due date on Monday, April 28. I went in for an ultrasound and non-stress test at 1 p.m., after my fundal height had jumped three centimeters since my previous appointment. Everything looked great at my ultrasound, until the tech tried to find amniotic fluid to measure. I only had two fluid pockets big enough to measure, and neither of them were a healthy level. My OB was called and it was decided to move my induction from Friday, May 2, to 7 a.m. Tuesday (the next day!). I came home, pouted about being induced, and tidied up the house. My MIL came to stay with us, and arrived at 8 p.m.
The ultrasound tech had showed me my cervix (that was just WEIRD to see!) and judged me to be 5 or 6 cm. dilated. But, at my NST, I was still having contractions 7 minutes apart with irritability between them, which was the same as the Monday before.
An unexpected break
After putting the kids to bed, my MIL and I sat on the couch visiting and going over the kids’ schedules. At around 10 p.m. or so, my back started aching, but I blew it off, since it usually started aching at the end of the day. DH went to bed early while we chatted. My MIL went to bed and I took a shower a little after 11 p.m., hoping to ease the back ache. This is also where I gave my vagina the pep-talk! (I really wanted the induction to be successful, and avoid a c-section.) I haunted The Nest for a bit, posted, and went to bed. And then decided I wanted sex one last time! I raped poor DH, and then snuggled in to sleep.
I couldn’t sleep. Now my thighs were in cahoots with my back ache. I stuffed another pillow between my thighs and tried again. Nope. I blamed my lack of sleep on DH’s snoring and stared at the clock. Then, I started timing the back ache/thigh cramping. Surprisingly, they were about 5 minutes apart! I got up to walk around and see if that would make them go away. For shits and giggles, I opened up ContractionMaster.com, and started timing them again. They were 5 minutes apart and lasting about 55 seconds when I first came downstairs. After walking around, they jumped to 3.5 minutes apart and were lasting just over 1 minute! They were starting to hurt, so I would stop during a contraction, rest on my knees with my forearms resting on the seat of a chair. I found making small circles with my hips relieved the discomfort. I was still in denial that I was in “real” labor.
No, it can't be
I looked up what I was experiencing in the Lamaze labor guide, and then, I started crying because I had literally given up on ever having a birth experience without Pitocin. It took more than 20 minutes to post on The Nest that I was in labor, between contractions. At 2 a.m., I went upstairs to wake DH. His response? “Seriously? Oh, is that a contraction?! You’re in labor!?” Apparently, he too, had given up!
This is the funny part: DH started racing around the house like a mad man! He went in the guest room, woke his mother up (who was confused at first as to why she was being woken up around 2 a.m.), and ran out the back door the get the truck. I checked on each of my children, kissed them goodbye between contractions, and ate a snack. Poor DH was so excited and nervous. He chased me out the door, I went back in to get my sandals to wear home from the hospital, and I swear he would have thrown me over his shoulder if he could!
The big moment
Contractions while sitting, buckled in, in a vehicle, are not fun. I had 3 or 4 contractions between home and the hospital. We stopped at the ER’s nurses’ station, where DH announced that we’d like to have a baby, and up to L&D we went. The nurse that did my NST was on duty, along with one other nurse. I was hooked up to the monitors for 15 minutes and then checked. I was 7cm! The monitors were unhooked and I was able to move around, as I had requested. (This was at 3am.)
I moaned and "sang the labor song” during contractions. DH was the best! I had back AND leg labor and he found the pressure point in my lower back that eased the back pain considerably. He held me, encouraged me, put wet wash cloths on my forehead, fed me ice chips, and was just all around awesome!
I was 8 cm at around 4 a.m. This is when my bloody show decided to show up. I rested for about 5 minutes or so between contractions during transition. The OB arrived at 5:15 and checked me. I was at 9 cm (had been since about 4:30), but still had an anterior lip on my cervix. She tried stretching it, but it wouldn’t budge. I labored for another 30 minutes, and she checked again. I still had the lip, was still 9 cm, so she had me start pushing while she tried to stretch the lip over the baby’s head. Not the most pleasant feeling in the world, and it took 20 minutes to get his head through the lip. Things went fast then!
My bed had stirrups, but it was adjusted so that I was basically squatting. Two contractions and he was already crowning! (DH was so excited! He kept yelling "Push!" like a goofball, LOL!) The OB broke my water, made sure the fluids were clear, and I pushed with the next three contractions. His head didn’t budge. Because of my very low fluids, the OB asked my permission to do a small episiotomy so we could get him out. She made a quick clip, and with the next contraction, he was here! Once his shoulders were out, the OB told me to reach down and pull him the rest of the way out and onto my chest. His eyes were wide open, and he was so pink!
I was shocked when the nurses told me he weighed 9lbs 2.6 oz! That’s almost 2 lbs more than my other kids were! He was 21inches long and had a 14.5 inch-long head. I got to give him his first bath he roomed in. His older siblings adore him. He’s been such a good baby! He has the longest alert periods, nurses like a champ, and had only lost 3 oz by our 24 hour discharge. As of his three day checkup, he was only down 2 oz from his birth weight.
Looking back
They staff followed my birth guide to a “T” -- other than the episiotomy, which, circumstances being what they were, I’m okay with. Recovery was REALLY easy, and I lost my pregnancy weight quickly. He nursed like a champ from the get-go, and is a healthy and happy exclusive breastfeeder baby boy who just turned 8 months old.
Good Luck! And I hope everyone has as wonderful of a birth experience as me! Congrats to all you new mommies!
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