My Birth story

Birth story
Labor and Delivery: Play by Play - Read the warning first!

Warning: For posterity and for other moms to be, I'm recording my labor and delivery experience... all of it! If you're squeamish or you just don't want to know, then don't read this.

If you read the last post I made before Peter came, I had a prenatal check up on August 17 my official due date. The doctor had told us to come in at 7am on Wednesday August 18 to have labor induced. I was only one day overdue but my blood pressure was up so they decided to go ahead and induce. Paul and I went back to Tallassee and got the house ready. Everything clean, sheets changed, dishes washed, clutter picked up, bags packed, car loaded and cat fed. We laid down around 11 and Paul dozed but I never really fell asleep. First I was just a little uncomfortable, then I was really uncomfortable, then I was in some pain, then I was in a lot of pain. I got up and walked around a little but it didn't really feel like contractions, at least not like my braxton hicks ones and they didn't seem regular but the pain was so bad I decided to call the doctor at three anyway. He said to go ahead and come in since we were already planning on it. In the time that it took us to get up, get ready, and walk out the door my contractions got regular, about two minutes apart, and intense. We headed for the hospital at 3:43am and made the 45 minute drive in about 25 minutes. At least, Paul says we got there that fast. Hunched over in the passenger seat, I think they moved Opelika like three hours away! Once we got there they took me back (alone) and got me settled into my room and bed. I got an IV and some staydol (I think that's how you spell it. It's a pain med that makes you a little drowsy. And I was more than ready to get some pain help at that point.) and answered about a gazillion questions. When did I last eat? Was I taking any medicines? Was my relationship with the baby's father abusive? No lie, they ask that. I told the nurse I had a poptart on my way to the hospital and assured her that I have a very loving husband. Then she decided to check me about which I was glad about because I just KNEW I was going to be pretty far along. I had been two cm the day before at the doctors office and had now been having pretty intense contractions for a couple of hours. So she checks and.... two cm! I couldn't believe it. They went ahead and started me on the smallest dose of pitocin and then the waiting began.

I already called my mom when we left for the hospital and she and my sister arrived just a little bit after we did. Paul's mom and sister also came that morning. My contractions were still pretty regular and still pretty intense but tolerable. Plus EAMC lets you have Jello and Sprite! And I am a firm believer that everything is more tolerable if there's food. Believe it or not, the hunger that had been one of the things I was most scared about. By 8 or 9 the doctor on call (not my regular ob) came in to check me again. I had progressed to about 4 cm We talked about whether or not I would be getting an epidural because she wanted to break my water but would rather I get the epidural first. I was still wavering about whether I wanted one because I just wanted to wait and see how bad it would get. Now, I have NO problem with drugs but an epidural (as all procedures) does have some pretty substantial risks so I didn't want one if I didn't NEED it. I told her I wanted to keep waiting and she decided to go ahead and put a foley bulb in to help me progress more. As I understand it, they put this thing up past your uterus, inflate it, then as your contractions push it out it encourages your cervix to dialate more. I had never heard of it before but I liked the idea of it and if any of you ladies are anti-pitocin, this is probably a good way to go. I was already on a low drip of pitocin that seemed to be working great, but the doctor just wanted to help it along a little. So she puts it in (not terribly comfortable, but not horrible) and then she tells me it will probably make my contractions worse... WHAM!... I think I'll be having that epidural now. So they call the anestiesiologist and start giving me fluids. It will take about an hour and everybody but one person must leave the room when they come. Now up until this point Paul has been in the room (with his daddy pass) and my mom/sister have been rotating in and out with Paul's mom/sister (sharing the two visitor passes). A short discussion later, my mom stayed and Paul went to the waiting room with everyone else. The epidural.. ugh...great once I had it... not fun to get. You sit on the edge of your bed and hunch over the person that is waiting with you so that your back is rounded and then for several minutes you hold VERY still. Now keep in mind, you are in LABOR the whole time! It really didn't hurt that bad because they give you a bunch of little shots to numb the area that they put the big needle in. Then they put the big needle in the middle of your back and I was totally unable to hold still. I was freaking out and I'm not really sure why. God bless that doctor, he did so good, but I was crying and shaking and the more I tried to hold still the more I shook. They did finally get it in and I didn't really feel it going in at all. They warn you that you might hear "a crunching sound" which I did not hear (thank goodness!) cause that would have freaked me out even more. Then they put a lot of tape around it and let you lay back down and wait for the meds to kick in. I've heard people say before that their epidural didn't work or didn't work very well... mine worked great! After about an hour I was completely numb from the top of my stomach down. I couldn't even move my legs so any time they checked me they had to move my legs for me. In my opinion... epidural=good idea!

After the epidural had taken effect they put a catheder in (weird!) and broke my water (also weird!). I think the foley bulb had already come out at that point but my water did have like a brown green tinge to it which meant Peter had already had a poopy. When that happens they want to be careful to make sure that the baby doesn't breathe any of the poop in as it's being born. It's called "meconium aspiration" and it's bad. Throughout the end of my pregnancy I kept waiting for Peter to "drop" and start to engage into the birth canal and the little stinker never would! So when they broke my water the nurse had to practically lay on my tummy to press Peter down into my hips. So by now it's 11 am, I am 5 cm, have been in labor for about 10 hrs and am now very comfortable. I had some more jello and sprite and I even took a little nap. I think Paul had one too! At about 3 the doctor came and checked me again and the time had come for pushing! They said I could only keep two people in the room and Samantha couldn't get out fast enough...I think she thought the baby might pop out and into her arms!

They warned me that first time moms sometimes push for about two hours and I thought "NO WAY". So push, push, push we did. Now, if you've never tried to push a baby out with the bottom half of your body paralyzed let me give you an idea of what it's like.... Nurse: "Okay Jessica, you have another contraction coming so we're gonna get ready to push" Me: "I do?" Nurse: "Yes, you do. Okay grandma and dad, let's hold her legs up and don't squeeze too tight because you will bruise her and not realize it. Okay... and push... push... push" Me: "Am I pushing?" It's really hard to tell if you're getting anywhere if you can't feel anything. So we did that for about an hour, pushing three or four times every couple of minutes and I was absolutely exhausted. I hadn't really slept in days and I had been fat pregnant for what seemed like years so it didn't take much to get me tired and this was HARD work. Thank goodness for the epidural because I don't think I could have coped with the exhaustion and the pain. At that point they let me lay back and rest for about 30 minutes and I'm pretty sure I fell asleep. In fact, I was so tired I was falling asleep in between pushs. After my rest the doctor came in to check on me (this is about 4:15pm). Peter had moved down a lot but was facing the wrong direction. Apparently babies should have their face toward mom's back on their way out and Peter was facing my belly. So the doctor turned him (which as you'll recall they turned him lengthwise about three weeks before). After that the doctor could tell that the pushes were much more effective and we were getting close. This whole time I still had one huge question in my mind... "will he fit?" I did NOT want to have to have gone through all this labor just to be wheeled away for a C-section at the last minute. I also knew in my heart that Peter was going to be a very big baby and the doctor had also metioned that this might have been the reason he was breech because my body just knew he wouldn't fit. So the whole time I am thinking.. "is he going to fit?" "can I still do this vaginally?" Well at about 4:30 the answer was a resounding "YES" we were about to have a baby! So I keep pushing and they start prepping the room and calling my doctor (who had said that he would stop by when he got out of the office at 5). At about 5:10 they tell me to stop pushing because the baby is almost out and the doctor is on his way. I insisted that the fabulous nurse who had been with me the whole time could just deliver him but she convinced me to wait a little longer. So Dr. Golden came in and out came Peter at 5:21pm! My epideral was still working great and because I was so excited I didn't even feel him come out. They set him on my tummy all gross and crying and at that moment... I was in love. I started crying and we took lots and lots of pictures! The nurse checked him out and cleaned him up and the doctor started the long process of stitching my back up (Peter's lovely shaped head was paid for dearly). They had to cut me and I tore a little too (a 3.5 I think)! I texted my dad (who was in New York) a picture of him and pretty soon the nurse asked if I wanted my family to come back. No sooner had she made the call than we could here Samantha (now Aunt Mantny) tearing down the hallway. The next day and a half were a little blur. I remember asking for chick-fil-a about an hour after he was born (I was starving). Seeing a number of nurses and doctors. Struggling to breastfeed. And sleeping on my tummy again... how wonderful! I'm sure I have left out some very important things, but that's all I got for now.

Update 6 months later... We are officially done paying hospital bills!