C’s Birth Story

After a couple false alarms, little miss C finally decided to come hang out with us last Friday.

Thursday

I had my 39-week OBGYN appointment on Thursday. I declined cervical checks at my other weekly appointments, but having had so many nights of contractions, I was dying of curiosity.

When she said I was 5 centimeters dilated and 75% effaced, the doctor was so excited. “I don’t know why you’re not holding your baby right now, and I know it’s frustrating. But when it’s time for the real deal, you’ll be starting a 100-meter dash at the 25-meter line. This is great. I’ll give you the smoothie recipe. I bet it will work for you.”

The smoothie was a castor oil smoothie. I think the only active ingredient in the smoothie was the castor oil, and everything else was just meant to mask the flavor. We went to the store after my appointment to get everything, and Jack mixed up the smoothie for me while I got back to work.

I can drink anything in about three seconds flat, but not that. It should have been relatively tasty, but I think I was getting a little bit of the castor oil underneath the ice cream, almond butter, ginger ale, and fruit nectar. It took me almost two hours to finish.

My doctor warned me that the castor oil could cause both diarrhea and contractions, but I fortunately didn’t have any of the former. But after a very busy workday, I was definitely having some contractions.

That didn’t make Thursday any different from the days leading up to it – I was having at least a few hours of contractions nightly.

Around 10pm, I fell asleep on the couch, thinking that the contractions were lessening and the castor oil hadn’t worked and C was just going to come when she decided to, no matter how much help I tried to give her.

Friday

And then I woke up around 2am with much, much worse contractions. But they weren’t worse than the ones I had on Sunday. They were about the same. I didn’t wake Jack, figuring I’d just work through them like I had on Sunday and then go back to sleep.

It was only about a half hour later when I changed my mind and decided to wake him. I was in a lot of pain and I didn’t know what to do. I wanted to go to the hospital. He was understandably more hesitant, since we’d had a couple false alarms and my contractions were just barely getting closer together. He dozed a bit more and I went upstairs to stand in the shower to help manage the pain.

After 20 or 30 minutes, I got out of the shower and was suddenly sure this was the real thing. I was finally bleeding a little, which hadn’t really happened with any of the false alarms.

I dried off, got dressed, gathered the last few things I wanted to put in my hospital bag, and went downstairs and told Jack we were going to the hospital. He still wanted to wait till my water broke, but I knew that could be quite a while, and the pain was getting harder to deal with.

The contractions I had in the car were the hardest to deal with to that point, because I couldn’t move around like I had been through my other contractions. Fortunately, the hospital where I delivered is only about 15 minutes from our house. We got there around 4:30am.

Jack dropped me at the entrance while he went to park, since I was having a hard time walking through my contractions at that point. I went to Labor & Delivery and checked in through another contraction, apologizing for my incoherence, though I’m sure the receptionist deals with it all the time.

They took me back to the triage room and hooked me up to the monitors and checked my dilation. I swear the triage nurse said I was 7-8 centimeters dilated, and I was so excited. That was a lot of progress from my 5 centimeters on Thursday morning!

This was the real deal. A Labor & Delivery nurse came to get us and take us to the delivery room, and they told me they’d called the doula from the hospital doula program we signed up for, and she was on her way.

The L&D nurse was so incredibly kind and spent a lot of time in our room setting things up. She showed us where the birth ball was, gave Jack some guidance on squeezing my hips to help manage the pain, and was generally great. Before she left when her shift ended at 7am, she said we were the kind of couple she wouldn’t have minded sticking around for.

But I got very discouraged very quickly upon arriving in the delivery room. I noticed the whiteboard said I was only 6 centimeters dilated and 80% effaced. I am still not sure if I heard the triage nurse wrong or what, but I suddenly felt like I’d moved about a hundred steps back.

Our Doula

We were in the room for about an hour before my doula showed up a little after 6am. Her name is Len, it was her first solo birth after completing doula training, and she’s the best. I’d been feeling uncertain about using the hospital doula program because I’d heard those doulas don’t advocate for your best interests since they’re employed by the hospital. However, neither Jack nor I had been convinced enough of the value of a doula to shell out $2K+ for a private one. So we paid $350, and ultimately, I’m so glad I opted to have a doula at all. Both Jack and I are now evangelists for them.

Without Len’s guidance and support, I very likely would have given up on my goal of an unmedicated birth because I would have run out of ideas on how to manage the pain myself. I’d have held my breath, trying to fight the contractions, way too often. I also would probably have snapped at Jack about 367 times because I was in pain and he hated that I was in pain and wanted to help, but I wouldn’t have known what to tell him to do.

Len provided tons of suggestions as to what might help. She set up the bed/birthing ball/peanut ball in different positions, got me in the tub when I needed some rest, and coached me through the most intense contractions in a way that even Jack says he couldn’t without feeling too corny. Right before C was born, she kept reminding me that my body was doing this, and my body has no interest in breaking itself. I hadn’t even realized how terrified I was that pushing C out was too much for my body to do, but Len’s encouragement helped me relax just enough to push when I was pretty sure my pelvis would snap.

6 to 8 centimenters

Anyway, I don’t remember the timeline perfectly. I was in significant discomfort. It took what felt like forever, but I think was actually until about 10am to progress to 7cm. I was super defeated once again at that point.  It felt like I was doing a ton of work for very little reward. I was hungry, but Len warned me that I’d probably be nauseated later, so I shouldn’t eat too much or anything too heavy. I had some juice and a KIND bar throughout the morning.

Jack and Len switched off squeezing my hips and rubbing my shoulders and upper back to help my body relax a bit during contractions. I sat on the birth ball for rest and put it up on the bed to lean on while rocking back and forth during rough contractions. I spent a lot of time on all fours with my upper half supported by the birth ball. Between contractions, Jack supported my belly. I paced a lot. Len tried to get me to lay down because I needed to rest, and I eventually obliged, but contractions seriously sucked when I was lying down, whether on my side or my back.

When they checked me again, I was about 8 centimeters and my water still hadn’t broken, and they said they could go get the resident to break it. I asked for pros and cons. Basically, it sounded like breaking my water would make it all go faster and feel way worse, but that it wouldn’t be any worse than if it broke naturally.

I wanted some time to think, so the nurses left and I sat in the tub for a while. I didn’t love the tub as much as I expected to, given how nice the shower felt earlier, but it did help with the pain a bit and give me a break. And it provided comic relief because the jets suddenly turned on while I was in there and no one could figure out how to shut them off. At some point, the nurses came back and asked what I decided, and I told them I wanted my water broken.

It took over an hour for the resident to be available to break my water due to other stuff happening on the floor. When she came in, I was completely terrified, honestly, because I expected the pain to get worse after, and it was already bad. Len said, “I don’t think it’s going to get too much more painful. You’re in a lot of pain. It’s just going to get faster and more intense, but you can do this.”

8 to 10 centimeters

And then they broke my water and it was a crazy gush, followed by some seriously intense contractions. Len tried to talk me into spending time on my side, but I had it in my head that I hated lying down during contractions, so I didn’t want to lie down during ones that intense. I got on all fours with my upper body supported by the ball and practically begged to have Jack or Len squeeze my hips to help with the pain. I think it was sometime in this period when I got frustrated with Jack for the only time all day. He did something like offer me water and I meanly swatted him away. Oops.

It wasn’t long before I asked Len when I could push. She told me that since we’d discussed that I wanted to push spontaneously, I should push when I felt pushy. I asked what that should feel like because I was already feeling pushy. I’d only been dilated to 8 centimeters when they broke my water. She said we could get the nurses back in to check, but she wouldn’t be surprised if I’d already gone from 8 to 10.

I begged the nurses to please just check me on all fours because I really didn’t want to move onto my back, and they obliged. They said that in that position, they saw no cervix, but also that it might be different in a different position. I really did not want to move and I was feeling super pushy, so I started letting my body push.

Pushing

It hurt a ton and I could feel her head. I felt so close, but every time I asked if they could see any signs of a head, everyone said no. This was confusing and I felt really discouraged, but I kept pushing. I probably pushed through 6 contractions in this position.

Len could tell I was getting frustrated and asked if I’d be open to coached pushing from the nurses. I had wanted to avoid that, but I also really wanted this to be over, so I said yes. I also said I might not do what they said if it didn’t feel right.

My nurses were staying in the room, so I knew they thought I was close to being done. At some point, I heard them talking about calling my doctor. She had just asked if she could take her last 15-minute appointment of the day before heading over to deliver C. The nurses had said yes.

Then, one of the nurses told me that squatting is the OG birthing position and suggested I try it. I was so “comfortable” on all fours that I resisted moving at all, but she said it would be easier for her to tell if I was effectively pushing and coach me better. Len said sometimes a change of position helps the baby move down. So, I said yes.

The nurses got out the squat bar and attached it to the bed, and I slowly moved into a deep squat. During the next contraction, I pushed hard. Suddenly, the room exploded in a flurry of activity that I barely registered because I was pushing a baby out of my body.

One of the other doctors in the practice I go to happened to be at the hospital for a C-section, and the nurses scrambled to call her. This was happening fast.

Len was taking pictures and while they are way more graphic than I’d ever share, that’s the only way I know that in the moment C’s head started to come out, there was a nurse waiting to catch her, and in the next shot where C’s head is fully out, the doctor has slid into place just in time.

My contraction ended shortly after that, but I was desperate to be done and I tried to keep my exhale going and keep pushing. Eventually I ran out of steam and needed another half a push to get her out.

The room was all excitement and fluttering around to do whatever happens in delivery rooms: handling my placenta, helping me lie down, putting C on my stomach. C latched to my breast quickly and, according to Len, perfectly.

And all the first pictures of me after she was born show me exhausted and relieved and totally in love with the little girl who spent 39 weeks and 2 days inside me.

She’s the best and we’re so, so, so happy she’s finally here.