Birth Story: My Little One Has Arrived

The night before I went into labor, I wrote my previous post about how she wasn’t here yet and scheduled it to post the day she decided to come. Guess she was ready to make her appearance after all.

My Birth Story

At about 5:30 am I woke up to menstrual cramps that kept happening every 5 minutes. I knew this was probably going to be the day because this is the first time I’ve experienced the stopping and the starting of the cramps. I got up cause I couldn’t sleep through them, went and showered since people say that it helps, but it didn’t really.

I then started getting last minute things ready in my hospital bag and got on the computer to talk to my sister to ask her what I should do. At about 7:00, the contractions started to become more painful but weren’t exactly coming and going at the same intervals. If this wasn’t labor, I don’t know what is…

At about 9 am, I couldn’t take it anymore, so I woke my husband up and told him that we need to get ready to go and arrived at the hospital about 9:45 and checked into a birthing room at about 10 because the exam rooms were all filled. That was fine though since they checked me and I was at 5-6 cm, so I would have been staying anyways.

The nurse who was on that shift told me I should probably walk around some to speed things up, so we ended up doing that for about an hour; having to stop every couple of minutes through each contraction.

I told my family I was probably being admitted and having her that day but I didn’t really want visitors while I was laboring. I mean, who does? But my in-laws ended up arriving around 4 pm and visiting in the room for a little bit. Husband wasn’t too thrilled that I said I didn’t want visitors right now but men just don’t understand. I am sure if I hooked him up to one of these contraction machines so he knew what it felt like, he would have been agreeing with me.

Around 5 pm, I told the nurse I wanted the epidural. I dealt with the pain long enough in my opinion and was ready to have the rest of this birthing process be a cakewalk. I didn’t know if the pain was going to get worse, the nurse assured me that it was going to feel like I am being cut in half. Not sure how or why she’s a nurse, but that scared the bejesus out of me so I got the epi. She also blew up my vein trying to get the IV in, which took about an hour. I guess at least she numbed me first.

The anesthesiologist finally arrived after I asked for it at 5 and proceeded to stick me in the back with his needle as I was hunched over. Scared about all of these horror stories with people being paralyzed by spinal crap, I was a bit nervous but stayed extremely still. It wasn’t too painful, in fact, I think the IV poking and prodding was more so. I thought I would end up feeling instant relief, but nope, I had to wait 10 minutes. After 10 minutes have passed, I said the only thing that’s changed is my feet and legs are tingly and I can still the contractions as good as before. I thought to myself, great, this shit isn’t going to work after all and I’ll have to endure it until she comes out. There are people who this doesn’t work on, or it only works on half the body and not the other half, so I literally thought I was one of those unlucky bastards. He gave me a couple more dosages and then it started to kick in. YES, I WAS IN HEAVEN!

The nurse was like oh that’s a good contraction. Yet I didn’t feel a thing, not even any tightening. HOORAY!

At 6 pm, my doctor came in and checked me and said I was at a 7 and broke my water.

At 8 pm, my doctor came back in and said I was dilated at a 10 and they were going to get things ready and we were going to start pushing.

8:15 pm, the pushing began. I felt like I was going to pop a blood vessel in my eyeball. I was pushing so hard I let out a few grunts that I had to chuckle at. Then my husband said a few things while I am pushing and legs in the air that made me laugh too. I guess cause I was not in so much pain, I could laugh at it all…

When the contractions starting getting bad and lasting 4 minutes, I could feel them but not as bad as before the epidural. I knew when one was coming on and that it was time to push, but my doctor counting down and letting me know as well made it ideal.

After about an hour of pushing, our baby girl was born at 9:20 pm on April 19, 2015, weighing 8lbs – 11 ounces and 20 3/4″ long. I was not expecting her to be that big, so it was a surprise, but I guess her dad and I were 8lbs+ too so I guess that makes sense. My good sized baby caused me to get a 3rd-degree tear, but I didn’t care cause I didn’t feel a thing. It was mainly because the umbilical cord was wrapped around her shoulders.

We did have some complications with her heart dropping low at the final stage of pushing, but we got her out and all was well. Is a little scary when people start rushing in the room when you’re unsure of what’s going on.

This was the hardest but most rewarding thing I’ve done and I am glad our baby girl is finally here. She’s perfect.

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