Labor with Liam (not graphic!)
I figured that I should go ahead and get this down for posterity, seeing as how I’ve been saying the same thing about our honeymoon nightmare and that’s been (gasp) 12 years ago now. First off, I think a lot of both my family and Joe’s family had given up on us having kids. We’re not old or anything- I mean, I’m only 30 and Joe is 34, but the fact that we have been married for 12 years and only had 2 cats to show for it seemed to make everyone think that we were never having kids. Personally, I’m really glad that we waited, because we had lots of “us” time (read- 8 trips to Las Vegas, 3 to New Orleans, and 2 to Orlando) and time to get financially stable. At least, as stable as one can be with kids- less than 2 weeks after his birth and all I can say is WOW are they expensive. Thank goodness we didn’t have twins.
Anyway, on to the story. We actually started trying to get pregnant in January 2007. I guess I thought it would be pretty instant, but it wasn’t…in fact, we actually got pregnant the one month we were trying not to- because I had oral surgery scheduled that month (I know, everyone says it happened when they weren’t trying, but it’s true!). We were in New Orleans for Voodoo Music Fest (because Rage Against the Machine was playing and Joe really wanted to see them since they were only reuniting for 3 shows- as a side note, Tom Morello was awesome). Anyway, we know Liam was conceived on October 27, 2007, even though the doctor’s office had him with a date of November 4, 2007. The pregnancy itself was relatively uneventful- my multiple sclerosis disappeared like it had never been there, and I never got any morning sickness at all. My only pregnancy symptoms (other than the obvious ever-expanding belly) were heartburn and feeling Liam kick the tar out of me from about the end of month 3. Seriously. I know that’s early, but Joe was able to feel him from the end of month 4. He had a really strong kick- still does, the little wiggle worm.
So, my doctor’s office gave us an official due date of July 27, 2008. We figured he might be a little earlier than that, seeing as how we knew their dates were off, but imagine my surprise when I went to the doctor on July 1, 2008, and was told that I was 2 cm dilated. She did say that it could still be another couple of weeks, but I knew it was going to be soon, since I had already started the whole “nesting” thing a few days before. I kept harassing Joe to have the car seat ready and all I wanted was a clean house. That evening, we went to Target to get the “must-haves” that were still on our baby registry. We came back, watched a little television (I can’t remember what we watched- I do know that the last movie we saw was “The Incredible Hulk” 3 days before his arrival- since I’m a bit of a sci-fi geek, it was on my list of films to see before he was born), and then settled in for bed about 10:30pm. Joe took some melatonin to help him sleep, because he hadn’t been sleeping well for a couple of days.
He was awakened by me, yelling “my water broke!!” at 10:50pm. In our labor and delivery class, our instructor made a big deal out of the fact that only about 25% of women actually experience their water breaking. I think I made up for the other 75%. I knew exactly what was happening, and after I yelled at Joe, I jumped out of bed and ran to the bathroom. As Joe described it, it was like a slip-n-slide in our bathroom. The cats were freaking out, I grabbed the phone, and called my doctor’s office to speak to the doctor on call, who told me to go ahead and get to the hospital. I kind of figured that, since another tidbit I remembered from the birth class was that they want you to deliver within 24 hours of your water breaking. Joe, after grabbing half the towels in our linen closet, had jumped into the shower trying to wake up. Thankfully, the bag for the hospital was mostly packed and I only had to grab a couple more things to throw in it. We finally headed out for the hospital at about 11:45pm. The hospital is about 20 minutes from our house at normal driving speed. I remember that Joe was going just over the speed limit on 277, when I reminded him that I *was* in labor and he *could* go a little faster.
We finally arrived at the hospital at midnight. They immediately wheeled me to the labor and delivery ward (the same ward that Joe and I were scheduled to take a tour of about a week later!) and got me into a room, and hooked up to one of those monitor things. Apparently I had been having contractions and didn’t realize it (they weren’t that bad at the beginning!). The nurse at the hospital checked and I was 4 cm dilated at that point. She then left us alone in the room, with the monitor hooked up. The readout was on a computer screen, and leave it to my husband the engineer to start playing around with it- the screen showed readouts for all of the women currently in labor (there were a couple of others besides me). My contractions were starting to get a little more severe, and Joe took entirely too much pleasure in saying, “here comes another one!” every time the little readout started to spike. Like I couldn’t tell. He was attempting to be helpful by saying, “you think you have it bad, you should see the lady in the next room- her spikes are off the chart!” Again with the not helping. Then, my nurse came in, followed by another lady with short, spiky hair who proceeded to try to give me an IV, only she butchered the job and I was literally in tears. I’m pretty sure that the most painful part of labor is NOT supposed to be getting an IV. After she left, I made some remark to Joe about Melissa Etheridge poking holes all in my arm. So, even during labor, my sarcastic streak was intact. Finally, at around 2am, my nurse came in and gave me some nubaine, which was like having a whole bottle of wine all at once. Joe recalls that, rather than the yelling you see pregnant women doing at their spouses on television, I turned to him and told him how much I loved him. Yep, I was clearly under the influence of drugs.
Around 3am, it was time for the epidural. Having had a spinal tap before, I pretty much knew what to expect. It really wasn’t bad. Apparently I had an awesome doctor for the anesthesia. I remember him being a nice guy, and I remember him and the nurses all admiring my tattoo (I have a Celtic trinity knot on my lower back). They did the kind of epidural where it keeps giving you medicine every hour or so for however long you need it. It worked really well, because I was relatively pain-free until about 7am. Coincidentally, that was shift change at the hospital, and there were no nurses to be found at that time. I remember being very vocal to Joe about the fact that they just left me there. Joe, trying to keep me calm, reminded me that they do this all the time. Sure, but this isn’t like McDonald’s where you can leave the fries in for the next shift- we are talking about childbirth here! Anyway, the nurse that I had had since arriving at the hospital disappeared, and finally a new nurse appeared, followed by a student nurse. Both of them were entirely too perky for my tastes. I remember one was Susan and the other was Anna, and as they told me, they liked to think of themselves as “Team Susannah.” Ugh. Had I felt up to slapping myself on the forehead, I might just have done it. They told me that Liam’s head was stuck, and they would be back to check on me in a bit. Had he not gotten stuck, I probably would have delivered before 7am. Unfortunately, he got a little hung up and stayed that way for the next 2 ½ hours. Around 9am, frustrated and tired from my child being stuck (which was not a pleasant experience), I asked Joe to get the Bobsey Twins back in the room because I thought I was ready. Coincidentally, my doctor had come on call at 8am, so she ended up being the one to deliver Liam. After another hour of pushing, Liam arrived at 9:56am on Wednesday, July 2, 2008. Considering that my water broke about 11 hours before that, I guess I had a relatively easy labor. That’s a lot easier to say looking back now!