4 weeks already
Having a newborn is definitely the hardest thing Mason and I have ever done. When we first brought him home, exhaustion and anxiety about doing things right or wrong was all I could feel, but now when I look at him -- even despite the extreme crying at times -- I am so filled with love. I'll make a more proper post at some point when there's more time and less sleep deprivation, but for now, my birth story x-posted from r/babybumps.
September 19
Leo was born today! He's sleeping peacefully in the bassinet next to my hospital bed, and I wanted to type this up as soon as possible while it was still fresh in my head. I love reading people's birth stories on here, so I'm happy I finally get to add mine.
At my 36 week appointment, my doctor told me I was already 2cm dilated and said she didn't think I'd make it to the full 40. I had been having Braxton hicks contractions since 32 weeks, many times a day throughout the day, but I guess some of them were real and led to my dilation. The three nights after my 36 week appointment/cervical check, I had long hours in the night of stronger than usual contractions that actually had me wincing. They were about 5-10 minutes apart, but would go away and become inconsistent again in the mornings.
At 36+4, I was giving my dog a bath outside and lost my mucus plug. The next day I had a bloody show. I called my doctor and she told me to come in to get monitored, and we discovered that I was having these mild contractions 3 times in every 10 minutes. Baby's heart rate looked good though so I was able to go home. At this point, I was 3cm dilated.
At my 37 week appointment I was still 3cm dilated and nothing interesting had happened so I thought we were back on track for a possible full 40 weeks or + pregnancy (I know it's possible for people to walk around dilated and still get to 40+).
At 37+3, my husband and I were sitting around playing games and watching Downton Abbey. At midnight or so we decide it's bed time and I get up to go pee and felt a gush that I initially thought was just some extra lumpy discharge or something. But after I peed, more liquid just kept coming out and I realized it was my waters. Called doctor immediately and after 20 mins, they called us back to tell us to come in. Omg there were waters everywhere. It would soak through a pad in a matter of seconds if you stood up after sitting/lying around.
At the hospital we checked in from the ER and I was just leaking waters all over the hospital floors and felt so bad. We got checked in at about 1AM Sunday morning. I labored through what honestly felt like my normal Braxton hicks contractions until 4AM, then the contractions started becoming painful. At about 7AM I was about 4cm dilated and having 7/10 pain contractions. At 9AM I was 5cm dilated and given an epidural which was super scary to me, but honestly it hurt less than one of those contractions I had been having every 4 minutes.
The contractions felt like those blood pressure cuffs you stick your arm in and when things get tighter and tighter and tighter and you wonder when it's gonna stop but it just gets tighter one or two more times and finally lets up...except around your entire uterus in the form of really bad menstrual pains.
After I got my epidural at 9AM (my guy was amazing and only took two minutes to place it and all the pain just turned into pressure) I was then told I could expect to get around 1cm every hour and should expect to have a baby in my arms possibly later that afternoon.
2pm rolls around and they check me. I'm only 6cm they say. Why is it so little? They want to start me on pitocin and I say sure because why not? It seems to work for a majority of people. At 4PM I only progress to 7cm, and baby's heart rate has been dropping after every contraction too much now and it's concerning. At 8PM I am still only 7cm and baby is being stressed by each contraction. Another doctor comes in and says to stop the pitocin. At 9:30PM she checks me again and finds I'm only 7-8cm dilated still and that if I don't naturally get to 10cm on my own by midnight or so (within 24 hours of water break) without stressing the baby that I will need to get a C-section, something I have desperately tried to avoid (my risk for postpartum depression is high given my mental health history and having an unplanned c-section is high on my list of anxieties).
The doctor and a nurse changed my position again for the 6th time to see if it would help not stress baby out, and after they left, I just sobbed for an hour convinced that a c-section was going to happen because my body was just stressing the baby out and that it sucked at having contractions/didn't know how to have contractions. I felt like my body was letting down my baby, and I felt so disappointed in myself. I didn't know how my body was going to get to 10cm when it had been going so slow even before the pitocin.
I stared at baby's heart rate the entire 2 hours. His heart rate was still going very, very low during each contraction and very high after each one. But after an hour, it stopped happening. It was like my body finally got rid of the residues of the pitocin and my body was going its "slow and steady without hurting the baby" way again. But I still wasn't convinced I could dilate fast enough on my own.
At 11:30PM the doctor comes in to give the final verdict. She says I'm at 9-9.5cm but that my cervix was very stretchy and baby was right there! She calls in a nurse and says I can start trying to push!!! I was so happy I think I cried here too.
Pushing was so, so exhausting, after about 30 hours of no food, no sleep. It was the hardest thing I had ever done. But 33 minutes later, baby Leo was born at 37+4, 7 pounds, 5 ounces! They put him on my chest immediately and he felt like jelly! A NICU team was called in just to make sure everything was okay. He apparently had a TON of gunky stuff in his nose and throat and probably some other places that they spent a lot of time sucking out with a machine. While this was happening I was being stitched up for some minor labia tears. Luckily I was still feeling just pressure thanks to the epidural.
After an hour they laid him back on my chest, and he immediately stopped crying so he could look into my face and listen to my voice. It was amazing to finally hold him to my chest, and it was so cool to know that he recognized my and my husband's voice.
I'm still getting into the hang of breastfeeding. The last session I had with him, he had colostrum all over his mouth afterward! I wasn't sure if anything was coming out at all since I had no leaking of anything, so I'm glad the colostrum was there. Our bodies are so cool, and I'm glad I had trust in it and kept at the breastfeeding even though it started out pretty hard (sleepy babies super hard to convince to feed).
He has been relatively easy to "troubleshoot" when he cries, and doesn't seem to cry unless he actually wants something. Seems to be able to easily soothe himself back to sleep right now, but that might because he was literally just born today and is super duper extra sleepy.
A nurse came in and took him to be weighed and some other stuff, so I guess I should take the opportunity to sleep now. :)
Tldr: had a 24 hour labor that almost resulted in a c-section due to people believing pitocin would help me progress when in actuality it effectively stalled my labor and made contractions really stressful on baby. The last few hours, pitocin was stopped and my body was able to progress its slow and steady pace to vaginally deliver baby. Happy family!