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Maxton’s birth story begins before labor. Over the weekend, I realized I had paperwork I needed to get into school before the 18th of February, a full moon the day before the due date. I knew I could go at any time before or after that time, but I knew if I put off turning in the paperwork that I would definitely go into labor. Monday was Valentine’s Day and I hoped to make it down to school to wait in line to be seen, but Brandon got called into work for a second shift that day. I opted to hope and pray I made it to school before having the baby and set my alarm for Tuesday morning, 7:15am to get down there before the crowds got too bad. I had trouble falling asleep Monday night (per usual) and wound up getting only 3-4 hours of sleep before my alarm went off Tuesday morning. As I heard the familiar song playing, I found myself moaning - I was having a pretty intense contraction. I got up and got ready, taking my time. Something felt a little bit off and I thought perhaps labor would be coming, but I’d convinced myself of that many times in the past few weeks.
Campus is inside downtown and is relatively small for a campus, but the parking garage is a bit of a walk away from where I needed to be. I felt as if I needed to take things pretty easy, so I made my way slowly through my errands. I got home and decided it would be a good idea to try to nap, but Brandon was in a bad mood and wasn’t too keen on the idea. He kept waking me up for various reasons and I might have gotten an hour or so of extra sleep before getting up. I knew I had to go to the grocery store for a few things, but wasn’t sure I’d be able to handle it on my own. Brandon mentioned needing to go a few places too and I wanted to walk, so I asked him if we could do that and then he could go with me to the grocery store. We set out on our way and I was very obviously moving a lot slower than everyone else. The contractions kept coming, but I was able to continue walking through them and they didn’t seem regular at all.
We got back from the grocery store around 7 or 8. I put the groceries away without much excitement and tried a new frozen dinner thing I hadn’t seen before. It was SO GOOD. I don’t know if I was that hungry, my body needed it badly, or what… but Italian frozen dinners are usually mediocre at best and this one was amazing. I commented on how good it was and told Brandon that it seemed my contractions had slowed, but I wanted to take a bath to make sure they were going to go away completely.
I got into the bath and could hear Brandon and Sebastian stressing about something downstairs, which really didn’t help me relax. My tub has the emergency overflow drain, so I wasn’t able to get it terribly full over my very large belly. I decided to lay in it sideways to get some of the pressure off my belly to see if it would help. I usually like to keep the bath pretty warm despite warnings not to, but the cooling water didn’t seem to bother me this time. I spent a very long time in the tub, first on one side and then the other, before deciding that the contractions were still coming and I’d better shower. They still didn’t seem regular, so I figured I’d be able to get a little sleep overnight and re-assess in the morning. As I was getting out of the shower, I felt a small gush and looked down to see bright red blood at my feet.
I tried not to panic, but called Brandon upstairs to bring me a pad and some underwear and went downstairs to call the after-hours number to see if I should come in. One of the midwives was on call and she called back almost immediately and told me I should come in just in case my water broke so I could get started on antibiotics if it did. When I hung up, I looked at Brandon and told him we needed to go in and I could feel the panic wash over my face and I started breathing heavily. Brandon cracked up laughing at my mini freak-out and then we got to business. I called my aunt to tell her I had to go to the hospital and she said she’d send her older daughter over to pick up Sebastian. I also called my dad to let him know what was going on and sent out a text to a few people. I didn’t want to announce what was going on just in case things didn’t progress, but by the time Bethany showed up for Sebastian, I could tell I was in labor. I was having trouble coping through the contractions and they were VERY painful, though I never did get a chance to time them. I was packing the last minute items and Brandon was running around frantically because he wasn’t prepared for it to happen AT ALL. Bethany helped me get Sebastian’s stuff finished up and we went to take him to the car. I got very emotional saying goodbye to my baby/big boy (I’m tearing up just now thinking about it) when Brandon looked up into the sky and saw a huge lunar halo. I kissed my midget goodbye and Brandon raced back inside, leaving me to have a huge contraction alone on my sidewalk. I barely managed to waddle though it to get back inside. I would have normally stood at the door to wave goodbye, but I didn’t even think to because I was so focused on trying to leave!
My brother had requested that I drop off the ticket I had printed for him before going into the hospital so he didn’t miss a concert while I was in the hospital - my previous labor had spanned over 3 days. We got everything packed up and into the van and I called my dad to tell him to BE OUTSIDE when we pulled up. We left at 11:25 - thankfully he just lives a few blocks away! He looked very worried and I told him that if this WASN’T labor, that I wasn’t interested in going into labor at all.
We got to the hospital and the woman at the desk could tell I was in labor by the way I was walking. She asked me to sit down and I couldn’t because the pressure. I was sent up to triage, where I was dreading going - last time I was there, I was pregnant with Sebastian and I was in there for HOURS being monitored for super high blood pressure, all alone and crying. The nurse had me pee and then get into bed. I told her I wasn’t looking forward to this part and that laying still isn’t fun - she responded, “Labor isn’t fun.” I could have punched her… but I didn’t. ;) She had me lay back on my back and hooked me up. I started to feel a contraction come on right as the blood pressure cuff tightened. It got very tight, released, and then started getting tight all over again through my contraction. The reading was something like 168/101 maybe, which is VERY high. However, she had me turn on my side and they were well within normal range. I had one that was 126/64 I believe. Only one was ridiculously high and baby’s heart rates dropped into the 120s during it. All the other times, the heart rate was anywhere between 130 and 150 and those numbers didn’t alarm anyone.
I had to go into a room to have her check my cervix and test me to see if my water broke. She said it hadn’t broken and she didn’t see any blood in my vagina (interesting, since there was some in my urine sample and it definitely didn’t come from there - I checked). She said I was 3-4cm, but she’d call it 3 and my cervix was still a little thick. I got dressed, she hooked me back up and the contractions kept coming at the same rate and intensity.
Right around 1am, she came back in and said that the one high blood pressure reading with the lower heart rate had won me an overnight in regular L&D. I asked her a million questions, clearly pissed off, but she said that’s what the midwife wanted and that I could take an Ambien to help me sleep overnight and we would see how things were progressing around 7am. Note the times: this was 1am, revisit at 7am.
As soon as she left, my contractions slowed and I started SOBBING. I was sure my entire labor experience was officially ruined because of one single reading. One of the nurses from the birthing center came in to see me. She gave me a hug and told me they would try to get me back there as soon as possible and that she knew it was important to me. The nurse from triage came back to take me to my room and it turns out it was the same room I birthed Sebastian in! It was very weird being back in that room again after such a rough labor with him, but it also kind of soothed me in a way. I relaxed a bit and was able to finally look the dumb nurse in the face again. She said I would be able to unhook myself from the machines if I had to pee, so I already knew it would be a completely different experience. Brandon decided to leave to get the DVD player and a few other things from home because he was expecting us to be there for a very long time. The nurse hooked me back up to the machines, but it was hard to keep track of the baby because he was SO posterior. She said I had a classic OP belly and that I was so pointy because of his knees. She brought in some cushioning to try to get me to sit in the rocking chair, but I could not get comfortable that way. I requested a birthing ball, but that didn’t help either. I tried the bed - no go. I decided to try to go to the bathroom, so I unhooked myself. I REALLY liked that toilet. Brandon came back and I found myself spending the majority of my time moaning and cussing on the toilet. After a small while, I started to lose my mucus plug… it was absolutely DISGUSTING. I couldn’t believe how much there was! Once the plug was released, things got extremely intense. I was having a bit more trouble coping because my lack of sleep the night before was kicking in and I was hardly getting any breaks in between the contractions.
One of the other nurses came in because my assigned nurse (not the triage nurse) was busy in another room and told me I wasn’t allowed to labor on the toilet anymore because even if they brought the machine to me, they couldn’t get the heart rates with his posterior positioning. She dragged me out of the bathroom and tried to get me hooked up to the machine again while standing next to the bed. My back labor was wrapping around my hips intensely and the only way I felt ANY relief was to bend over - and that lost the baby’s heart rate. I could tell she was getting frustrated, but I really didn’t care. At one point she even said “yeah these things aren’t really conducive to natural childbirth.” YOU THINK? You can’t find the heart rate because I’m not strapped to a bed unable to move my legs. Finally, my nurse came back in and noted my distress. I frantically asked her why the contractions were coming so fast and I could hear them whispering behind me that they WERE coming pretty fast. The nurse decided it was time to check me because if I was progressing, I needed antibiotics for GBS. Sure enough, I was 5-6cm at 4am. The nurse told me she was going to contact the midwife to see if I could come down to the birthing center. She said if we waited much longer, I wouldn’t make it there at all. I am SO GLAD she took action here and Brandon has told me numerous times that he is very thankful too. While she left to ask if I could be transferred, I had a few terrible contractions on the bed. I surprised myself by calling out for Brandon during them, as if he could save me or something. He got up and rubbed my back through a few of them which I was pretty impressed by! Labor is truly not his element, but I think he could sense how frantic I was. The midwife finally gave her okay and I opted for a wheelchair since my contractions were coming so close together. We finally got to the birthing center where I stripped out of everything, put on my “bath bra” and tried to pee. While on the toilet, my water broke easily and I felt an instant relief. My water was a very dark green - meconium. For a moment, I was afraid I would be transferred back, but the nurse just made note of it and told me to hop in the tub.
The difference between the sterile hospital room and the warm birthing center was phenomenal. There was a relaxing CD playing in the dark bathroom. In the tub, there were lights changing every so often which I thought might be distracting - it wasn’t. The tub was slow to fill, but I was encouraged to let it fill around me and relax into it. Once I was finally in a non-stressful setting, my contractions seemed to slow down just a bit, but the intensity grew. The nurse came in, gently ran her fingers through my hair and caressed my shoulders and told me to moan deeply through the contractions and just relax. She told me to let my body do the work and to ease my baby down. Her behavior was absolutely perfect - the entire shift was like night and day from all that I knew between my few hours already spend in L&D and Sebastian’s delivery. Unfortunately, the baby was still posterior so relaxing wasn’t an easy option for me to give into. I had Brandon text the doula, facebook and twitter to say that I was in the birthing center and that my water broke. The time it posted was 4:44am.
After what seemed to be just a few contractions in the tub, I felt the sudden urge to go on my hands and knees. It was the only position I hadn’t tried and my body was slow to react to everything, but the water helped me flip over like I wasn’t even pregnant or in labor. I was able to relax easier and moan better through the contraction. I heard the midwife come into the bathroom and exclaim, “Oh!” realizing what my body was doing. She did a quick check and said there was only a lip of the cervix left. My body was pushing on its own.
The doula came and asked why we didn’t text her sooner - but there was no sooner! I was still in shock that everything was moving so quickly and I didn’t want to wake anybody up if it was still going to be a long road to delivery. By this time, the bathroom had two encouraging nurses, the midwife, my doula, and Brandon. Brandon was quiet and off to the side, which made no difference to me whatsoever and I know it made him more comfortable than trying to be supportive of something he simply didn’t understand. He doesn’t handle stressful situations well and I figured it would be this way if we had the help of a doula.
I did a few pushes but the cervix was still there and he wasn’t descending. The midwife wanted me out of the tub so she could try to get me to push past the cervix since it was hard to reach me in the water. I got on the bed and she tried to have me relax and push through a contraction while she moved the cervix, but my hips WOULD NOT RELAX. The pressure in my back was making my hips cramp up in a ton of pain during each contraction that it was nearly impossible for me to pull my knees toward my chest. They tried to get me to simply relax on my side through the contractions and focus on breathing instead of pushing, which was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done. My body gave in for about two small pushes through each contraction where I couldn’t breathe through it anymore. I heard them checking his heart rate during the contractions and finding it to be in the 90s. Quite a bit of time passed here, but it was a lot of the same - laying on my right side and trying my best to breathe through the contraction, then after a few contractions, the left side. I was in so much pain and unable to relax that my brain just wanted me to give up so badly. I kept shouting “I CAN’T! I CAN’T!” and I kept wishing the low heart rate would mean c-section. It was lasting so long with seemingly no change in my cervix that I just wanted to give up. I know that is a classic sign of transition and I know the level of pain I was experiencing isn’t something that comes with a baby in an ideal position, so I forgive myself for those thoughts. I just think it’s important that I recognize and bring to light those thoughts because they are absolutely NOT what I was expecting to feel at all. I was even terrified of back labor and it felt nothing like what I expected it to feel like.
The staff decided to bring out a new tool to let me try to use - a birthing bench. I have tried to find a picture of what this thing looked like on google, but I have yet to find it. It was blue and triangular, low to the ground and AMAZING. It was the closest thing to laboring on the toilet without laboring on the toilet. My knees were above my hips naturally, so I didn’t have to worry about pulling them up and I was finally able to bear down the way I needed to. I think my hips and the cramping were interfering and making me push AWAY from the pressure before, whereas the bench allowed me to push INTO the pain. I immediately felt a shift. I felt immense pressure in my behind and I started to feel a burning sensation deep inside my vagina as his head cleared the cervix. I didn’t want to tell anyone what I felt for fear they would make me get on the bed again, but even if I had decided to tell, there was no way I could vocalize what was going on.
After a few pushes that way, they wanted to check me again and get the baby’s heart rate which meant getting back into bed. I almost cried (or maybe I did?) because it was the absolute worst on the bed. I tried to get that out, but I’m not sure I was very coherent. Once I was on the bed, they tried to get me to breathe through another contraction, but I spat out that he was coming. No one in that room believed me except Brandon. Shocking, I know… I guess he knows that I wouldn’t say that unless he was. They went to lift my leg to check me (I was on my side) and I heard a shocked “Oh, he IS coming!” as I could feel him slip to the end of my vagina. Now, I felt the ring of fire with Sebastian, but it was nothing compared to this ring of fire. Oh holy moly. I know part of it was that I had the epidural with Sebastian, but it was very light. I imagine part of this was also positioning. I can’t tell from the video if he had turned to come out, but I never felt any spinning at all, so I can only assume he came out backward and that’s why I felt the pains at the level I felt them. As his head started to come out, my contraction ended, but it felt like I had stopped halfway down his face. That isn’t a very pleasant feeling. I tried pushing between contractions, but they screamed at me to stop and wait for the next one. If you watch the video, I say “IT’S THERE!” - I’m talking about the next contraction. The rest of him slipped out fairly easily, but he wasn’t very quick to respond. The midwife went to lay him on my belly, but decided to suction him instead. I imagine because of the meconium. They rubbed him down a bit and he finally started to cry. I can’t remember what I felt in that moment at all. I don’t remember if I was worried because he wasn’t crying, if I was just in awe looking at him - I have no idea. They took him over to check him out. We had heard a deafening POP as he was sliding out and they thought he may have broken a clavicle. He is the picture of health, so I think it may have actually been something in my spine or hip shifting, because my tailbone still feels off and I have been having some trouble moving my left hip. I am hoping to get into a chiropractor once I am comfortable enough letting myself get treatment for something and leaving the baby. ;)
He was born at 6:57am (remember the times from before? At 1am they wanted to give me an Ambien and said they would revisit to see if I could go to the birthing center at 7am - the L&D nurse said she didn’t think I would make it to then) at 8lb 3oz, 20 inches long, apgars of 8 and 9.
Rachel had come in as he was crowning and she left about an hour after he was born. I am still very foggy about that hour too. I was expecting to have this delicious high after he was born, but I was mostly just exhausted. I kept falling asleep while talking to Rachel and while trying to nurse. He kept crying and crying and crying and wouldn’t stop until I made it sound like I was yelling at Sebastian to get down from something - a sound he is familiar with from the womb. ;)
As for after the birth, there were some significant differences than with Sebastian’s birth. I was able to stand up and walk around easier without pain this time, my bleeding has been a lot lighter, I tend to overdo it because I feel pretty well overall, my milk supply is INCREDIBLE this time and it came in quickly (Sebastian was jaundiced and I didn’t make much milk), I was a lot hungrier after this birth, the time it took for labor was a lot shorter, and I am a lot less tired this time. I had to get a catheter because I couldn’t empty my bladder for over 10 hours, when over 4.5 cups of urine were drained from me. I was a bit sore, but it didn’t last long. Max was a lot fussier at first and then calmed down, whereas Sebastian slept a lot at first and then was pretty high needs. I wanted my placenta this time, but even though they told me they would store it for me, they left the container out at room temperature for a whole day before I noticed it was sitting there. Part of me thinks it was the midwife. I told her I wanted to keep it and she started going on and on about how a midwife found out that consuming it can lower milk supply… but the thing is? It’s my decision. It should have been stored properly. I asked if I needed to bring a cooler and I was assured it would be kept safe. I still have it and need to throw it away, but it will be hard.
Looking back, I think if I were to be pregnant again with a posterior baby, I would go through the intense labor and pain again because I know I can do it. Immediately after the birth, if you would have asked me I would have said I would choose an epidural next time in the case of the same positioning. I keep hearing about women having super long back labors and they are able to do it, so I know I can too. I truly wasn’t expecting active labor to be that short.
I am extremely grateful I had the support to give birth naturally, if only for the better recovery. I have a beautiful and peaceful baby from the experience, I feel mostly well rested, and after a week I feel like I’m just on a period after getting over an illness. Just a bit weak, but mostly capable. Now I just need to find the time to use the keyboard so I can catch up on school work!
