I've put together 3 versions of this event. Feel free to read the version that you are most interested in and skip the rest.
The short short version We had a baby! It was a girl! Yay us!
The short version On March 30th we had a baby girl at 5:45am! I can't believe we have a girl - I was totally convinced that we were going to have a boy! One of our birth plan preferences was for John to tell me what the gender of the baby was. When she was born, he told me "It's a girl!" I said "What?!?!?!" and then I had to sit up to see for myself. She has a lot of wavy brown hair and dark blue eyes. She weighed 8lbs 8oz and was 21.5 inches long with APGAR scores of 8 and 9 after delivery. Both mom and baby are doing well!
The long, expanded, detailed and entirely too much information versionI woke up at 1:30ish on Monday morning. I had been sleeping for a few hours and was groggy. I stood up and out of habit went to the bathroom*. I went to the bathroom and returned to bed. I felt a contraction as I got back into bed. However, I had been having contractions pretty regularly for the last few weeks and I figured if this was going to be the real thing I wasn't going to sleep through it and I wasn't about to stay up half the night analyzing false labor. So, I dozed off but was unable to stay asleep. I was so uncomfortable! Finally, I got up to do a little walking around the house, get a drink of water and see if there was anything timeable.
I was having trouble timing the contractions I was having and finally at 2am I decided things were real enough to wake John for some assistance. As expected, John sprung into action out of a dead sleep. We timed contractions for 15 minutes before making a call to our doctor to let her know we were going in to the hospital. John ran around and gathered our last minutes items that needed to be packed while I wandered around trying to help. However, most of the time I would be distracted by a contraction and not complete the task I was working on or forget what I was doing all together. John would run by and grab whatever I was holding to throw into the bag or finish what I was doing.
The contractions were getting more intense and it felt amazing to have John pressing on my lower back during the contraction. Just before 3am we woke my mom to hand over the monitor for William and let her know we were going. (For the record, I don't know what took so long. It really didn't feel like an hour.)
I'm not going to lie - the ride to the hospital was long and not a whole lot of fun. I had put a lot of relaxation music onto our MP3 Player and I listened to it on the roughly 30 minute ride. I tried to relax, but it wasn't going so well. The contractions were NOT fun while I was sitting down. Things had been workable as long as I was able to move around. But, it the car, it wasn't easy. A little over halfway to the hospital, I felt a huge shift downward. After that big movement, things got even more intense and there were fewer breaks between waves. While we were driving, I was carefully considering my options and coming up with plans**.
Finally we arrived at our hospital emergency room (laboring moms are all admitted through the emergency room after hours). It was just about 3:30am and as we approached, the woman behind the desk asked us "Is she is labor?" In answer, I leaned over the window to work through the peak of a contraction and gave a little groan. She hurriedly opened the door and gave us directions to L&D. She asked if we wanted to use a wheelchair - I declined because of the whole sitting problem. It took a long time to get to L&D because every time I had a contraction, I needed to stop and work through it.
We finally got to L&D and the nurses took one look at me and hurried me off to a room. The nurses had to help me change into a hospital gown and then told me they would like a urine sample. This is funny to me because in my head I was saying:
I'm so sorry, but I just can't right now because I can't sit down and I'm so uncomfortable. I'm really sorry!
But, what they got from me was this:
BLANK STARE
Then they asked me to go ahead and get into the bed so they could start an IV and hook up the monitors for the baby's heartbeat and my contractions. Again, in my head I clearly remember being polite and nice:
I don't think I can sit right now and I'm sorry if that makes your job harder. However, I'm totally willing to help you do whatever you need to make things easier for you. I'll hold still, eat green beans or stand on my head. Just won't sit down. Again sorry!
And again, all they got from me was this:
BLANK STARE
While this was going on, John was busying himself with applying extreme amounts of pressure to my lower back. If he stopped for even a second or moved his hands I would let him know that movement or lowering of pressure was unacceptable. The contractions were coming roughly every minute and lasting a freakishly long time (I don't know how long they lasted - it just felt like f-o-r-e-v-e-r). At 3:45, they convinced me to climb up into bed for a minute to be checked so we could make a plan. I was 100% effaced at 6cm dilated. I was so happy to have made it so far.
Somewhere in here the contractions started having more than one peak and not coming fully back away to give me a break. After several of these, I decided it was time for some relief. An epidural was placed at about 4:30am and by 4:45am I was finally able to speak to people outside of my head again. The differences in epidural from William's birth was incredible - even though the exact same person administered both of them. The epidural I had during William's delivery was very strong and I was unable to feel anything. This epidural was really light and I could still feel the contractions and some pain with each one. However, I wasn't feeling the worst edge of each one. It also helped that after the epidural was placed, transition was over (the most intense part of labor) as the contractions spaced themselves out and were not as long lasting. Kind of stinks because I had to be sitting down through the most intense contractions to receive the epidural - and we all know how I felt about sitting down.
At just after 5am I was checked again and found to be completely dilated and at zero station. This is also where the nurse discovered I didn't have any membranes (my water had broken)**. Our OBGYN was called and our room was prepped for delivery. Our OB arrived at 5:29am according to John's notes and we started pushing. Pushing was much easier this time because I could actually feel what was happening. After 15 minutes, our baby was born - it was a GIRL!
*This is the only time I can figure my water broke. I wasn't awake enough to really notice what was happening and things sure picked up after I used the bathroom.
**I had been again planning on not having any medications during my labor and delivery. Just hours before I was adamant about not getting an epidural. I still felt strongly that I didn't want the medicine, however during the intense contractions I could feel myself questioning if that was the right plan. In the end I decided I would wait and see how things progressed and leave the final decision for later***.
***Now I feel like I have done everything but the pushing without the drugs, I am still up for having labor without drugs. So if (which is a BIG if right now), I was going to be pregnant again, I would again plan on a medication free delivery.
I know this picture quality isn't the best, but it is the first picture of me holding my daughter!
John holding his baby girl
A little more cleaned up, after the cord has been cut
Weighing in...8lbs 8 oz
What our girl did a LOT of...cry. She was NOT happy when she had her clothes off!
But, she sure is pretty when she is all cleaned up!
I am in love with her wild woman hair! It is super soft and wavy, although with everyone touching it it gets greasy fast. This picture also gets the hair color about right. Again, with everyone touching it, it turns darker with all the oils (yuck).
