Friday, April 27, 2012
I woke up with my first contraction at 4am. I thought “hmm, that’s interesting”, but
considering it was a full week before his due date, and I had convinced myself
that I would go at least a week past
his due date, I didn’t think much of it.
I went back to sleep and dozed for the next hour while I had another
couple contractions. At 5am the
contractions started coming closer together, so I pulled out my iPod and
started timing them using one of the pregnancy apps I had downloaded. I timed them for the next hour, but convinced
myself I must have been doing it wrong, because the log showed contractions
lasting one minute and spaced about five minutes apart. I knew from all the books and birth stories
I’d read that in early labor the contractions were supposed to be about half
that length and irregular. The pattern I
was seeing was consistent with active labor and meant I was supposed to call
the midwives. When James’s alarm went
off at 6am we got up together and hemmed and hawed about whether we should go
into work or if this could possibly be the real deal.
I was still in denial about this being real labor at 7:30am
when I texted my midwife to let her know I’d been having regular contractions. She called me immediately and told me she
was going to head my way despite my suggestion that I call her back in an hour
with an update. We then called my mom
and told her that I was in labor and she should probably head over to the
house. At this point I was working
though the contractions by sitting on an exercise ball, leaning against the
back of the couch, and vocalizing though each wave. As the contractions got more intense I asked
James to put counter pressure on my lower back to help relieve some of the pain.
(Fortunately for James , the mail arrived sometime early that morning, and with
it his new wrist brace. He certainly got
his money’s worth from it that morning alone!)
I stayed in this position for the next couple hours during which time my
mom showed up (bringing a dozen red roses with her). As the contractions became closer and
stronger I mentioned how we should get the birth tub set up, but James didn’t
want to leave me to work through them on my own.
At about 9:30am I felt a little queasy during a contraction,
and when it was finished I lifted my head from the couch to tell my mom and
James. Unfortunately all I managed to
get out was, “I’m starting to feel…” before vomiting on the carpet. For the past few hours I’d had small bites of
apple, cheese, and a protein bar to help keep my energy up, but all that seemed
for naught at that point. James and I
headed to the shower to rinse me off and my mom cleaned up the mess in the
living room. After working through a
couple contractions in the shower I insisted that James get the birth tub set
up. It didn’t matter that he wouldn’t be
there to support me while doing so, I just needed the extra oomph of pain
relief the water was providing.
Fortunately we had inflated the tub when we received it on Wednesday (to
check for air leaks), so all he needed to do was put the liner in place and
fill it with hot water. Before going into
labor I had romanticized the idea of giving birth in our bedroom, either in the
tub or on the bed, but in the midst of labor I didn’t care where the tub was,
just as long as it was set up ASAP. It
was easiest to fill the tub in the kitchen, so that’s where it went. While James was busy getting the tub filled,
my mom stepped in his place as my labor support rubbing my lower back during
contractions. After getting out of the
shower, it was too uncomfortable to sit back down on the exercise ball so I was
standing leaning against the counter to work through the waves.
At about 10:30am I was going through transition and starting
to get antsy about the midwives (Shanna and Jacquetta) still not being there
yet, but just as James was about to call them they walked through the front
door. They checked the baby’s heart beat
and my blood pressure, but otherwise stayed off in the background and let me
work through the contractions with James.
At this point I was working through them by hanging around James’ neck
and vocalizing while he rubbed my back.
We had emptied the hot water heater, and the tub wasn’t yet full, so the
midwives set about boiling some water to add to the tub. I was starting to feel very tired and wanted
to rest my legs between contractions, but sitting down was too
uncomfortable. Finally the tub was full
and warm enough for me to get in, so I immediately stripped down and got in on
my hands and knees. The first thing I
said when I was in the water was, “OMG, this is the best $150 we ever spent!” The warm water on my belly felt amazing! I immediately started feeling a little pushy
and asked the Shanna if that meant I was almost done. She said she could check me if I liked, and
after I said yes, she told me I was complete (aka 10cm dialated) and could push
whenever I wanted. I spent the next hour
alternating between being on my hands & knees and sitting back leaning
against the side of the tub. The
Jacquetta would check the baby’s heart beat between contractions, and James
made sure I had a cool washcloth for the back of my neck.
Pretty soon I felt the undeniable urge to push. The most accurate way I’ve heard it described
is that it’s the same feeling as vomiting, but in reverse. I have no idea how long I spent pushing, but
my mom said it was only about half an hour or so. In between pushing contractions, I completely
zoned out, and even dozed off a few times (James literally laughed at the fact that
I fell asleep during labor). I had definitely entered “labor land” at that
point. The midwives were very
encouraging. I never felt like I was
being instructed, just told to keep up the good (hard) work. Pretty soon I was feeling the ring of fire
which was by far the worst part of the whole ordeal. But the midwives kept up my morale by telling
me I could reach down and feel his head, and boy, did he have a lot of hair! At this point I was trying to hold back on
pushing and to breathe him out instead, to allow my tissue to hopefully stretch
instead of tear. The midwives coached me
here at the very end to keep pushing, even through the pain, and then all of a
sudden he was born, all at once, into the water at 12:12pm. I sat up, they handed him to me, and I
brought him to my chest. I was kind of
in shock that it was over and he was here!
The midwives had me lower him down into the water to keep him warm as
his umbilical cord stopped pulsing (allowing him to get all the blood left in
the cord). He was covered in vernix (not
surprising, as he was a whole week early), and his head was all cone shaped
from the trip.
Once the cord had turned white and limp, they clamped it and
let James cut it. Then they handed him
to James, who wrapped him in a towel, and helped me to the bed to deliver the
placenta. In the next hour I delivered
the placenta, was stitched up from a little tearing that occurred, and tried
nursing him for the first time (though he wasn’t interested). They weighed and measured him (7 lbs 7oz,
19.5 inches long), and we decided on a name (Oliver William White). Then my mom picked up lunch for all of us
from Jimmy Johns (Beach Club on wheat for me), and she and the midwives ate in
the kitchen and let James and I have a little alone time with our new little
addition.
Pretty soon my mom headed home to start cooking dinner for whoever
was coming over that day, and James’ mom and sister (Alice) arrived. I got dressed in a new pair of pajamas that I
had purchased just for that purpose, and joined them in the living room. By 3:30pm the midwives had cleaned everything
up, packed up, and headed back to Midland.
We all just hung out in the living room basking in the big surprise that
happened. Later in the evening we had a
delicious dinner of beef stew, salad, and bread with both sets of
grandparents. For dessert we had
birthday cake and toasted the birth of our first born with sparkling wine.
It was a joyous, exhilarating, exhausting, and completely
awesome day. I know a home birth is not right for everyone, but it was definitely the right choice for me.
Some extra memories:
· - The music I listened to during the whole labor
was The Wailin’ Jennys on Spotify. I had made a “Labor” playlist of some of my
favorite music, but I put the Wailin’ Jennys on at the beginning, and it was
just right. Looking back, I would
definitely not have enjoyed the Labor playlist I created. We reached the end of the set of albums and
the music stopped just before he was born.
· - The day before his birth I had been extra hungry. I went to Five Guys for lunch with Tito and
Little Heather (no one else in the lab was interested that day) and ate a
burger plus the entire order of French fries they serve. Usually James and I split the regular order
of fries. I hadn’t felt like cooking
much the entire week before he was born, and so for dinner that night we picked
up some sliced brisket and mac’n’cheese from Dickey’s BBQ.
· - The night before he was born we watched a
depressing documentary about credit card debt on Netflix.
·
We didn’t finish everything I had hoped to do
before he was born, but all the important stuff fell into place. I didn’t get to weed the garden or sew the
curtains for the kitchen, but the birth tub came in, James got his wrist brace,
and we changed my phone from Net10 to Ting (to save money on all the phone
calls and text messages that follow a birth!).
