Caleb's birth

Caleb arrived to greet the world this Saturday morning, March 13th at 10:08 am, 51 hours after my water broke.

It’s taking me forever to write this story because I don’t have a lot of time between feeding and caring for the baby, and trying to sleep when I can. I can’t sleep much. I do have brief times for naps, but the problem is I can’t really fall asleep during what should be nap time. It takes me a while to actually fall asleep, and by the time I’m out, its nearly time to get up again, so yeah – it’s been rough. I’m hoping my body adjusts and gets used to napping soon so I can get at least 6 hours a night, I would love that.

Anyway, I’m not skimping on the details in this story, because I want to be able to remember everything later, so if you are squeamish, you might not want to continue reading. The short version is, absolutely nothing went according to my birth plan. I ended up with every intervention I said I didn’t want, except for a c-section (yay!), but at the end of it all, I didn’t care.

My water broke at 4:30 am Thursday morning on the 11th. We were so not ready. I always said I would stay home if my water broke, but when it actually happened, I was really scared. I was only 36 weeks and 5 days, and totally unprepared for that to happen, so I just wanted to get to the hospital and make sure everything was OK in there. We didn’t have a bag packed, so Ethan rushed around putting everything together while I showered and ate. Then we arrived at the hospital at 7am. I was having very minor, inconsistent contractions that felt like Braxton Hicks to me. They didn’t do any internal exams because of the risk of infection after water breaking. My midwife gave me 24 hours with no intervention for labor to start on its own, but nothing was happening. They gave me a sleeping pill to help me rest overnight, and were going to start induction in the morning if I hadn’t started labor on my own. All night I had the same minor, non-painful contractions, about 8-10 minutes apart. I was really hoping they were doing something for me.

Finally, Friday morning, they checked me for the first time and I was not at all dialated or effaced. Baby was -3 station. Basically I was nowhere. I was disappointed but ready to get the show on the road. My midwife started cytotec at about 7am Friday morning, and I started contracting regularly 5-8 minutes apart, but the contractions were very mild. I did have to be continuously monitored at that point and got an IV, which were two things that I didn't want, but at that point it was ok with me. I got to be off the monitors every 2 hours, which was nice, but the IV does limit movement quite a bit. It is not easy to drag those poles around. With the cytotec, they had to check me every 4 hours and reapply it. After three checks, I was still not dialated, and about 20% effaced, which is basically nothing. Caleb also did not descend at all. This was around 8pm Friday night.

At this point, I made the decision to start Pitocin. We didn’t have much choice because my body wasn’t doing anything on its own and if we didn’t get Caleb out, we were headed for a c-section. I had a little emotional breakdown when we told the midwife to start the pit. It was a hard decision for me to make because I was afraid of the pit, and I knew I was so far from my natural birth plan, I felt like a total failure. I cried for a while, and the nurses, midwife and Ethan talked my through it and reassured me that it was what I had to do for Caleb, because it was time for him to come out. Once the Pitocin started I started having more painful contractions right away, 3-5 minutes apart, but they were tolerable. My doula showed up and we started using the hypnobirthing techniques to breathe through the pain. I felt pretty good about getting through the contractions, and was feeling positive that I could still go without an epi at that point. I was even able to sleep a bit (fitfully) between 12am and 2am.

When I woke up at 2am, all of a sudden the contractions were hitting much much harder. I was also having back labor, which was like a bad backache that wrapped around my abdomin to my back. I could no longer talk or walk through contractions, and had to focus. Contractions were about 2-3 minutes apart, but I still felt like I could manage it. Between 2am and 4am, the contractions got progressively worse and closer together until they were less than 2 minutes apart, and the pain was worse than anything I'd ever felt. The hypnobirthing was helping to keep me calm, but I was praying that I was in transition. I started vomiting during contractions and my modesty went out the window. I had to moan to get through the contractions. It was so much more painful than I had imagined. I really though “this must be it, he’s almost here”. Then, my midwife checked me and told me I was only 4cm, but 100% effaced.

And that is when I lost it. I have never felt so scared and discouraged in my life. All I could think was "only 4 cm, I still have 8 hours of this". I don’t know why 8 hours was stuck in my head. I asked for an epi right away, but my Ethan and my doula talked me out of it and told me to get in the tub (this was around 5am I think). So I got in the tub and tried to work through the pain. Contractions were coming about a minute apart, but I got no break between because of the back labor and continuous abdominal pain that didn't stop between contractions. I was so exhausted from the pain that I could not lift myself out of the tub. I don't know how to describe the pain of intense contractions, so I won't try - other than to say that there is an unbearable amount of pressure, like you are trying to hold an elephant inside you.

At that time, I told Ethan that I wanted an epi and I was 100% serious. By the time the epi guy arrived it was about 7. Waiting to get the saline drip in and for him to set up, was the longest half hour of my life. I thought I was going to start screaming when the contractions came, but I used the hypnobirthing as much as possible and managed to lay still on the table. I did say some pretty funny things during that time (I think the f word slipped out more than once). The epi finally started working by 8 am, and I can honestly say it was the best decision I have ever made in my life. The relief was so intense I want to cry just thinking about it! I couldn't feel anything! I slept from 8am to 10am. I never thought I’d be the one to say it, but I would get an epi 100x over after that. If we have more children, I don’t think I’ll even try to not get an epi. I don’t want to ever experience that kind of pain again.

My midwife didn't check me after the epi (only the one time at 4cm) because of how long my water had been broken. They were monitoring my contraction patterns, and at 10am they decided to check because they thought I might be ready to push. Here is the craziest part of the whole story - the baby had already crowned when they checked me!! He crowned while I was sleeping. When I was experiencing the worst pain, I was so close to pushing, I just didn’t realize it! My midwife quickly changed her shirt while the nurse rushed to get the table set up for delivery. About 5 minutes later, they put my legs up on the table and lifted my blanket. Then they saw that Caleb's head and shoulders were out! He delivered himself! I felt only a slight tug as they pulled his body out. It was incredible. The nurse said she'd only seen that happen before a handful of times in 30 years of nursing. I was so surprised that I couldn't believe it and before I knew it he was on my chest, crying. We were in love immediately. They dried him off a little, and we snuggled skin to skin, then tried to breastfeed. After a while, they took him and gave him a bath and we've been together ever since.

A lot more has happened this week, and being a new mom is exhausting but so wonderful and full of little surprises. I love Caleb more each day that goes by, and I hate the thought that the days are already passing and he’s already growing – I just want him to stay this way.

I am working on getting pictures posted on Facebook. We are taking tons! We also have some cool video of him that we are trying to figure out how to post.

Whew, I’m glad I got this done! Now it’s off for another feeding. 