Intrepid Murmurings

Okay, so I finally got the birth story written up....it took me awhile! And it looks like a novel, egads! Its nice to have it all written down, though, so I can not worry about forgetting the details. Lonnie had to help me with some of the timing, as it is all kindof a blur for me, especially the first half...

Emma Rae's Birth Story

On Wednesday, May 17th, I started noticing crampy contractions, low and in front, different from the ones I had been feeling for weeks. They were really infrequent and occasional, with no pattern that I could notice. My mom was here and we were out in the yard, she working and I mostly lounging and fetching things, but I was up and about a fair bit. Later in the evening, around dinner time, they started getting noticeably more regular. Still not painful, but definitely something to watch. We timed a few of them, and were getting excited. They were still 8-10 minutes apart, but as the evening wore on they got closer and closer, and more painful. We went to bed, and I decided to sleep in the guest room so Lonnie could get some sleep. I dosed between contractions, and they definitely got more and more intense, and I called Lonnie in around 2 or 3am. We timed them and they were 5-6 minutes apart, and getting closer. Called the doctor, and they told us to go in. Lonnie showered, we gathered our things and left. When we got to the hospital around 4am the contractions were bad enough that I had to stop walking when they hit, and they HURT! I was feeling whiny and not sure about how I was coping, this early in the game.

At L&D, I was set up in a triage room and they strapped on the monitors. They checked my cervix and I was still 4 cm dilated, the same as two days ago at my OB appointment! I was really disappointed at that, as I had figured the pain and contractions all night had been doing more. My contractions in triage had spread to further than 5 minutes apart, so they told us to either go walk around for 2 hours to help things progress, or settle in for awhile and get some pain meds. In my head I knew the walking was the best option, but I remember wavering for a second.....really didn't want to go out again! But we did, leaving our stuff in the triage room. Soon out of the hospital on our walk I started puking into the bushes. I was glad it was only 4:30 in the morning and so empty out there! We walked at a snails pace over to see my mom and grandma, who lives a few blocks from the hospital. Hung out for a bit there, then walked around and back to L&D at 6:30. Once there and on the bed, the contractions felt even worse. Standing didn' t make it feel much better, either. My cervix had made a little progress, but not much, though the contractions were getting more and more intense. It was a really busy day in L&D and at first they told us we may have to wait awhile for a birthing room, but one must have opened (and I think they realized I needed my antibiotics soon -- I was GBS positive) because a nurse whipped in pretty soon after that and got us settled into a room in record time. Yahoo!

At our hospital a nurse is assigned to one patient and stays with you continuously through her whole shift, which was wonderful — ours was great. She was supportive of our plan to try a natural, med-free birth, and repeatedly told us she was there to support us, and that we could do whatever I wanted. She checked my cervix again, hooked me up to some monitors, and started my IV antibiotics. Once that was in I could move around and use the tub, and I was really looking forward to that. It was really hard to manage the contractions lying down with all the monitors on, but getting up was just as bad, it seemed. At this point I was really thinking about getting pain meds, and was out of it enough to keep forgetting I wanted to try the bath first. Lonnie was great at keeping focused and reminding me of that.

This part of the laboring is really hazy in my mind, now -- I was already pretty out of it, I think. My mom and grandma were with us for awhile, and but left for lunch and to give us some privacy at some point. After a half hour or so I was able to get into that bath, and it was heavenly! It felt so great, and for a little while the contractions were more manageable in it. The puking returned, at some point around here, but it passed after a bit, thank goodness. We added a couple rounds of warmer water, but after an hour or so it started getting bad again and I was ready to get out. During every contraction I was getting to the "this hurts too much, I can't do this!" phase, feeling really out of control and unable to relax or get through the pain. Throughout this time, Lonnie really great about keeping me focused on coping without them, telling me how great I was doing, and supporting me through contractions, but he also recognized when it wasn't working any more and agreed it was time to try something different.

Once I was out of the bath, we decided to try some Fentanyl. I wanted to try that before an epidural because I didn't want to be bed-bound. I had originally planned to use movement, the ball, and positioning to manage the pain, but none of that had any appeal in the moment — standing and moving did not help at all, dang it! All I wanted to do was lie down, so I got back in bed, got the meds and immediately felt a bit better — much more able to relax between contractions, I kinda dosed even, and even the contractions were slightly more manageable. The downside, which we knew, was that it wore off quick. Ouch! After an hour, it had worn off, contractions were, of course, continuing to ramp up, and I was ready for the epidural.

The anesthesiologists came pretty quickly, there were two of them (we realize now one was med student) and they were great, talking me through the whole thing. It was incredibly hard to manage contractions while lying on my side as they prepped me. Once it was in I felt a little relief, but not much. I felt it somewhat on one side, but hardly at all on the other. Between contractions I thought about all the horror stories I've heard and read about epidurals, and wondered what I had gotten myself into. Ugh. The anesthesiologists upped my doses a couple times, and left when it looked like it might be working. When they were gone, the nurse had to put in a catheter, because I was feeling lots of pain that I thought might be my bladder, and it hurt like hell!!!! It was burning, making me feel like I had to pee really badly, and was almost worse than the contractions themselves. The anesthesiologists were called back, because clearly the epidural was not working. They determined the placement must not be quite right, and that they would have to redo it. Ack! 2 epidurals for someone who originally didn't want any! This time the other anesthesiologist did it, and though he ran into the same problem (a bone was in a funny place and the angle was wierd) once it was in it took right away. WHEW! I was soon numb on both sides, and felt an incredible sense of relief. The time between those two epidurals was definitely the most intense pain I have ever felt, and the most difficult part of my labor.

For me, my labor is distinctly divided into to halves, before and after the epidural. Ha! I am so glad to have tried laboring naturally, but do not feel at all bad for making the choice to get meds; for me, in this labor, I feel it was totally the right choice. It was about 11:00am when the epidural finally kicked in, and then it felt like the real waiting game began. I was relaxed, excited, and felt good. I was able to chat with Lonnie, my mom and grandma, who had returned, and occasionally, our nurse. She periodically checked my cervix, and at some point gave me another round of antibiotics. We listened to music and just waited around. My progress was somewhat slow, which we expected once I had the epidural. Our doctor checked in now and then to see how things were going. The baby was staying high, at station zero, and my contractions slowed a bit, to 6 or so minutes apart. The nurse wanted to start a little bit of Pitocin, to move things along, so we did that. It definitely helped, and I was fully dilated by 2:00ish, but the baby was still high. The nurse and doctor wanted me to "labor down", which meant giving my body time to move the baby down on its own before pushing. So, more waiting.

Another hour or so passed, and not much was happening. Baby was still at zero station and not moving. My doctor was scheduled for a c-section at a certain point, and I think the nurse wanted to catch her before she went into that, so she had me try a couple "practice pushes" to see how I did. It was the weirdest thing to push without feeling anything, something I really never imagined! The nurse had to tell me when to push, because, of course, I couldn't feel contractions....so much for spontaneous and undirected pushing!!! I really had my doubts that this would work, it just felt like I was doing nothing! But the nurse said I was doing really well, and had me continue. She was so great about helping figure out how to do it, and was so supportive throughout. I started pushing around 3:30, and was able to move the baby down pretty quickly. The pushing was tiring, but not at all painful; I really did not feel a thing, no pain, no pressure, even! At some point, I think around 4:20, the doctor came in and suited up -- thats when it finally felt real that this was, in fact, happening!

When the baby started getting closer, I started feeling a little pressure, and was able to know when to push on my own a lot of the time. Another nurse came in to assist with the baby, and they moved a mirror in so I could see what was happening when I pushed, and had me feel the head a couple times -- that was actually pretty cool. When the head had first started appearing, my nurse had said she thought it looked small....ha ha! The head was in fact gigantic, and took a lot of pushes to get out. The doctor was good about having me not push while she was crowning, to minimize tearing, and had been using mineral oil, too, to help with that as well. Once her head was out, her body took quite a few more pushes....she was a big girl! After a total of an hour and twenty minutes of pushing, she finally came out and was put on my chest for a few minutes. It was an incredible, indescribable moment, to finally meet our baby girl after all this time and struggle! Emma Rae Hutchinson was born at 4:50, weighing 9lbs, 3.2oz, measuring 21.5 inches long and with a head circumference of 14 inches and chest of 14.5.

Once the cord was cut, she had to be moved across the room to be put under the warming lights for a bit. Her Apgar scores were 9/9, though, which was great! I was sad not to have all that done on my chest like we had wanted, but at least it was in the same room, and Lonnie went over to be with her while all that happened. I did end up having a second degree tear, so after the placenta was delivered the doctor went to work stitching me up. Once that was done, Lonnie was able to bring Emma over to me. She was alert and awake for a good 2 hours or more after the birth, and my mom, grandma, sister-in-law and aunt were able to be there for awhile as well. We tried our first attempt at breastfeeding, and after that I was able to get some dinner, yahoo! We spent the rest of the night and next day in the postpartum room getting to know each other as a family. The nurses had to keep checking her blood sugar levels at various intervals, because she was so large, but everything checked out fine. We saw our my doc and the ped the next morning, and went home that evening around 6:00.

All in all, it was a great birth experience! It was not at all how I had envisioned, but all along we had been very open-minded about playing things by ear and being flexible, and I think that helped a lot. I have to say that I did enjoy the latter half of the birth and the pushing stage so much, despite (or because of?) being numb, and am so glad to have been comfortable enough to be present, aware, and in a positive mindset for the delivery and birth. Yahoo!