On Wednesday April 26th I finished my 9:30 spin class and began having contractions. At their closest they were about 10 minutes apart, but not overly intense. That night at 8pm while giving Annabelle (our three year old) a bath I felt a small trickle run down my leg, but assumed I had just peed.
The next day I continued to have contractions, first every thirty minutes, then growing closer. I walked at the gym while Annabelle took yoga and played with all her friends one last time. By the end of the day they were 15 minutes apart consistently and painful--I couldn't walk or talk through them, alarming our waitress at the Silver Diner that night. I was also feeling very damp, but asured myself it was just regular pregnancy discharge-- Even though in the back of my mind, I was pretty sure my water had a pinhole.
Friday April 27th started with contractions still 15 minutes apart. I started frantically making sure the house was spotless, helped Ryan put together our rachet dining nook table, and went grocery shopping. By 11am contractions were 10 minutes apart. Annabelle and I went to visit our neighbor, Ellen, and we played with her dogs and went out to lunch. The dogs (Shiloh Shepherds, a fancy breed that's basically a German Shepherd mixed with a Malamute) realized I was pregnant and in labor, and gave me a head to toe tongue bath. Apparently it's a thing dogs do when they see a pack member in labor. So that was a pretty big honor, haha!
We got home around 3:30pm, and my contractions were being weird. I'd have an hour where they would be five minutes apart, then they would space out to fifteen minutes, then to eight or ten minutes apart. Finally my Mom arrived at 6pm, my sister at 6:30, and we ordered in dinner. Contractions were still 5-10 minutes apart, but finally increasing in intensity. At around 8pm I went upstairs with Ryan so I could shower and he could time my contractions. After taking off my shorts, it became immediately apparent that my water had broken, and the leak was getting worse! So I showered, said goodbye to Annabelle, and we headed to the hospital.
When we arrived at intake, the doctor confirmed broken waters with the words "yeah, that's a lot of gushing". I got my first cervical check at 11pm and was 2cm dilated and 80% effaced. They moved us to our swanky labor and delivery room--decked out with a labor tub, birth ball, rocking chair, and they didn't require you to stay in bed for ittermittent monitoring! Best of all, they informed me they wouldn't start Pitocin based on a timeline. It would be based on baby's condition and my preferences! Definitely Crunchy Mama birthing heaven.
I got my first dose of penicillin (GBS positive), then labored in the tub for 20 minutes, then walked the halls for twenty minutes, then twenty minutes on the birth ball during monitoring. Rinse and repeat. Around 2am my doctor came to offer me a cervical check, which I turned down because my contractions weren't coming very hard or fast. She offered me a Pitocin bump, which I turned down--I was desperately afraid of the "Cascade of Interventions". Husband asked what my plan was, and I said I'd get the Pitocin if I was still under 5cm at dawn.
At 2:30am my husband was exhausted and I told him to go get some sleep. I did my monitoring, my walking, my tub. From 2:30am until 5am the contractions were 10-15 minutes apart and unpleasant, but I knew I wasn't dilating. I complained about the unfairness of it all on Facebook--Everyone told me second babies take half the speed of first babies, and Annabelle was 5 hours from first real contraction to holding baby! I did EVERYTHING right this pregnancy. I worked out 2-2.5 hours a day, 4-6 days a week. I gained a reasonable amount of weight. Why wasn't my body working?!
My nurse comforted me and said that plenty of women took hours to get to 5cm, then shot to 10cm in an hour. I felt better, but I still wasn't dilating.
My husband woke back up at around 6:30am. After my monitoring I bounced on the birth ball and told him about the night and my minor freak out. At 7am our doctor came and offered me a cervical check. I accepted.
She turned to the nurse mid exam and said "2.5--" then realized I was listening and corrected to "3. Definitely three!"
But I knew. I'd only dilated half a centimeter in eight hours. It was time to accept that 59 hours had passed since the pinhole in my water broke, and I wasn't going into active labor on my own. The doctor was very kind, and let me know that I could have the minimum dose and the nurse could turn it off any time. She said that a lot of people only "needed a whiff", and then bam! Baby. I felt really assured.
Then the shift changed. My sweet nurse was replaced by a total hardass. Disclaimer, she was veteran and extremely knowledgeable. But at some point she also lost sympathy and compassion. I also got a new doctor, the only doctor in the practice I didn't like--and I despised this guy. With the shift change I didn't get started on the Pitocin and my last dose of penicillin until 8:45am.
I got on the birth ball while the nurse started me at the minimum dose, 2mg/hour. Within five minutes I was starting to feel a difference. My contractions were coming much harder. The space between them shortened. Still, they were manageable. The nurse said she'd be back in thirty minutes to up the dose. It made me nervous--the doctor said I could be on the minimum. I didn't want more. Still, I'm tough--I've run a 50 mile ultra marathon, I did an indoor 70.3 triathlon 30 weeks pregnant. I was sure I could handle it.
I was terribly mistaken. The nurse came back at 9:30, and doubled my dose. I asked if it was really necessary, my contractions were a minute long and less than five minutes apart. She said she wasn't sure I'd progress, that the monitor was showing my contractions as farther apart. So I accepted it. Five minutes later I was in the worst pain of my life. I could barely breathe through the contractions, they were two minutes long every two minutes. My water finally broke for real, and with every contraction water exploded out of me. It was unimaginably painful, like I was being ripped in half. Nothing else I've ever felt compared even slightly.
After fifteen minutes I told my husband when the nurse came back I was going to ask her to turn it back down. He did one better, he called her back. She was obviously very reluctant to turn it back down, but did. She didn't think my labor was established yet (WTF, SERIOUSLY​?!?!) And thought it was going to slow back down. I told her I literally couldn't handle contractions like the ones I was having, that I needed to lower the dose.
The intensity lowered, but not to where they had been at my previous dosage. They continued to come every two minutes, lasting for two minutes. But between them, the pain never stopped. It felt like one long contraction with multiple peaks. When the nurse came back fifteen minutes later, I asked if it would be foolish to turn off the Pitocin and labor in the tub for a while. She gave me a look and said she'd ask my doctor but she thought my contractions would stop once I was in the tub.
She came back at 10am and turned it off, then told me I needed thirty minutes of monitoring before I could get in the tub. The "thirty" minutes were torture. Baby kept falling off the monitor and it took closer to 40 minutes. I stood and swayed through the contractions that still wouldn't stop. The nurse asked between two contractions if it hurt, because I was breathing through it. I told her that it did, that it always felt like I was having a contraction.
I almost started crying when I got in the bath--It was lukewarm. I clung to the handicap rail while the contractions kept coming. At their peaks I felt this intense pressure, like I had to push. I tried a gentle practice push, and the pain instantly lessened. I assumed baby must be sunny side up, because there was no way I was fully dilated, I was 2.5cm less than two hours earlier!
After twenty minutes I told Ryan I couldn't do it any more. It hurt so much. He called the nurse back to discuss pain management. We talked about doing a partial dose of Nubain --which the nurse was vehemently opposed to-- or an epidural. I couldn't pick, I couldn't think. She offered to get the doctor and have him do a cervical check before I decided. I agreed.
He came at 11am, and I hoisted myself out of the bath and to the toilet. I felt the urge to push again, but went to the bed to get checked.
Now, I hated this guy. A year earlier he had given me some very patronizing running related advice. As I mentioned, I'm a 50 mile ultra marathon finisher. He identified himself as a "10k man" while giving said patronizing advice. Hated him.
But he really did give the nicest cervical check, haha! I was at 8cm at 11:10. He also agreed with the nurse, he didn't like giving Nubain/etc because sometimes it made babies stop breathing after birth. He said I could keep laboring for another hour or two and see where it went. Or I could get the epidural. I definitely couldn't handle two more hours unmedicated. I agreed to get the epidural.
As soon as they left the room, the Contraction From Hell started. I couldn't breathe through it, I moaned and shouted through it. It felt endless. I was being monitored in the bed, and I looked up at the monitor to see it had been going for eight full minutes. Even the nurse looked interested. She asked if something was different, or if I still wanted the epidural (which she was literally holding). I told her I wanted to push. She got the doctor, who checked me at 11:20. I was 10cm with a thin lip, but he was sure I could push through it.
My reply was--and I wish I was kidding--"you know, I used to think you were the biggest douche in the world. But right now I love you. I would leave my husband for you right now."
He looked surprised and responded with "The biggest douche in the world? That's not very nice."
Then at 11:22 my next contraction started, and I started pushing. It was awkward, the nurse had me holding my own legs and she kept telling me to stop if I arched my back or puffed out my cheeks. At one point she said "Just think of how much you want this baby." I And I responded by yelling "I didn't even want this baby! My fucking husband did!" Yeah, yikes. Everyone in the room looked very uncomfortable.
We got through the lip in two pushes, then baby started to descend. The doctor had to return something somewhere and left, and I asked the nurse if I could touch the head when the baby started crowning. On the next contraction I started pushing again. They were basically wasted pushes, baby got a little lower but mostly the nurse just told me everything I was doing wrong.
As the next contraction began, we started to finally make progress. On the first push she was crowning. The nurse took my hands and put them on baby's head. It was cool feeling the head, but I could also feel how hugely spread my labia were. It was freaky, and I tried to pull back, but the nurse held my hands there. On the next push baby emerged to the shoulders, and they told me to stop pushing. I tried, the urge to push was incredible. After a few seconds it was like a dam broke and I couldn't wait any more and began to push again.
I basically panicked and pushed as hard as I could. Baby emerged farther, I think about to the hips. She was all long limbs and squishy and wet, almost like a squid. I kept freaking out, the body felt so long and I just wanted it to be over. I yelled "Get it out!" as I pushed one last time, and baby had finally arrived. Immediately the panic subsided.
Baby was born at 11:37am, after almost exactly 15 minutes of pushing, after less than three hours of active labor.
I don't actually remember how I found out after nine long months that baby was a girl--Husband says the doctor didn't announce it, and baby wasn't held up, she was put directly on my chest. But in the truck driver vein of my delivery, my response was to shout "It's a girl! I fucking knew it!"
I loved her the second she hit my chest. She was also grey. She cried three times, then went quiet. The doctor quickly cut the cord, and she started crying again as soon as the nurse picked her up to bring her to the warming station. While she was being suctioned and getting her Apgar scores (8&9), I asked the doctor about the condition of my undercarriage. To both of our surprise, no vaginal tearing and no stitches! I did have a very minor/superficial urethral tear. Then the doctor started trying to deliver the placenta. Unfortunately, it wouldn't budge. He apologized, then removed it manually. I'd heard a lot of horror stories about this procedure, but found it pretty painless. There was less than a minute of fairly intense pressure, then it was over. It certainly hurt less than contractions.
I started shivering violently, and the doctor's assistant brought me some warm blankets. Soon after they brought me Rosalie for skin to skin, and my husband noticed the floor next to my bed was wet. Apparently the line from the Pitocin to my hand wasn't connected, which is why my placenta wouldn't detach. After that it was all very normal, the nurse wanted some people from the NICU to check out Rosalie when she wouldn't latch, but they never came and she latched once we got into our recovery room.
We're one week pp and doing really well! She's an excellent sleeper and a great eater--when she's not falling asleep. Big sister loves her! And after a pregnancy that felt totally surreal, that I never really bonded with, I'm impossibly in love with her! Really hoping to avoid PPD this time. Fingers crossed! ❤