Tuesday, January 29, 2013

At the beginning: My Birth Story

I started this blog before my baby boy was born in October, but I'm just now getting back to it. I don't know much about blogging. I'm still stuck in the mindset of "All the cool kids Livejournals."

Writing my birth story has been on my mind for a couple of weeks. And one day I'll write my fun pregnancy story.


Warning: While not an explicit birth story, it IS a birth story.


At every appointment my doctor reminded me that I could be induced whenever I was ready. I guess other women wanted those babies to pop out as soon as possible. My little guy was going to cook as long as he wanted. I hadn't even hit my due date.


Text messages from that week:

Chris: I want my baby.
Me: Which baby? The PS3, XBox360, computer, dog, me?
Chris: My son, woman! Pop him out!

Two days before my due date, I woke up at 4:30am to blood in the bed. It was fairly light so I knew it was my "bloody show". But of course, I had that freak out "What if it's not?" moment. The contractions started around 5am. I knew we'd be sent back home to wait until they were close, so at home I stayed. Around 7am, I decided I had waited long enough and was ready to make the 30 minute drive to the hospital. We brought the dog to my mom to take care of and left.


We waited in the waiting room for about 20 minutes before I was brought back to the inspection station to make sure I was along. This was my first time in a hospital for something that wasn't a small emergency (like stitches). "You're going to have a baby today." I was shaking the whole time I was in the room. When I got my IV, I felt like I had been stabbed in the wrist. I was told my OB wasn't going to be able to be there that day. I ended up liking the OB that was there anyway.


I was wheeled into my Labor & Delivery room. The nurse wanted to know if I needed an epidural. I know that epidurals can slow down labor. My plan was to hold off as long as possible, but the nurse told me the anesthesiologist lived 30 minutes away. Around 9am, I consented to it.


The epidural was as painful going in as I had imagined. Chris stood infront of me, held me, and tried to reassure me while trying not to freak out himself during the five minute long torture.


My water finally broke shortly after that. Friends and family came by to visit. I really had just wanted to sleep which I did for a short while. The nurse came in and told me the doctor would be by around 1pm to see how labor was going. She had me try pushing a couple of times which didn't do too much.


When my doctor came in, she told me my baby was partially turned on his side. If she wasn't able to turn him, I'd have a c-section. One of my big fears! After a while, the kid finally turned and it was time to push before he tried to flip back.


Scare tactics and bribery were the staff's games. If I couldn't push him out, they'd have to cut him out. When I did push him out, I'd get food. Yay!


I pushed for an hour and a half. Not long compared to other birth stories.


The last half hour, I started getting overheated and claustrophobic. "Can I take this gown off? I'm really burning up." One of the nurses in the room wiped my head off with a wet washcloth, but the doctor didn't want me to. "The baby's going to be messy when he's born and we put him on your stomach." I didn't care about modesty or being messy. I turned into the Hulk at some point and ripped the gown off.


Toward the end, I was completely exhausted and my blood pressure was dropping. The "C" word came up again. The doctor asked if I wanted help bringing the baby out or I might need a c-section. I got the episiotomy. She used the kiwi to suction the baby out and put him ontop of my stomach (I didn't even care that I was naked) before a nurse swept him away to clean him up. I held him while they stitched me up (my epidural was wearing off at that point so I was crying for two reasons).


Ryden was born at 3:42pm on October 6, 2012 with a head full of blonde hair and blue eyes. Aside from having to get his frenulum clipped because he had trouble latching on during breast feeding, he was perfectly healthy. On Monday we went home with our beautiful new addition.