I know many of you wanted to read my birth story so here it is!
38 week appt: 2cm, 90% effaced, and baby at -1 station.
39 week appt: 2cm, 100% effaced, and baby at almost 0 station.
My doctor stripped my membranes at both appointments, but I felt like my baby boy was never going to come out. I had contractions from about week 35 and I was over it. After my 39 week appointment where I was having pretty bad contractions, I decided to go to yoga and squat him out. That didn’t quite work. I had contractions on and off for the next couple of days but they weren’t anything I could time.
Sunday morning I was feeling pretty crummy and decided to start making meals to freeze. I should have known I was nesting but I never thought about it. I cooked most of the day and realized about 3pm that the contractions could probably be timed. I was right, they were 12 minutes apart. About 7pm John and I decided to take a walk to get things moving. They were still consistent and were about every 10 minutes. I showered and made sure our bags were packed and tried to go to bed about 10pm. However, that did not happen. The contractions were getting worse. Around midnight I had John start timing them because they seemed to be right on top of each other with little breaks in between. After an hour of them being 3-5 minutes apart for a minute long we decided to go to the hospital.
There weren’t any positions that were comfortable and walking was the only way to get through them. We drove to the hospital about 1:30am and the nurse informed me that I was still only at 2cm. She gave me some meds that would either make the contractions worse if it was real labor or it would make them go away if it was false labor. I thought I was being sent home to die because I was in so much pain.
We got home, went to bed, and I breathed through the contractions until about 7am when they practically went away. They were still close together but not intense at all. I was so upset but sent John to work because mom was here just in case anything happened. I slept until about 11am when back labor hit me. I tried taking a bath but the only position I could tolerate was being in the frog position. My mom called my doctor’s nurse and explained the last 12 hours and she told me to come back to L&D. The contractions were so much worse than I ever thought possible. The drive was the worst part.
We got to L&D about 1:30pm and they took one look at me and put me straight into a room. I was 4cm and begging for an epidural. I had to wait about an hour, but when once I had it I was a very happy person. I (half) joked with my mom that the only position that worked was the fetal position. I spent 1:30pm-11:30pm at 4cm. I just knew my water needed to be broken, but they wouldn’t do it. Apparently baby was so low he pushed my bag of water to the side. Finally, around 11:30pm my doctor broke my water. In 2 and ½ hours, I went from 4-10cm. I was ready to push at 2am. During my practice push, my nurse made me stop because baby was coming. She called my doctor (who thankfully was already there) and my sweet baby boy was born at 2:12am after pushing for less than 10 minutes.
It was such a great experience. I'm not sure I could have had a better birth story. It went pretty much as I had hoped. John and Mom were invaluable during that whole experience, including up until today. John and I aren't ready to make baby #2 by any means, but if I were guaranteed the same experience, I would do it over again.
Anyway, that's my story and I'll leave you with a picture of my favorite little man. :)
