For me those last few weeks of pregnancy are spent
daydreaming about the day I would give birth.
Would my orchid still be blooming? Would it be during the full
moon? Would my water break or would I
spend all night contracting, wondering when I should go to the hospital? How would it all play out? It’s an event
wrought with emotions of excitement, anxiety, fear, and hope.
My due date was March 27th, Easter Sunday. I’ve never thought much of due dates and have
never actually had a baby on my due date, but I assumed I would go a few days
late based on my experiences with Miles and Reuben. To add to my assumption, I hadn’t been having
any contractions, the baby was high, posterior, and my cervix hadn’t dilated
much. My guess was that he would be born
on March 31st.
On Sunday, March 13th, we spent the evening at my
parent’s house. The weather was nice and
we spent a fair amount of time playing outside with the kids. My brother in law joked that jumping rope was
going to put me into labor. Later that
night Kirk asked me if I wanted to take some evening primrose (an oil that
supposedly helps move things along). I
declined because I felt so unprepared to have our baby. Kirk said something along the lines of, “It’s
not like you’re going to take one pill and suddenly go into labor.” I still opted against it. We had been in the process of moving Maren
into her new bedroom in the basement and didn’t have any furniture. I had taken some of the baby stuff down from
the attic but it was still in bags and bins sitting in the garage. Mostly I felt overwhelmed with everything
that “had” to happen before the baby came.
Plus, there was a huge winter storm warning issued for the next day with
projections of 1-3 feet of snow. I could
just picture me going into labor and my mom not being able to get to the house
to help out with my older kids. After
spending some time entertaining my worries, I finally fell asleep.
At about 5:00 am the next morning, I was feeling a little
gassy. As I tried to pass gas, I felt a
little gush. I hadn’t been to the
bathroom for a few hours so I assumed that I just needed to pee. I changed and went back to bed. At 7:00, when I went to wake the kids up for
school, the gush happened again when I was cuddling with Maren. At that point, I was a little suspicious, but
still thought I just needed to pee. I
went into the bathroom and told Kirk that either my water had broken, or I was
having issues controlling my bladder. We
were both still in denial at that point.
It only took another 15 minutes or so of walking around to confirm that
my water had broken. Ready or not, today
would be the day!
Not really knowing how long it would be before real labor
began, I called my mom and tearfully relayed the situation. I was in a bit of a panic, knowing that I
didn’t have ANYTHING ready. She said she
would come right away and pick up my Miles and Reuben. Since I wasn’t contracting yet, we opted to
send Maren and Jesse to school and have my mom pick them up later. After getting things situated with the kids,
I felt less stressed and more excited about what the day would bring. My midwife said I could either go straight to
the hospital or hang around at home and wait to see if contractions would pick
up.
Kirk and I figured it would be a good time to get some
things ready. My mom took the bin of
newborn clothes and bedding and offered to wash everything. Kirk packed up the hospital bag, did the
laundry, and cleaned the house. I
showered, shaved, and painted my toenails a lovely purple (to match my varicose
veins) all while listening and singing along to Aimee Mann and Dido. I also ate several meals, knowing that I
wouldn’t be able to eat once I checked into the hospital.
At around 1:00 we decided to go on a walk to see if I could start
contracting. It’s been a tradition with
every labor to walk or visit the big tree stump a few blocks away. The winter storm seemed to be a bit of a dud
and it wasn’t raining so we took our chances.
We took a few pictures at the stump and decided to keep walking up
around the hospital pond and Glassman pond.
On the way home, big snowflakes started to fall and the wind picked
up. Luckily we wore our raincoats and
had an umbrella, but by the time we got home our pants were soaked. The walk brought on a few contractions, but
nothing major. My midwife suggested I go
in, mostly because there is a higher risk of infection the longer you go with
ruptured membranes. I obliged because I
really wanted the little guy to come and didn’t want to end up laboring all
night.
We got the remainder of our things ready for the hospital
and headed out. When I arrived at around
2:45 I was only about 2.5 cm and having some regular, mild contractions. I told the nurse I wanted to try and nap
before starting on Pitocin. It turns out
that napping in a hospital is notoriously impossible. Just when you start to doze off someone comes
in, the phone rings, or a monitor starts buzzing. Finally at around 4:30 the nurse started me
on a low dose of Pitocin. She left the
room and within 5 minutes a monitor was going off. Kirk fidgeted with it a bit and was able to
get the alarm to turn off, but it wasn’t really administering any of the
Pitocin. We called for the nurse, but no
one came. Since I was still tired, I
just let things be and finally got a quick nap.
My midwife and her student showed up at around 5:45 to check
on me. They fixed the Pitocin and dialed
it up a few notches. Within a half hour
the contractions were coming on pretty strong.
I knew I would most likely want an epidural and I didn’t see any sense
waiting until the last minute like I did with Miles and Reuben, so I asked for
it. I was only about 4 cm and still had
a ways to go before delivering. It was
perfect timing, but still took another half hour or so to kick in. I still had quite a bit of movement in my legs and I could
still feel the contractions, but they were only mildly uncomfortable.
Kirk and I tried to watch a movie, but the
medication made me a little sleepy. I
was hoping that everything would go quickly because I was starting to get
hungry. At about 7:30 I sent Kirk down
to get some food. The cafeteria was
closed so he ended up leaving and getting pizza at Papa Johns. While he was
gone I was feeling quite a bit of pressure.
The nurse checked me and I was about 7 cm. She seemed to be a little nervous that Kirk
was gone and stayed in the room with me to make sure I didn’t push the baby out
without him. At about 8:40 Kirk strolled
in at the same time as the midwife.
When she checked me I was fully dilated, but the baby was
still sunny side up. She tried holding
onto his head and swiveling him around, but he was not interested. She wanted me to go ahead and start pushing
anyway. I was really nervous and had
visions of him getting stuck or me pushing for hours. It was pretty evident with my first few
pushes that we were making progress and in just 3 contractions (at 8:52 pm) the
little guy was out ready to face the world!
He started crying immediately and they placed him up on my
chest. He was a tiny 6 pounds 8 ounces,
18.5 inches, covered in vernix, with fuzzy blond hair. My eyes filled with tears of happiness while
the nurses wiped him down while he shrieked on my chest. He was perfect in every way! I won’t deny a twinge of sadness in those
tears, to come to the final culmination of what I consider one of the most
amazing experiences in life.
As he gazed up at me with those bright, open eyes, it felt
so good and so right to have him here. I
was so elated that everything went so smooth and easy, that he was healthy and
arrived safely. Looking back on all my
thoughts about how “the day” would go, I don’t think I could have imagined a
more perfect day.
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