At the time of this writing, our beautiful baby is 7 weeks old! How time flies! It's taken me awhile to finally get her birth story documented, but here it is!
On Saturday, September 20th around 9PM I started getting contractions while reading about relaxation tips in my hypnobirthing book. I wasn’t sure if they were the real thing, so although we had prearranged to have Jen and Matt come over if I went into labor at night, I was apprehensive about calling them. The strange thing was that, although they got as close as about seven to ten minutes apart, they would become less frequent, or stop altogether if I walked around--a sign of false labor. I texted Jen to see what her status was--if they would be available that night. She texted back that she was ready and willing whenever we needed her.
I kept timing my contractions and they increased in frequency to five minutes apart--that’s when I was supposed to go into the hospital according to my Doctor. . .but they were still going away when I walked around. So I called the after-hours Doctor for my clinic. I had to wait on hold off and on for a total of 15 minutes. During this time I was walking around and I ended up getting contractions about five minutes apart even while walking! So when the doctor got on the line I felt a little silly, because at this point all signs pointed to me going to the hospital and it was pretty obvious. So I told him how things had been going and that things had seemed to progress in the past 15 minutes. He agreed that I should go to the hospital.
We called Jen and Matt and they hurried over. When we were in labor with Leila we stopped by Sonic to get a milkshake so that I could have the calories to get through the intense physical exertion that labor would require. With Leila I got a chocolate banana milkshake. We carried on the tradition and stopped by Sonic. I got a fudge, hazelnut, oreo milkshake (I was pregnant, right?!) We got to the hospital shortly after midnight and they brought me into a triage room to determine if I was really in labor so they would know whether or not to admit me. They checked my cervix and I was at a 2 ½. That was progress! At my last prenatal appointment over a week before I was only a 1! I ended up with two nurses--Melanie and Maggie (Maggie was a BYU nursing student). I learned something about my preferences as a “healthcare consumer”-- I don’t like having students work on me. When I was in labor with Leila, a young medical student broke my water. Now, being in labor with Heidi, every time my cervix got checked, I had two people touting off the phrase “you’re going to feel a little ‘pressure’” (euphemism for pain). Who wants to go through double duty of having your cervix checked? I didn’t love that. Also, there was a lot of talking between the two of them (by way of teaching and asking questions). This made it hard to zone out and take my mind off of the matter at hand. I thought for a moment that maybe I would have better luck delivering at a different hospital next time where BYU students aren’t so prevalent. I know . . .I should probably be more considerate and be willing to support other people’s education, but labor is already a painful, uncomfortable, scary experience. I don’t really feel the need to add gravy to those mashed potatoes!
They asked me if I had a birth plan. I hadn’t written one out, but I had some things in mind for how I wanted to give birth. I asked if I could take a hot shower to keep my mind off the pain and if I could have a birthing ball. Melanie told me that it was a possibility IF they determined that I was really in labor. REALLY IN LABOR?!?!?!?! SERIOUSLY! I’m having painful contractions five minutes apart and you have to DETERMINE if I’m REALLY in labor?!?! OK. I get it! I understand that doesn’t constitute being in true labor necessarily, but don’t go invalidating a laboring woman! There’s gotta be some kind of training where these nurses could learn how to word things so as not to be so aggravating! How about “we need to make sure you are dialating before we delve into your birth plan”. To someone who is having consistent painful contractions, she IS in labor in her view, and that SHOULD influence how a nurse communicates with her. Anyway, the contractions kept coming and they would get stronger, but it reverted to them only coming consistently, strong, and close together if I was sitting or lying down. As soon as I walked around they would slow down or stop altogether. They kept checking me and I wasn’t progressing at all. Walking around is supposed to help you to dilate. So I walked around and let Robby sleep since he was exhausted and I knew he needed his strength if he was going to be my labor coach. I walked around the halls of the labor and delivery unit and after an hour I came back to my room. The nurse came in to check me and I was nervously anticipating what she would say since I had only had two or three contractions the whole time I had walked around. Sure enough I hadn’t progressed at all--I was still only 2 ½ cm dilated. They told me they would probably be sending me home. The readings on the baby weren’t great though, so they wanted to make sure she was doing OK. Chances were that the monitors just had gotten loose, but we wanted to be sure. This bought me some time so that I might perhaps dialate during the time they were monitoring the baby.
Robby said that if I really didn’t want to go home (and I really didn’t), they really couldn’t make us go home. We could just tell them we were choosing to stay. I didn’t want to be demanding though. . .although it was a good a time as any. Twenty minutes later, the baby’s readings were good, but after checking me I again had not progressed. They called my doctor to notify her of my status and she told them to send me home. That was the last thing I wanted to hear! How could they send me home! How could I not be in labor?! My contractions were five minutes apart when I was sitting or lying down! What?! Are they just going to go away?! It was 4AM. Was I just supposed to go home and nap for five minutes between contractions?! Surely I would be back in an hour! I was also Strep B positive! If I came back in an hour, just barely in time to have the baby, they wouldn’t have enough time to administer the antibiotic! I voiced my concerns, but they were resolute. They told me that they couldn’t help me along by breaking my water because their policy was that I had to be 39 weeks to have my water broken artificially. “I’ll be 39 weeks tomorrow!” I said. “Ya, but you’re not 39 weeks now”. Seriously! This was rediculous! I was only 38 ½ weeks when they broke my water with Leila! I was on the verge of tears as they told me all the things they’re supposed to tell me, like what symptoms to look for in order to come back into the hospital. I had to muster up every ounce of self-control to keep myself from crying like. . .a baby; but I managed to hold it in. They gave me paperwork to sign stating that I agreed to be released. To say I signed them reluctantly would have been an understatement. Begrudgingly would be more suitable, but still wouldn’t do it justice.
Matt and Jen were sad for us that the baby wasn’t coming that night and empathized with my frustrations. I was a little embarrassed that we had called them and it seemed all for naught, but they were sweet in saying that it was no trouble at all and to call them again--even if we weren’t totally sure I was in labor. They left and I laid down in my bed. Sure enough I felt the painful surge of a contraction. This was going to be a long night. But suprisingly I was so tired I fell asleep right after that contraction and didn’t experience any more. I slept like a rock. For the next few days I went back to experiencing normal, weak, irregular, and rare braxton hicks. It’s amazing that false labor can fade away and be as though it never happened. I was humbled to admit that maybe medical professionals really did know what they were talking about!
Thursday morning, September 25th at 2AM, I woke up with contractions, having gone to bed at 11pm after watching a hackers documentary with Robby. I would have liked to have gotten more rest, but knew that any efforts to sleep would be futile. So I went out on the couch and started my scripture study while timing my contractions. At first, the contractions were pretty consistently about 7 minutes apart. Wanting to see if they would stay consistent while walking, I paced around the apartment with cell phone in hand (to time contractions and keep reading my scriptures). The contractions continued and increased in intensity and frequency! Some time probably around 3am, Robby’s mom, Heidi, got up to go to the bathroom and saw me sitting in the living room. I told her what was going on and, although it was the middle of the night and she had been burning the candle at both ends already, she stayed up and prepared a lesson plan so that she could request a substitute for a couple of class periods that day and come visit me at the hospital! My contractions got to the point of being only 5 minutes apart and both Heidi and I agreed that it was time to wake Robby up--at this point it was about 4:15am. I was glad he got a couple extra hours of rest, because again, I knew how intense and tiring it was to be my labor coach last time--he needed all the sleep he could get! I grabbed our hospital bag and we got a couple of other things together and took off. It was nice to have Heidi there and not have to worry about what to do with Leila in the middle of the night! Our plan was to go get a milkshake before arriving at the hospital, but Sonic didn’t open until 6am, so we headed over to McDonalds since they’re open 24 hours. As Robby ordered an Oreo Mcflurry for me from the drive thru, the faceless voice responded that they don’t have ice cream right now. . .what? No ice cream before 6AM?! “I’m going to kill you now!” I said under my breath. It was a good thing that not only could I not see his face, but he couldn’t see mine. The beauty of drive thrus I guess. So a strawberry banana smoothie would have to do--although it wasn’t packed with calories, so I could load up before the big event, at least it was thick, sweet, and drinkable. It would have to do. I also ordered an egg McMuffin (wanting some protein and something to offset the sweetness a little). By that point my contractions had started to slow down--to where there were two that were 10 minutes apart! I considered suggesting to Robby that maybe we hang out and wait for them to get a little closer together again. I didn’t want the admiting staff to just roll their eyes and not let me proceed past that admitting desk. But on the other hand, my contractions were still pretty painful and Dr. Savage had told me that now that I was 39 weeks I didn’t have to be sent home for being in false labor--she could just induce me whenever I wanted. So we just kept right on to the hospital, arriving at just around 5am. This time I was in enough pain that I needed Robby to bring me up in a wheelchair (just like when I had been in labor with Leila). With the excitement and anxiety of the moment, Robby was driving it pretty fast. I didn’t love this because that meant the chair bumped and jolted over every flaw on the ground. So when I contracted, that bumping aggravated the situation! Once I asked him to stop the chair while I contracted. The next time was so painful that I couldn’t verbalize my desire for him to stop, so I just raised my hand and he got the message.
We got checked in and we informed the check-in nurse that I preferred not to have any students working on me. She agreed to pass that along to the charge nurse. I ended up being assigned to a tag-team of two nurses. As I mentioned, one thing I don’t like about there being a student duo is that there is more chatting that takes place. So at first I wasn’t super impressed by having two nurses again. However, I was not yet in excruciating pain and didn’t need to check out of reality just yet. These two were really funny, talkative, upbeat nurses which helped to lighten the mood. They checked my cervix and I was dialated to a five!!! A FIIIIVE!!!! I was thrilled! I wasn’t dialated to a five until I had been in the hospital for probably 8 or 9 hours with Leila! AND after they had broken my water for me! What a relief that I didn’t have to wait for that pain staking part of the process! Then, as always there was a shift change at 6am and I got a new nurse--just one, named Sue. She was nice, accomodating, patient, and left me alone when I didn’t want to be bothered. So that was perfect!
By this time, Robby had turned the laptop on and set me up with the hynobirthing tracks that I had found on Youtube, ones that seemed like they would be relaxing and help me to zone out. So I had my headphones in and was trying to divert my attention away from the ever-increasing intensity of my contractions. Oh how I had forgotten how painful these were! Of course I did! You have to forget if you’re ever going to consciously decide to get pregnant again! Sue checked me and I was a 6 ½ or 7. Wow! I was progressing fast! I told her that I wasn’t sure if my water would break on my own because it didn’t last time and breaking my water was what helped me to progress when I delivered Leila. I asked her if she thought that would be necessary again. She told me she was going to call Dr. Savage to let her know how much I had progressed and that she could ask her about that. The nurse was gone only about two minutes. I had an especially painful contraction and felt my whole abdominal region tense up, at which point I felt a gush. I yelled to Robby “call the NUUURSE!!!” So he called her with the call button and she came in. “I don’t know if my water just broke or if I just peed! Can you check?” I said with urgency. She chuckled and lifted the blanket. She didn’t even have to check my cervix, she just knew from the color of the fluid that my water had broken. What a relief! Things were moving along so quickly! But wow! It was painful!
I just tried to breathe through the contractions the way I had been taught in Lamaze classes. I tried to focus on the way other parts of my body felt, I tried to relax my limbs. It was working surprisingly well! My feet were so relaxed that my toes were tingly. I learned in my Lemaze class and in my hypnobirthing book that when you’re afraid, you tense up, you trigger your sympathetic nervous system which assists your body in fight/flight, so all of your blood travels away from the center of your body (where the blood is needed to facilitate childbirth) and out to the arms and legs so that you can either fight or flee. This impedes the process of childbirth and can actually lead to you feeling more pain and having a longer labor. I knew I had been so scared giving birth to Leila and if my fear and tensing up had anything to do with the extraordinary pain and fairly lengthy labor I experienced, I wanted to prevent myself from being afraid and tense as much as possible. So although I had formerly criticized hynobirthing for being too hippy, listening to mellow music and narratives on how to relax my by body was really pretty helpful! During transition when the contractions were bone-crushingly painful and so frequent that they seemed to come one on top of another, I struggled to maintain composure. I wanted Robby to pull out the little LED candles I had bought, turn those on and dim the lights in the room so I could try to relax and focus even more. At that point though, I knew asking him to do anything would burst my focus bubble, so I just hoped internally that he would think of it. Then he said “Do you want candles?” Miracle of miracles! He read my mind! I said “yeeees!” Then, he sat there as though he were waiting for me. Then, as though he were reminding me, he did one of the Lamaze breathing techniques where you pretend to blow out candles--this is especially helpful during the really hard parts of labor and to keep yourself from bearing down when you have the urge to push! . . .That’s not what I meant by candles!!! So I finally cried out “noooo! The battery candles in my bag!” He found one of the two packages and set them up. I realized that I hadn’t prepared him well. I hadn’t voiced my expectations previously. I had brought several things with me to help me relax or cope with the pain and had somehow pictured that he would just whip each item out at just the right moment. But he was barely familiar with the goodies I had in my bag and I hadn’t told him that I wanted him to pull things out and offer them to me. This made me frustrated with myself and I cried, despite my efforts to control myself and think happy thoughts. I felt like in some ways I had to cope alone because asking for help to cope at this point seemed counterproductive. I got to a point of desparation though, where I needed a diversion. I managed to calm myself down and I asked him to give me a scalp massage and rub my temples. He did so, but I had to keep encouraging him to go harder--it needed to be hard if it was going to be any kind of distraction from the surges of pain I was feeling.
I kept trying to focus on what I was listening to. I had given Robby a fairly lengthy playlist, but we only got through two narratives and maybe two songs. Things just went so fast! I wanted him to give me a priesthood blessing, but by the time we were in the hospital, it was just “go time”. I also didn’t have time to eat any of the Freezies (my favorite brand of “otter pops” I had brought along). Sue checked me again and I was a 7+. She called Dr. Savage in. I was feeling the urge to push and she cautioned me not to so that my cervix didn’t swell. Despite the overwhelming urge, I resisted pushing. She checked my again and I was an 8 ½! Was the Doctor going to arrive on time? She called Dr. Savage to see where she was. She was almost to the hospital. Dr. Savage arrived and checked me again. I was a 9 ½! She told me “you’re almost there! You’ve just got a tiny lip of cervix left”. I told her I wanted to push. She told me I could push a little, but not to bear down. I tried to push just a little, but quickly learned that it was all or nothing. As soon as I let myself push a little, my body seemed to take over and I beared down. . .hard. She didn’t try to stop me. She just seemed to take the attitude of “OK. . .I guess we’re pushing now”. Then she coached me through it just as she did with Leila. She told me to push, then stop pushing, then pant, then push, then pant. During the pushing parts I yelled like a laboring mother in the movies! In just a couple of moments I felt that wonderful relieving feeling which followed a great deal of tension--the baby’s head emerging and the rest of her body just sliding out. So, to recap--we got to the hospital at 5AM and I had her in my arms at 6:30AM!! When women are Strep B positive, the nurses want to have them on the antibiotic for 4 hours ideally, but I was barely on it for one! They said that should be good enough, and it was.
I heard Heidi her cry briefly. Then they placed her wet body on my chest so I could get a glimpse at the world’s newest little angel--my angel. Just as I had with Leila, I was in awe of the fact that there really was a baby in me, so perfectly formed with all ten fingers and ten toes, perfect ears, functioning eyes, all in this perfect package that was now ours! Then they cleaned, weighed, and scored her. She was 7 pounds even, 18 1/2 inches long and had a 9-9 APGAR score. She didn’t get full points because she was struggling a little bit to breathe normally. She grunted and squeaked like a brand new puppy. The Doctor and nurse didn’t seem too concerned though, so I tried not to worry about it either. They said she just needed to get used to this new way of breathing. Then they were ready to give her back to me and put her in my arms. But already, the afterbirth contractions were so strong that I didn’t feel like I could hold her just yet. They weren’t quite like labor contractions, but more like heavy menstrual cramps. It was just so painful that I couldn’t picture having her on my stomach and putting any pressure there. I worried I would drop her. So I had Robby hold her for the first little while. I didn’t know how long it would take for the pain to go away on its own, so although I went through the labor itself without an epidural, I didn’t want to hold off from cuddling my baby, so I asked for an ibuprofen.
I was soon able to hold our darling new daughter and get a good look at her beautiful flawless face. She really couldn’t be more sweet and perfect! It’s amazing how you can wonder what they look like for nine months, then not long after meeting them you can’t picture your life without them. Heidi is a miracle! Not because of any difficulties surrounding her conception or birth, but because she is a living breathing combination of Robby and I, a daughter on loan from our Heavenly Father, and everything her name means and her namesake stands for: nobility, serenity, and beauty. She is utterly adored by all three of us. I constantly experience the paradox where I can’t wait to watch her grow and see how she develops but on the other hand, I want her to stay doll-sized and cuddly forever! I’m absolutely smitten!
