Saturday, March 17, 2012

My Long Birth Story

Well, February came and went and my baby girl stayed put.  My mom and sister Sarah arrived in town on February 25th and we spent our days walking and shopping and walking... trying to get this baby out of me, but I guess she was happy as a clam in there because she didn't give us any clues to her arrival...  until Saturday March 3, 2012.

I woke up Saturday morning with really strong back cramps that were consistently coming every 10 minutes.  However, as the day progressed, they became less regular and eventually disappeared only popping up randomly. Boo.  Daniel, my mom, Sarah and I went to the Tobacco District to just walk around.  We ate lunch at the Mellow Mushroom Pizza shop (laughed hysterically at I don't even remember what--Japanese games shows I think) and then went for a four mile walk--once again with the hopes of gravity working wonders.  I even "jogged" a small portion of the walk!  At this point, the pressure was really on, because Sarah's flight left the next afternoon and I really wanted her to at least see the baby.

Eventually, the cramps started up again. Yay.  The drive home from Durham was unbearable. My back hurt so bad, I felt like I was going to have to rip my ovaries out in order to get some sort of relief.  The cramps--at this point known as back labor-- started really picking up about 9:00pm.  I called the midwives at the hospital and they told me to take a bath to see if they slowed down any.  So I did. *Note:  One of the worst things you can do while in back labor is lay on your back.... how do you relax in the tub without doing that?*  Well, they didn't slow down.  The back contractions were consistently coming with two peaking points: every 4 minutes, lasting 40 seconds, followed by a 20 second contraction two minutes later.  The midwives told me to come in and get checked.

We got to the hospital around 11:00pm and checked in.  They began to monitor my contractions and then checked me.  I was dilated to a two. I cried.  I was a one and a half centimeters the previous Friday and all of the contractions of the morning, afternoon, and evening only gave me a half a centimeter.  Talk about discouragement. They sent me home with an ambien and told me to get some sleep.  The midwife was very enthusiastic however that she'd be seeing me early in the morning in full on labor.

Well, Sunday morning came and the back contractions became very irregular again, but they were much stronger than Saturday's.  The ambien allowed me to sleep for a few hours, but my dreams left me stressed and unrested-- I dreamt that I had to continuously go through all of this pain (contractions) in order to get stroller parts and eventually, I'd have all the parts to make a stroller for our baby.  I endured the pain for hours, only to learn that the stroller wasn't even for me and I was doing all of the hard, painful work for somebody else haha.  It was awful. 

Because I was scheduled to be induced Sunday at 8:00pm,  I tried my hardest to stay at home and "labor" for as long as possible.  I even went to the first hour of church (it starts at 1:00pm) and was talking to a bunch of women while the contractions were coming and going.  We weren't sure what was going to happen, so Daniel's parents took Sarah to the airport. The contractions got worse and worse, but they were so irregular I had no idea how to determine how far along I was.  It was so frustrating and all of the things I learned in my birthing class felt moot.  What happened to the 5:1:1--this is how you know when to come to the hospital/ know when you are in active labor/etc.  We didn't even talk about back labor!  All of my information was coming from the Internet and my mother (who was reading up on it).  I eventually found a few hours of distraction by listening to an audio book and laying in fetal position on my mother's air mattress. By 5:30pm, however, I couldn't take it anymore.  I called my midwife and told her about the irregular, but very strong contractions I was feeling. I told her that I was in a lot of pain. She told me to eat a good meal and come on in.  My last supper:  left over spaghetti and meatballs haha. (I later learned that that is the meal the midwives joke about.  Apparently they say, "Eat something you don't mind tasting again."  Luckily, I didn't have to).

We got to the hospital around 6:00pm.  Once again the midwives monitored the strength of my contractions and then did the cervix check.  They confirmed that the contractions were very strong; however, I was still only dilated to a two.  That's right.  STILL a two, after 48 hours of what they call "prodomal" labor..ie false labor with real contractions that don't do anything.  Once again, I cried.  At this point, my midwife gave me two options.  Start the pitocin (artificial oxitocin-- a labor hormone) or morphine plus another drug to help me sleep.  She highly suggested option two.  She said that a good nights rest could make all the difference.  I concurred and the morphine was great, but it didn't last all night.  I only slept for about 4 hours and then around 4am the nurse came in ready to start the pitocin.  At FOUR am. I literally begged her not to.  I could not handle the contractions just yet.  I asked her to just give me more morphine and let me sleep.  Luckily, the midwife agreed to my wishes and didn't put me on the pitocin until about 9:00am on Monday, March 5.

The contractions started coming immediately and they were very regular and increasing in strength. I stood, rocked, and then bounced on my labor ball for about 3 hours.  I listened some more to my audio book (not realizing for the whole 3 hours that I was listening to the same chapters that I listened to the night before) and I breathed.  I did the breathing that Rodney Yee does in my yoga videos and was amazed that my body actually became hypnotized.  I was experiencing the pain in my body, but viewing it as an outsider which made it bearable.  I could even relax my back muscles that were spazzing on a regular basis. 

As mentioned earlier, the contractions continuously got stronger and longer.  I felt like I was making so much progress and was literally devastated when I learned that it was just the pitocin.  Apparently, the strength and length of the contractions while on pitocin are no indicator that they are actually working.  That was proven when the new midwife (Stephanie) came in to check on me.  I still wasn't dilating quickly.  It was at this point I asked for the epidural.  Stephanie advised me to wait until I was at least dilated to a four otherwise, I risked the chance on slowing down the process even more.  I agreed, labored for another two hours and finally reached my 4cm mark.  That's right.  It took me 5 hours of hard, pitocin induced labor, (on top of my 48 hours of prodomal labor) to dilate to 4cm and get the go ahead for the epidural--which I wanted the moment I stepped into that hospital on Sunday night haha.

Getting the epidural was a cinch: pinch, burn, uncomfortable for 30 seconds, RELIEF.  I got the epidural around 2:00pm.  After which I was able to relax a lot more.  I still felt the pressure of the contractions, but they weren't unbearable.  At one point, I was even able to talk and joke around with Daniel, his mom, and my mom.  Most of my time was spent keeping my muscles under control though.  For whatever reason, the epidural made me shake uncontrollably.  I think it even scared Daniel and my mom to watch me shaking so much.  Once again, my yoga breathing techniques helped a ton.  I was able to slowly relax my forehead, my neck, my shoulders, my lower back, etc.  until all my muscles would stop shaking...until I lost my focus and they would react all over again.  It took a lot of concentration. 

From this point on, I began dilating 2cm every 2 to 4 hours.  The epidural began to wear off and nobody told me about the little button that gives more medicine until it was too late and my midwife didn't want me to push it because I was going to need to feel the contractions in order to know when to push.  Oh, and somewhere in there, I got a new nurse and for whatever reason, I really didn't like her.  She came across as stupid, so every time I'd try to talk to her I'd regret it and demand to talk to the midwife instead haha. (My mom and Daniel both said that I wasn't too unpleasant though.  In fact, while pushing, one of the women said I was doing a good job and I stopped to say, "thank you." haha My mom laughed at this.)

I think it was a little before midnight that the pain became so bad that I had to start pushing--against my midwife's advice.  It felt like I had two metal soft balls grinding against my tailbone. 

Two and a half hours later, after the hardest thing I have ever done, a small baby girl arrived at 2:01am on March 6, 2012. My thoughts as she exited the birth canal?  George Washington and "Honest Abe" haha.  I don't know why my mind went to those men, but I kept envisioning chopping down the cherry tree with George (a man's job/manual labor haha) and "Honest Abe" telling me that it would only be a few more pushes, and then the baby would come and I trusted him fully, because he was Honest Abe after all haha.  I really think that I was delusional for the last 40 minutes of pushing because I also thought that I was floating upside down, spread eagle and  I was really frustrated because I needed gravity to work in my favor.  Oh well, at least my body helped me deal with the pain.

One thing that surprised me?  I didn't cry at all after she came (like I thought I would) and I really craved a root beer. 

The baby had had a bowel movement in utero (?) so the NICU team was there and they had to cut the umbilical cord immediately to make sure that she was okay.  Luckily, she was.  As soon as they cleaned her up, they brought her too me, but I wasn't quite ready to hold her.  The nurse and midwife were still in the process of detaching the placenta and it was hurting an awful lot, so Daniel took her from me and then it was all over. 

My nurse took me to the bathroom and when I came out, everybody was gone.  All the commotion had calmed.  They had brought me a tray of food and a sprite (they didn't have root beer) and then I was wheeled upstairs to recovery with Daniel.  That was it.  It was over.

A different stupid nurse met us up in the recovery room at 4am and decided that it was a good time to lecture Daniel and me on how to not kill our baby.  She handed me this 4 page pamphlet that she wanted me to read and I tried, but my arm kept falling and before she even turned around I was asleep.  Daniel told me later that she kept asking him to wake me up, which he politely just stared at her and disregarded her request and then she tried to tell him that because it was a new day, he was going to have to go back to guest sign in and get a new visitors tag... a request that merited her another blank stare. She finally left and at 7:00am (only three hours later), the doctors started their rounds.

Because baby girl (she didn't have a name yet) came at 2am, my days were all confused.  The baby was only 6 hours old and I was right out of the delivery room, but I felt like it was a whole day later and that I was supposed to be up and walking about, so I was.  I was sore and light headed, but it was doable.

Daniel and I kept looking at this little girl in awe.  She's was so beautiful.  Finally, I asked, "What do you want to name our little girl?"  Daniel's top three picks were Kenly, Marly, and Roslyn.  Mine were Marlee, Madalyn, and Roslyn.  We narrowed it down to Marlee and Roslyn.  I finally asked her what she wanted to be named.  At that precise moment, she gave me the cheesiest grin I have ever seen in my life.  Too goofy to be a Roslyn... so we picked Marlee-- a sweet, silly, happy name.  A name that isn't too rich for our liking haha.  I think she'll be the little girl that just chuckles at everything and loves life and everything it has to offer.     

I arrived at the hospital on Sunday March 4rd and didn't leave until Thursday, March 8th. It was a long, long process.  Giving birth was definitly the hardest thing I have ever done in my entire life. In fact, right when it was over, I told Daniel never again, but it's true... with each passing hour, I remember less and less the pain and I'm overwhelmed by the miracle of the little baby sitting next to me. 

Daniel and I are so grateful to have her in our home.

While having Chinese with my mom and Sarah the week before Marlee came, my fortune cookie read, "You will soon witness a miracle."  I wish soon would have been sooner, but for once in my life, I can say my fortune cookie came true!!

  



               

2 comments:

  1. I'm not going to lie, that was probably one of the most terrifying things I have ever read!

    Love you, Mandi! That package really is on its way soon, I promise! Can't wait to meet Marlee!

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  2. You poor thing that sounded like a pretty tough labor. but your such a champ. I can't believe that nurse, what an idiot. I love that daniel just blankly stared at her tell she went away haha. I also really loved that you thought of George washington as you pushed. When i was pushing with Ruby I kept telling the nurse, "Mommy always wins." haha I hope i get to meet little Marlee while she is still little.

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