Maria's Birth Story

iamcaro

I'm a FTM and my baby arrived May 18 at 3:03 pm. — just 3 days after her guess date. We planned a natural hospital birth using Hypnobabies and hoped to avoid any interventions. Even though this didn't happen since I experienced PROM, I still feel I achieved many of my goals for a great birth. I avoided pain meds (and baby was super alert at birth!), it was a relatively short labor and I had extremely minimal tearing, so my recovery has been great. Here is our story:

Maria’s due date of May 15 came and went without any signs of labor on the horizon. I had my 40 week check up that morning and the doctor said nothing was happening – no dilation, no effacement. So I assumed I was staring down another week of pregnancy. Saturday night we went to church and then dinner and the baby was way more active than usual, making me miserable. I felt pressure that I thought was her pressing against me, but I now believe they were very early, very mild contractions.

We went to bed Saturday night and moments after I lay down, my water broke in a gush! It was 12:38 a.m. My husband and I started double checking out hospital bags and making sure everything was ready to go. I was so excited and assumed labor would start sometime in the night. I decided to try and get some rest, but had trouble sleeping because I knew baby would be here soon!

But nothing happened that night. I continued to monitor my temperature and wait. I went for a few long walks on Sunday and felt pressure waves from time to time. It was our wedding anniversary, so we cooked a nice meal and ate our frozen wedding cake. I had a glass of champagne and we watched Game of Thrones like we do every Sunday. I eventually tried using the breast pump around 10 p.m. to induce labor naturally, and mild waves started coming with more frequency around 11 p.m. – 22 hours after my water had broken!

I went to bed thinking I really needed the sleep to prepare for what was coming. Between 1 and 2 a.m., I began having contractions that kept me from sleeping. While Joe slept, I walked around the house, sat on the birthing ball and listened to some relaxing music. The pressure waves were every 2-5 minutes lasting 30-45 seconds. As a first time mom, I had no way of knowing that this was all still early stage labor and I had a long way to go! I called the doula and had her come to the house around 4 a.m. She helped apply heating pads to my back and get into good positions to work through each pressure wave I was feeling. Eventually, they were lasting 1 to 1.5 minutes every 5 minutes.

After eating a bowl of cereal, I decided it was time to head to the hospital at 7 a.m. My water had been broken for 30 hours.

My contractions slowed down significantly while we transferred to the hospital. When I was checked in triage, they told me I was 70% effaced and 1 cm dilated. I was devastated! I thought I had been laboring for hours, and I had so far to go! They put me in a room and the doctor came to discuss our situation. My contractions were 8 minutes apart at that point and he basically said I wasn't in labor because they weren’t creating any real change in my cervix. Since my membranes had ruptured so long ago, they were anxious to get baby out as soon as possible, which meant I would be getting pitocin to get my labor going. They also gave me IV fluids and antibiotics for the ruptured membranes. I had hoped to avoid all of these interventions, but it was hard to argue after hearing I had dilated so little.

My husband covered the clock in the room and I settled into a rocking chair beside the bed. The pit kicked in and my contractions began getting stronger. I could still breathe through them and remain calm. At some point, the nurse rushed in and told me to get on my side on the bed right away because baby’s heart rate had dropped. Laboring on my side was much more uncomfortable and every contraction felt so much stronger and more painful.

Sometime between 10 and noon, the midwife came to check me. I was at 3-4 cm, but she also said she felt a forebag of waters that had to be broken. For some reason, that simple procedure was incredibly painful, however, things really kicked into gear after that.

My contractions were overwhelming me now, and they still didn’t like baby’s heart rate so I had to remain on my side on the bed. I was feeling completely overwhelmed by the intensity of each contraction and could no longer control my breathing through each one. They put an oxygen mask on me to breathe into to help baby. At this point her head was so low in my pelvis that it was pressing hard on my back causing major pain there. My husband and doula applied counterpressure to try and relieve it. I was losing my nerve and kept telling them “I can’t do this.” But they assured me I could and that I was doing it!

I don’t know how much time had passed, but I eventually felt my body bearing down on the baby and I said “I’m pushing!” They told me I better not bear down on baby while my cervix wasn’t open enough or it would cause it to swell and I’d need a c-section. However, my body was doing it all by itself and I couldn’t control it. I was really scared that I couldn’t stop bearing down during the contractions even if I tried. The nurse asked if I wanted pain meds, and I thought they would help me relax and stop bearing down. Also, I had been considering it for a long time because I was in tons of pain! I said yes, I want the epidural, and the nurse bent down to check my progress.

“Caroline, you’re complete.”

I couldn’t believe it – I was so happy for the good news and to realize that my body knew what it was doing!

The nurse said the midwife was in another delivery and I better stop pushing until she could get there. Ha! No way I could do that. I worked through each contraction and the midwife arrived shortly. I asked if I could deliver in a position other than my back, and she allowed me to flip to my hands and knees on the bed. Now I was really pushing and they could see baby’s head, but it hurt so much more than I could believe! Her head was right there several times, and I kept trying to push harder to have this experience be over! Luckily, I only had to push through 6 or 7 contractions and she was here at 3:03 p.m.! She came out crying and she was placed on the bed by my legs where I could feel her wriggling around. I was so exhausted and happy it was over! When I flipped back over, she was placed in my arms.

Maria Rose had arrived healthy and strong!