My natural birth story (and pictures!)

Just wanted to introduce you to the newest addition to our family, a healthy baby girl... Finnley was born at 12:53 am on August 26th, weighing in at a healthy 8lbs 2oz, and measuring 21.5 inches long.

I?ve included a short version of her birth, but if you want the really long version I?ve included that after the pictures. Enjoy and best of luck to the rest of you!?

The short version...

?The labour and delivery was everything we had wanted - totally natural and med free. I got through the early stages of labour at home, and was in the hospital for only 4.5 hours in "active" labour before I started pushing. I pushed for just over an hour before Finn made her grand entrance. DH was truly an amazing labour coach and helped keep "my eye on the prize" the entire time, even when I wanted to give up.??

Things got a bit scary after the delivery, since I ended up hemorrhaging when I delivered the placenta, and lost more than a liter of blood. I was given a couple shots of pitocin immediately, but when those didn't stop the bleeding the midwives had to make an emergency call to the OB and have her come in and try to get the bleeding under control. I was put on a pitocin IV drip, catheterized, and the bleeding eventually stopped.

??Despite the frightening finale, I would do it all over again in a heartbeat knowing that the process would result in our amazing little girl. Finnley is doing great and I think we fall more in love with her with each passing hour. Breastfeeding has been going well, though right now she only sleeps in our arms or in a sling, so I'm thinking we need to work on that unless we plan to sleep in shifts for the next few years...

The long version....

Finnley's birth story begins with DH and I having sex on Sunday evening, in an attempt to get things going. I guess it worked, because I lost my mucous plug on Monday morning. I had an appointment with my midwife at 4pm, and when she checked me she said I was 1cm dilated (I had been a half cm 4 days earlier).

I went for a walk that night, and around 11pm I started experiencing some contractions. I had been having some cramping throughout the day, but nothing that I would actually consider a real contraction, because the cramping was pretty continuous. These were definitely different than anything I?d ever experienced - the contractions felt like intense menstrual cramps that spread into my back and wrapped tightly around me. The contractions kept going throughout the night, ranging from 5-10 minutes apart, and I had more spotting and ?cleansing.? I tried to rest as much as possible, but lying down definitely did not help ease the contractions at all.

The next day was more of the same, except now I was exhausted after being up all night with contractions. The contractions were about 4-7 minutes apart throughout the day, and at this point I could definitely tell I was in the early stages of labour. They were growing increasingly uncomfortable. I spent most of the contractions bent over the couch or kneeling over the birth ball, moaning, trying to get comfortable. I called my midwife and went in to get checked out around 3pm (riding in the car was brutal and made contractions so much harder to cope with!). She checked and I was 3cms ? progress! She said it could be anytime, and to call her and go to the hospital when the contractions were ?unbearable.?

We went home and within a couple hours I was in quite a bit of pain, so we called and went in to the hospital. We checked in around 7:30pm, and I was at 5 cms, and the baby was posterior which was causing me back pain. As soon as we got to the room, I jumped right into the Jacuzzi tub. It helped a bit, especially for the back pain, but I was still having lots of painful contractions, and after about 2 hours I got out and laboured leaning over the bed, rocking my body back and forth, moaning and cursing and yelling at times. I started to feel a lot of pressure, and at 11:00pm I was checked and told that I was at 9cms! No wonder I had been feeling so much pressure. My water hadn?t broken yet, and although I didn?t want any interventions, my midwife recommended that she break them because I was so close, and it would speed things along. The water was clear, and she gave me the green light to start pushing a bit when I felt pressure.

Pushing was brutal and way harder than I ever thought it would be. By this point I hadn?t slept in 38 hours, had been having contractions for 24 hours, and was physically and mentally exhausted. I didn?t have enough energy to hold my own legs back as I pushed, and the other midwives had to hold them for me. DH was amazing and kept encouraging me, standing at my head as I pushed, helping me by holding my head forward so I could get it my chin to my chest with each push.

There were times where I felt like I was going give up, like it was too much and too difficult, like there was no way this was going to happen. But I knew the more I hesitated the longer it would take, so I tried to give it my all during each contraction. I was so loud during pushing that the midwife actually told me that screaming wouldn?t help!

When her head finally emerged it was the best feeling in the world, because the rest of her body just sort of slipped right out. So after an hour of pushing, at 12:53am on Wednesday, August 26th, FInnley finally emerged and entered the world crying. She was placed immediately on my chest as we waited for the cord to stop pulsating. DH cut the cord even though he didn?t think he?d want to.

What happened next is something I?d rather forget, but I guess it?s an important part of the process. When I delivered the placenta, I felt a huge gush of fluid. I was having a post-partum hemorrhage. DH said it looked like a water fountain of blood streaming out of me. They quickly gave me a shot of pitocin, but that didn?t help so they gave me another. The whole time the midwife had her hands inside me and on my uterus trying to get it to contract to stop the bleeding. When that didn?t work they hooked me up to an IV drip to get the continuous flow into my body, and called the OB and nurses in for emergency support. The OB got her hands inside me and continued to try to get the uterus to contract. They used a catheter to drain my bladder to assist in the contracting.

Eventually the pitocin started kicking in and the blood flow began to slow. I was in and out of consciousness throughout this ordeal and didn?t really know what was going on, except that DH looked terrified. He kept kissing me and telling me he loved me but he looked so alone and helpless standing there holding our brand new daughter. He is my strength, and to see him looking scared was probably the most frightening part of the entire experience.

After a couple hours to recover a bit in the delivery room, were transferred to our room and spent the early hours of the morning staring at the beautiful daughter we had created. My blood levels came back very low and anemic after losing so much blood (1.5 liters - more than 1/4 of my total blood supply), so I had to start taking iron right away to get them back up. Other than that, the worst part of the ordeal was the swelling from all the fluids they pumped into me ? my feet looked like Homer Simpson?s and my fingers were the size of sausages!