Abigail's "too-quick-to-use-hypnobirthing" birth story (very long)

SteffaniO · August 2009

After reading Ina May's Guide to Childbirth in the beginning of my pregnancy, I began planning for a natural (med-/intervention-free) birth. Toward the end of my pregnancy I had private, in-home hypnobirthing lessons and felt very confident and relaxed about birthing.

On Friday, July 10th (36w 4d) I woke up to find a wet spot on my bed where I had been sleeping. I wasn't still leaking, so I shrugged it off and decided to wait and see if anything else happened, and went to work. At work, I noticed that I was having timeable BH contractions for the first time (I'd had them before but never consistent) and they were getting closer together. I called my MW's office and told them what was going on - they told me to go in and get monitored if my contractions got to 4-6 minutes apart. Around lunchtime, they did - and didn't change when I changed positions, and I'd been chugging water all day, so I went in to L&D. For two hours I was hooked up to the monitors and my contractions cycled between being regular/frequent and irregular. My MW checked me and said I was between 1-2 cm and 50 percent effaced (at my 35-week app't I was 1 cm and 50% so there was virtually no change), and sent me home with instructions to drink plenty of fluids.

Sunday afternoon I had my final hypnobirthing lesson and asked my instructor how to tell the difference between BH and "the real thing" if contractions aren't supposed to hurt, but that's the only distinguishing factor I ever heard mentioned by anyone who'd gone through labor. She basically said that they shouldn't hurt, and I couldn't really know without going in and getting checked. Turns out she's full of it.

Four days later (Tuesday, July 14th; 37w1d) I was sitting at work kicking myself for not saving up more money so that I could take time off of work before my due date (August 3rd). All day when I went to pee I had a strange and uncomfortable sensation of pulling/opening around my vagina - I started to think that perhaps I was developing a UTI and planned to ask my MW about it at my 37 week appointment the next day. My feet swelled up for the first time and were so bad that it was uncomfortable to walk (it felt like pins & needles when I took each step), and I was so exhausted (despite a full night's sleep) that I almost asked to go home from work early. I stayed, though, and just went to bed a little early that night (8:30ish).

At 11:30pm I woke up - nothing new, for a couple of weeks I had been waking up around 1-2am to pee, always in the middle of a BH contraction. This time, though, I woke up because the contraction was so uncomfortable, not because I had to pee. I trudged down to the bathroom anyway, though, and then got back into bed. I couldn't fall back asleep because I had 3-4 more contractions that kept me awake. At midnight I decided to get up and time them.

From 12-1 (now July 15th) I sat downstairs with the dog watching Deadliest Catch, got up and walked around downstairs, up & down the stairs, drank lots of water, and checked out the bump. My contractions were consistently 5-7 minutes apart and some were as close as 3.5 minutes. The intensity stayed about the same - they just felt like menstrual cramps. I called the MW at 1 and told her what was going on. She replied, "Well, this happens a lot with first babies. You can come in and get monitored but I can't promise not to send you home again, or you can try drinking some water and taking a warm bath and see what happens."

At 1am I got in the tub and grabbed my ipod to listen to some hypnobirthing tracks. I couldn't make myself comfortable and Marie Mongan's voice started to get really irritating so I got out of the tub about 20 minutes later. I had to pee because of all the water I'd been drinking, and when I stood up I noticed bright red blood in the toilet. At this point I figured I could probably go to L&D and not have to worry about being sent home. I hopped back in the shower to wash my hair (which was completely pointless because I got so sweaty during labor), called to let my MW know I was coming in, then woke up FI and told him we needed to get ready to go. He went downstairs to make coffee and I woke my parents up to let them know I was going in to get checked out. I asked my mom if she wanted me to call her after I saw my MW, and she said that she would just come down in a bit regardless.

It was a little after 2am when we left the house. My contractions went very quickly from "just uncomfortable/irritating" to the point that I needed to focus and couldn't really talk through them. I kept timing them in the car and they were about 3 minutes apart. The whole ride I was reconsidering natural childbirth and thinking that maybe an epidural wouldn't be such a bad idea (and in the back of my mind I recognized these thoughts as a sign of being in transition, but didn't think I could be that far already). I tried to relax and listen to my hypnobirthing scripts again but my ipod and headphones ended up on the floor before we got to the hospital.

We finally got to the hospital at about 2:45am and I had to sit there and get checked in (WTF did I fill out pre-registration forms for?) and then went to a triage room. I started crying because the contractions got so strong - I really hadn't expected this (although really I never knew what to expect at all). The nurse asked what my plans for medication were; I told her I was planning on nothing but my plans were changing, and they called the anesthesiologist to prepare for an epidural. My MW came in and checked me and I was indeed 9 cm dilated. The nurses kept asking me if this was really my first baby ("Nope, guys, I was totally just trying to pull one over on you for the lols") and no one could believe I had only been in active labor for 3.5 hours. FI called my mom and told her to hurry - she had just gotten my dad on the road after he tried to tell her "I'm in no hurry, I'll be able to eat lunch before that baby gets here."

They moved me to a private LDR room at 3:15 and told me that I had to let a whole bag of IV fluids drip into my IV before they could do an epidural. I laid in bed on my left side and moaned through the contractions - FI tried to help me relax but I really just couldn't. One thing I noticed (it was almost like watching myself from outside of my body - very weird) was that I was trying to breathe through them but was afraid to breathe all the way in because I could tell this would make the contraction more intense and I didn't want it to hurt any worse. I knew that this was counter-productive though and that I needed the contractions to be more intense so they could do their job, so I finally breathed all the way in and to my surprise it made the contractions easier to handle despite being more intense.

At 3:30 my mom arrived and I couldn't have been happier (funny, because I had originally thought I didn't want her in the delivery room). I refrained from telling him, but I really thought FI sucked as a labor companion. I felt like he couldn't hold my hand "right" (Really, what is the right way to hold someone's hand?), and I couldn't understand why he didn't rub my head or my back or anything (Hmm, maybe because I didn't ask him to?). But, momma stepped in and knew exactly what to do without me saying a word and I calmed down a bit. At that point my MW told me I was almost fully dilated and that if she broke my water, I could have the baby quicker than it would take to wait for the IV fluids to finish so that I could get an epi, and that I'd really only have the epi for a very short portion of the delivery anyway. I knew she was right, and I really just wanted it all to be over, so I decided (again) to go natural.

At 3:40 my MW broke my water (which was such a relieving feeling) and I was able to start pushing almost immediately. This was absolutely the least uncomfortable part and made the contractions much easier to handle - it was just exhausting. With my first push, I pooped. No one said anything but I knew I'd done it - the nurse just cleaned it up and everything kept on rolling. I started to get uncomfortable so I tried pushing on my side but after one push like that I moved onto my back again. There was a ton of pressure as Abby moved into the birth canal and I noticed myself making some very cavewoman-like grunts and moans as I pushed. I started to feel like giving up because I felt like I wasn't making any progress, but then her head finally started to crown. When it came out, I felt like I was tearing upwards but my MW assured me that I wasn't and it was a normal feeling because of all the stretching going on.

At 4:10 am she was all the way out (5 lb, 12 oz, 20 inches) and for a few minutes I was so exhausted/relieved/disoriented that I didn't realize what was going on - the cord had been wrapped around Abby's chest and neck and she wasn't breathing. The pediatrician worked with her while my MW delivered the placenta and then stitched me up (I ended up with a first degree tear, 4 stitches). They had trouble getting her breathing on her own so they wrapped her up and let me see her (but not hold her) for just a few seconds before taking her to the special care nursery. She stayed there for 2 hours before being brought back to my room and had to stay under the warmer for a few more hours so it was 6 hours later before we were able to breastfeed.

Afterwards, my brother jokingly asked me if I was going to tell my hypnobirthing instructor that I wanted a refund. Even though hypnobirthing ended up not working for me through active labor, though, I don't think it was totally a waste - I feel like the relaxed attitude that it gave me might have had something to do with how far into labor I was able to get before I was in pain (really it was only bad for about an hour and a half). Between my mom and my MW (who was really awesome) I ended up having all the support I needed and looking back now, it really is like everyone says - I've pretty much forgotten about how bad it might've been and all I know now is that I was still able to do it completely natural (I never took anything for pain post-partum either - recovery has been easy, all things considered) and I've got a beautiful little girl to show for it who I absolutely adore.