Cordelias birth story

Our due date was Feb 18th and she arrived on Jan 30th.  My water broke on Sunday night about 9pm at home.  No sign of contractions in sight, this is how it was with DS and I ended up having pitocin.  We called the doctor and he said we could stay home but had to be in the hospital by 8am the latest. Planning on delivering at Family Beginings in Miami Valley Hospital and they were going to try to let me progress naturally for awhile.  So I tried walking, sitting on my ball, and nipple stimulation to try to get things started...nothing.  Of course during this time we started packing like crazy and putting the carseat in the car.  We had to do this rush last time with DS because we were not ready (he was 9 days early).  We swore we would be packed and ready this time...oh well.  Next I deceided to just get some sleep.  At about 1am I had some cramping in my back so woke up and figured maybe that was the start of contractions and that I would walk around the house.  I went from room to room and cleaned up whatever I could find that needed doing.  Ended up back on my ball and contractions did start coming although nothing too regular, about 30 seconds long every 3-5 minutes but if I got up and moved around they pretty much stopped.  Went back to bed figuring that I was going to need the sleep the most.

Was up and ready to go.  We dropped DS off at MILs at 7:20am and headed to the hospital.  Only 2 contractions during the drive, so not going so well with those.  Figured that I would end up back on pitocin again this time around.  Still wanted to head to Family Beginings to try for my natural birth (med-free).  This is inside the hospital where I tried to deliver with DS.  We got in our room and the nurse checked me, I was 3-4 cm and she was still pretty high up.  She had me get on my hands and knees on the bed (a queen) and lean on the birthing ball to try to get her down lower.  My contractions started coming regular and I really liked being in this position.  I was getting like 5 contractions in 15 minutes in no time. 

At about 11 am the contractions were very hard and I was standing leaning over a dresser at this point with DH rubbing my back.  The nurse hadn't been back in to check me yet (this is a home like setting with little or as much help as you are wanting), but came in to check me before going on her lunch break.  I was hurting a lot at this point and was hoping to be at least 6 cm so I could use the birthing tub to help with the pain.  So I got in the bed and she started to check me and called the doctor asap because I was ready and needing to push now.  I knew that I had the urge, but just assumed that I did have to poop, because I thought no way was I ready already!  I couldn't handle being on my back so they turned me on my side.  I couldn't even turn on my side by myself at this point.  Doctor Woods arrived (I have Dr Horlacher/Woods/Kidd as my doctors) and we got down to business right away.  Three contractions and had my little girl arrived. 

It was a great, fast delivery.  No tears this time around, which makes a huge difference from when I had DS.  The nurse had only checked me those 2 times, but with my past birth we didn't expect things to move quite so quickly.  My 2 birth experiences were so different from each other!  I feel great and we were able to go home in a little over 24 hours after her birth.  I can't say enough about Family Beginings and how wonderful the nurses were during our stay.  I love that place:)

Cordelia Leigh was born 11:25 am January 30th.  Weighed only 5 pounds 6 ounces at birth and 5 pounds 2 ounces when discharged the following day.  She was 18.3 inches long.  She was born at 37 weeks and 2 days.  She is EBF and my milk is already in at 3 days.  Big brother, Cedric, loves her (so far!).