Cervidil Induction at 41 weeks

My OBGYN has a policy where they don't let their patients go past 41 weeks, so naturally I would make it to that deadline despite my efforts to induce naturally. They reserve me a room to come in Monday night to start on Cervidil before being given pitocin the following morning.  I'm only 1 cm and 50% effaced when they checked me Monday afternoon

They give me the cervidil at 8:30, and at first I just feel a little crampy.  The nurse gives me a sleeping pill at 11, and we settle in for the night.  Well my body had different ideas.  At midnight, I threw up the sleeping pill (it has been a nightly ritual for the last month of pregnancy to throw up about that time of night) and continued to vomit/dry heave probably every 10 minutes or so.  The nurse checks me and sees that I've dilated to 2 cm, so she lets the cervidil fall out.  Half an hour later, I feel a pop but no gush, and the nurse doesn't think it's my water breaking.  The cramping starts getting more intense, and I figure at this point that my body must be going through pre-labor.  As the dry heaving continues, the nurse offers me narcotics to take the edge off.  Although I planned for a medication free birth, I accepted in the hopes of getting some rest before the real labor contractions started.  It didn't take away the pain completely, but it helped me rest between contractions so I could focus during them on relaxing my body and letting it do its thing.

At 4am, the narcotics are wearing off, and it's becoming increasingly difficult to focus on relaxing my body.  I'm dilated to 6 cm by this point, much to my surprise.  The nurse offers us an epidural, but DH and I take a few minutes to talk about it.  In the end, we decide it'd just be better to get another round of narcotics and get the epidural later if I need it.  Plus I found I could manage the contractions with the narcotics' help.  Having only been in active labor for 4 hours, we figure we'd have another 5 or 6 ahead of us at least.  The contractions were so strong that it was hard to focus, but DH kept up his coaching and reminding me to breath through them.  I wanted to sit up in bed, but the nurses wanted me to lay back so they could monitor my contractions.  It wasn't until I got the second round of narcotics that I could even consider laying back, and even then I couldn't stand it for long and had to lean forward.

At 5am, I'm still 6 cm, and the narcotics have kicked in.  So DH retreated to a chair where he slept for a few minutes and woke up during contractions to coach me through them before going back to sleep.  At 5:45am, I page the nurse to come help me use the restroom.  She decided to check me, and she discovered that in those 45 minutes I had dilated the last 4 cm and started pushing.  DH jumps out of bed and rushes to my side as the nurses scramble to get things ready and to call the doctor who was at home asleep.

Pushing felt like such a relief that I did it gladly.  But after only 10 minutes the nurses told me I had to stop pushing to wait for the doctor.  I do my best to breath through them, but my body is instinctively pushing anyway.  After 10 agonizing minutes when I keep telling the nurses that I have to push, the doctor finally shows up.  After 5 more minutes of pushing (and a surprise episiotomy), DS is born.  The cord was wrapped around his neck once, and the side of the cord ruptured as the doctor was trying to unwrap it.  Poor DH had a pair of scissors shoved in his hands and was told he had to cut the cord right then.  He hadn't planned on cutting the cord, but there was no time.  DS meanwhile hasn't started crying yet, but as soon as the doctor suggests giving him oxygen, he starts crying and I get to hold him for a minute.  They whisk him off to get a blood test done because of the ruptured cord, and DH goes with them.  The doctor helps me deliver the placenta and stitches me up before DH and DS come back.

So even though I was scheduled to get pitocin at 7:30 am, DS was born at 6:09 am at 8lbs 7oz with no complications on Jan 31.  I tore quite a bit, but a week later I'm feeling pretty good for the most part.  I suspect that had I not been given the cervidil that I would've gone into labor by myself fairly soon.