Logan's Birth Story (thomas930)

thomas930 · April 2014

Well, this story is a bit over due but Logan James arrived on April 9th at 1:56pm, weighing 8lbs 15oz and 20in long, after 18.5 hours of an epidural free labor.

Tuesday the 8th I had my 39 week appointment where my midwife did my first internal exam and we found that I was a good 3 cm and we went ahead and did a sweep. I had a feeling that if I went for a membrane sweep that it would most certainly put me into labor either that night or there soon after. Well my instinct was right and by 7:30pm (5 hours later) I was contracting every 3 mins. I timed my contractions for an hour and while they weren't real painful we decided to head to the hospital because they were getting to be 2 min apart and I have a history of high pain tolerance with my previous labors.

Got the hospital at 10 pm and found that I progressed to 4 cm, midwife said that I could stay and we got all settled in! Contractions continued all through the night but by 5 am they started to space out to 6 mins so at 6 am we made the decision to walk the halls for an hour to see if they would pick back up. 7 am rolls around and they are still at 6 mins. My midwife decides to check me to see where we are at and I haven't made any more progress, I was still at 4 cm. We then decided to start pitocin to get my body back into a regular contracting pattern and she would recheck me at 11 am to see how it was working. It didn't take much pit to get my body back to doing it's thing and my contractions were back at 3 min apart and getting stronger and by 11 am I was 6 cm. I labored on the birthing ball and breathed through my contractions.

Around 1 pm I hit my wall, I was sitting on my bed and DH was sitting across the room from me and all of a sudden I started crying, DH came over and sat next to me and I remember saying that I was really frustrated that things were taking so long. My nurse walked in and saw that I was upset and she asked me if I was to be checked to see how far along I was...little did I know she had a feeling that I was right on the edge of transition. I was 8 cm and my water broke while she was checking me. She called my midwife down and get ready for delivery. When I midwife got there I was just about 10 but still had a lip of cervix. My midwife suggested that I get on my hands and knees to try to get Logan into a better position and try to get rid of the lip. She had me push a few times and when that didn't do much she had me move to my side which caused terrible pain in my hips. I pushed a little like that and she ended up having to manually move the lip of cervix out. Then the real pushing started. DH suited up since he was going to help catch and I started pushing. Logan's shoulders got a little stuck on the way out, my midwife referred to it as a "tight squeeze" rather than true shoulder dystocia. DH caught Logan...something he has been waiting almost 5 years to do, catch one of our babies, and he placed him on my chest. I ended up with a minor tear along my old scar which needed a few stitches.

Logan was my biggest baby yet, he was 1.5 pounds bigger than my other two and is just a joy. He is my Rainbow baby.