Labor & Delivery

Can we take a moment to discuss labor & birthing ?

For me — it was the worst experience. I thought I had a high pain tolerance…. jokes on me.

I spent almost 48 hours in labor and by the end of it I swear I saw my soul leave my body.

At my 39 week appointment I was not dilated and Legend showed no signs of wanting to leave the womb.

Naturally, I did everything possible to get him to come out. I can’t tell you the amount of spicy food I consumed but I can say that I swear his first few poops smelt like Indian food 😂. I drank 2 raspberry leaf teas a day and had sex up until the day before he was born.

On Monday the 12th (39 weeks 6 days), I had random cramps that just felt like I realllllly had to pee. They felt like this for most of the day. Around 10/11pm is when they started getting uncomfortable. I took a hot bath and turned the jets on and when I got out I kid you not, I peed every two minutes. I would pee, walk back to bed, get comfortable and have to get up and do it all over again. I didn’t sleep that night. My 40 week appointment / due date was Tuesday the 13th. My appointment was at 9:45am. By this time a few people had already texted me asking if our little dude was coming yet. I also was still peeing every two minutes. One of our friends thought maybe my water was breaking slowly. I called my OB office emergency line at 8am and they advised me to just head to the hospital.

We made it to the hospital around 9am. At this point I was at the waddling stage. I uncomfortably waddled all the way to the entrance of the hospital and when they admitted and checked me I was only 2cm dilated. Excuse me, what ? Now we just wait. Let me just say that every time I get hospitalized and have to have an IV something always goes wrong. This time was no different AND the needle is bigger. It took 3 tries to get it right. The first nurse put so much pressure on my WRIST after failing to put the IV in that I cried and instantly bruised and they had to bring an ice pack for my wrist. At this point she had another nurse take over who made it look easy and the first nurse didn’t come back until later in the afternoon to apologize. Side note: there were TWO nurses trying to put the IV in talking to each other and trying to find veins while a third nurse asks you a bunch of questions to try to distract you (this doesn’t work when they keep messing up). Please know, it is OKAY to tell them to shut the hell up and do one thing at a time. Moving on, I remember at one point they checked me again and I was still 2cm dilated and I was like, “I went backward?” I was so upset. My boyfriend had to reassure me that I was only 2cm when they first checked me so I actually just hadn’t progressed further yet. Lunch time came around and I ate the disgusting creamy chicken soup they brought me and took a cat nap. When I woke up around 4:30-5 I took a hot shower and as soon as I got out I immediately didn’t feel good. I projectile vomited into the trash can and crawled into bed. When the nurse came in they checked me again and I was 6cm dilated. I remember sleeping on and off and when I was awake I was just in so much pain.

My entire pregnancy I wanted to go all natural. We even looked into birthing centers! But by 1am I tapped out and decided to get the epidural. I didn’t do a bunch of research on epidurals because I was adamant that I didn’t want it soooo let me tell you I was surprised when I discovered they also put a catheter in. Once the epidural was done we thought all was going to be right during the rest of my labor but leave it to me to have an epidural not work. The pain didn’t go away. They tapped my epidural out and couldn’t give me anymore. I got about an hour or so of sleep… that was the blessing the epidural gave me. When I woke up I was still in pain, I could still feel everything, I could still feel my legs. At some point I finally dilated to 8cm and then was there forever. Or what felt like ever. Abe was my ice chip godsend and my permanent personal fan.

In the morning I was still at 8cm and the new labor and delivery nurse kept telling me I had to breathe through the contractions, which duh ? I’ve been doing that for HOURS before you took over, I’m aware. Eventually she had me do “choo choo” breaths which worked briefly until I could only make it through one breath. I remember telling the nurse how bad I had to poop and she kept telling me it was just the baby. I was positive that I had to poop but she swore it was the baby. At some point my body started ignoring my breathing and just pushing on it’s own and I kept being told I’m not ready to push and that if I do I could tear my cervix.

I started crying and it wasn’t because of the pain, it was because I physically couldn’t get my body to not push and I was being told not to push over and over again. I kept saying I can’t anymore, I can’t and the nurse was like, “yes you can, you’ve been doing it this whole time”. Again, I know; This is why I’m crying saying I can’t!

She checked me again and must have been confused or something because she went to get my OB to have him check me and as soon as he did he goes, “this baby is ready to come out now”. So, we FINALLY get to push although we had been pushing for probably the past ten minutes — maybe longer. I remember being so tired and so hot. Abe at one point had to let my leg go so he could fan me and give me ice. The doctor kept telling me to push while the nurse kept telling me to wait for the contraction. She gave me that feeling you get when you’re mad and your significant other tells you to calm down… if I wasn’t in pain I probably would have cussed her out and not felt bad about it. I totally understand that she was just doing her job but she stressed me out even more and made me feel like a child and the scare tactic she used telling me I was going to tear my cervix didn’t make me feel better, it made everything worse.

The doctor had to do a vacuum assisted delivery to bring Legend into this world because he turned his head just barely and his umbilical cord was wrapped around his shoulders. When he finally came out he cried once, they placed him on my chest and he stopped breathing and turned blue which in turn had me mentally shut down. They had to quickly cut the umbilical cord and help him breathe and when they gave him back his poor face was bruised. Legend was born on April 14th at 12:29pm weighing 7lb and 8oz.

The doctor told us that we had a complicated delivery and that a pool birth is what you see in the movies and our delivery is real life. Needless to say, I’m really happy we didn’t end up doing a pool birth because I would have been really upset if they would have had to transfer me to a hospital. By the time everything was done I almost passed out from exhaustion but the lactation consultant came in immediately and we had to feed the baby and not long afterward they transferred us to our postpartum room and at that point I was wide awake !

A few things I learned from this experience:

⁃ epidurals don’t always work

⁃ some nurses need better bed side manner

⁃ labor really freaking sucks

⁃ pushing isn’t so bad

⁃ babies suck the life out of you

⁃ the pressure from contractions suck reallllllly freaking bad and epidurals don’t help with pressure

⁃ ice chips are life

⁃ your body tells you when it’s ready even if the nurse says otherwise

⁃ You may get sick and throw up — this is normal

⁃ sometimes even your nurses don’t know why your epidural isn’t working

⁃ You’re not supposed to be able to walk to the bathroom immediately after birth… I did (everyone was surprised — again failed epidural)

⁃ You’ll never know just HOW complicated your labor / delivery is (they won’t tell you)

⁃ That first shower after giving birth is everything

⁃ Lidocaine spray becomes your best friend

⁃ You’ll likely need a diaper for a while after birth

I’m probably missing some things and if I am I’ll make a follow up post. But after everything was said and done I got my little Aries baby and although it was traumatizing and exhausting obviously I would do it all over again for this little boy. I will say that this experience would have been ten times worse without a supportive partner. Abe was amazing throughout the whole process and literally didn’t sleep while watching over me before the baby was born. I also can’t count the amount of ice chips he fed me or the amount of time he fanned me for but I know I couldn’t have done this without him.