Since I've had a request to post about the birthing experience, I must oblige my fans...I will spare everyone the gory details, but will give a reasonable accounting of the happenings. Tuesday morning (the 17th) I had my appointment with Dr Jones to check my progress (after having been dilated to 3cm for 2 weeks then 4cm for a week and a half). Still at 4. She highly recommended that I get induced that night. I really wanted to go "all natural" so I was pretty much against pitocin (the labor inducing drug). She explained there was also this other suppository thing they could do which was more "natural". Jay & I decided to go for it, so the 2 of us plus my mom headed to the hospital at 10pm that night.
After ariving and being checked out by the nurse, she informed us that per hospital policy, I was actually too far along to do the suppository thing. The options were to go home, babyless, again, or to stay and have pitocin. Dr Jones and also my mom's friend who is a nurse both informed us earlier that really pitocin is the same exact hormone that your body makes naturally for labor, and if they start slow and work up the dosage it really shouldn't be any different than the real thing. So we opted for that. By the time they got everything set up I think it was around 1am. They started the pitocin at the lowest level and gradually increased it all night long, about every hour I think. I didn't really get any sleep because I had to be strapped to an IV and 2 monitors (one for me and one for baby). So there was no way to get comfortable. I think by the early morning I was up to 5cm...I thought wow, that was slow, this is going to take forever.
But the next time they checked (I think around 9ish) I was already up to 8! I am so grateful, I was praying to be able to get through this whole ordeal without an epidural (I am seriously deathly afraid of the needle and possible side effects, though I know it's fine 99% of the time) so I was sooooo thankful that I had basically gotten to 8cm without really feeling the contractions too intense.
However, 8 to 10 cm was another story. That is "transition" and I was definitely feeling that! I don't think I would have been able to make it through that part without the help and expertise of my doula (labor and birth coach), Donna. She was awesome and came prepared with a multitude of massage items and advice on what to do and helped with my breathing. (The way I found Donna is a really weird coincidence, as she just happened to be shopping at Old Navy when I was there and started talking to me about being pregnant and she told me she was a doula. I had been looking into it but basically decided against it because of the cost. She is getting her certification though and needed a final birth to attend for free, all I had to do was fill out a little form at the end!)
At some point I made it to 9cm and the nurse decided to have me start pushing then, to break past 10. I'm not exactly sure why, but I guess she was right as it all worked out ok in the end. As Jay mentioned, I ended up having to push for 2 hrs, which is a while, but it could have been worse. The pushing part really sucked though and those are the gory details I will spare you. One thing I thought was cool though is that my riding instructor from CA read the blog and the part in Jay's post about me having the stamina to push for 2 hrs, and she emailed me back saying of course Jenna has stamina, she's a horseback rider, after all! That's one thing I really can't wait to get back to - riding! Hopefully even with a baby I will be able to take some time for myself to start that up again.
Anyways, after all that hard work Jay and I were rewarded with beautiful Laina, and of course, as any mom will tell you it's all worth it!
Recovery is going well. I was super sore everywhere (like being in a car accident or something) for a few days, but that is wearing off. We made our first trips out already, having been to the pediatrician's officeFriday and Saturday, out to lunch yesterday, and the grocery store yesterday. Laina loves her carseat and falls asleep every time (which I guess most babies do).
Anyways, that's the story from mommy's perspective. We'll keep the blog updated with pics and stuff probably more often than usual now, so keep checking. Sorry no new pics of Laina to post today - I'm slacking since Jay was taking all the pics and he went to work today. (We just watched Bruce Almighty yesterday and I feel like him, like I need a tagline to sign off with...but I got nothin')......
3 comments:
I cannot say how impressed I am that you did the whole thing au natural. I too have a deathly fear of needles but have resigned myself to the fact that during labor, I probably won't care. That's what everyone tells me anyway. Not that I have a birth in my near future (let's not start any rumors). And how awesome about the doula. What a blessing!
Tara, it's not the needle you should be afraid of, but the feet of tape they remove from your back after delivery. One would think that a doctor that can numb your lower half could find a tape that doesn't rip off your skin when it is removed!
I actually knew what a doula was when you mentioned it because they'd had one on Gilmore Girls, and then the couple ended up naming their baby girl Doula. Random.
That's awesome you were able to get through it without the epidural.
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