It was a gorgeous 74 degree sunny spring day in Kansas City. We were scheduled for an 8pm induction at the hospital and I was determined to make the most of my day at home. I took my exercise ball and some light weights outside and enjoyed soaking up some Vitamin D. I felt very calm that day- praying and leaning on the bunches of good luck texts from loved ones. (Thanks everyone!)
When Tony got home from work I prepped a light meal as instructed and we passed the time by rewatching some episodes of New Girl, just the four of us. At 5:45pm the hospital called and pushed our start time back to 10:00pm. That phone call was discouraging! I think bumping back a very pregnant lady’s induction time makes any airport delay look like a piece of cake. I was nervous that they would cancel us completely that night but as luck would have it, they didn’t.
We headed to the hospital around 10pm and the actual induction part began at 11:30pm with a cervadil suppository. I was only 1cm dilated so the thought was to place that in for 8ish hours and remove it in the morning with the hopes of being more dilated. The cervadil was not fun. I was contracting, cramping etc and even with an Ambien didn’t get much sleep that night. We watched Wonder Woman as I tried to relax and let the medication do its thing.
The next morning at 6:30am, the cervadil was removed and I had another uncomfortable cervical check. I was only 2cm at most and was pretty discouraged. My nurse told me that that was very normal for cervadil, and the main thing was that my cervix was very soft and nearly 100% effaced. I was told I had an hour or so before the pitocin would start, and was able to shower. Tony ran home (5 min from hospital) and let out our dogs and fed them breakfast. At 7:30am, the pitocin started and at 8am my doctor came in and wanted to break my water. I’d heard that it was uncomfortable so I asked if we could wait until Tony returned from home and that’s what we did. He held my hand as I squeezed it and had my waters broken with a plastic hook. (Gives me the willies.) I was shocked at how much came out! This was all around 9:30am and every half hour or so the pictocin level was increased, strengthening the contractions and increasing my discomfort. It’s definitely true that the contractions intensify when there isn’t amniotic fluid anymore. The fluid cushions the contractions and when it’s gone… so is the cushion.
At 11:30am I was struggling to power through the contractions. My pitocin was at 12/20 and I had a stupid goal of wanting to get to 5cm before getting the epidural. But another cervical check revealed that I didn’t make any change in 4 hours. So I decided to get the epidural. Within 15 minutes I was singing a different tune and watching HGTV (chip and jo marathon) with Tony. The epidural placement went so fast that I didn’t have time to be nervous about it. I think my family members got some pretty funny text messages from me at this point.
At 12:30 I was feeling so good that I took an hour nap. (well… an hour nap being interrupted by my blood pressure cuff going off every 15 minutes, which by the way hurt way more than I thought it would! I was so happy to lose that thing at the end of all this!)
I woke from my nap with break through pain, and despite hitting my PCA button a few times remained uncomfortable. My nurse came in (btw… she was the greatest nurse in the whole world- shout out to Anna M!) and decided to check me thinking that I was making some cervical change. Sure enough I was at 5cm! Like other friends’ had told me- in their experience the epidural helped them relax enough to dilate their cervix. My nurse decided to call anesthesia back in for another “big dose.” Within 30 min my pain was gone again and I was back to dozing/ship-lapping with a smile on my face.
A 4 pm check due to increased discomfort revealed that I was nearly complete- with just a stubborn anterior lip in the way. (Just a smudge of cervix holding the baby back from descending past the cervix completely.) Anna told me to kick back and relax and we would recheck in an hour.
5pm check: still anterior lip. Got another rebolus from anesthesia because my break through pain was back again and I took another hour to let my body do what it was supposed to do.
At 6:10 pm I was checked again, and I heard the words that both excited and terrified me. “It’s time to push.” And then the intimidating stirrups went up and the bed went from being a place of relaxation to a place of business.
At 6:17 pm I started my first push. For any people new to this, you push in 3 pushes lasting for 10 seconds each for a total of 30 seconds. It took me a couple rounds of pushes to know where and how to push, but I had such great coaching from Anna that once I figured it out I was pushing correctly for the rest of the time. Also to be noted, Tony made a “labor playlist” that he started for the pushing that began with “Bring ‘Em Out” by T.I. and then transitioned to some lighter country and pop. 🙂
Also to be noted, Tony had said that he would be a “north sider” and not look at what was going on down there, but given my short frame and how crunched you have to be to push in stirrups, he didn’t have much choice. What I remember is him kissing the side of my face at the end of the 3rd push and offering me an ice chip or two as he told me what a good job I was doing.
Let’s talk about the pushing for a second. It was amazing how little energy I had it by the end of the second push. For the third push it took all I had in me as I was praying to God to help me deliver this baby on the third push. I was generally gasping for breath by the time the third push was over. Tony would give me my ice chip and I would get to rest with as much rest as you can get it with your va-jay-jay exposed to the world and your feet up in stirrups until the next contraction began. But pushing for me basically became a religious experience, and I only had so much physical energy of my own. The verse “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” came to mind and I’m convinced that I was not pushing alone.
After 45 minutes, Anna had me feel Fiona’s head, which felt like a tiny sliver of slimy peach fuzz. She then hit the delivery button and called everyone in, telling me that it was only a matter of a few more pushes before she was here! What next felt like 20 minutes of incredibly awkward pushing (everyone was staring at my vajayjay) was Fiona doing me a favor. She was coming out at such a snails pace that it allowed my body to make small adjustments and not tear. She moved her little head back and forth as only her little sassy self would do. Anna had me feel her head one more time when she saw that I needed more encouragement- and I yelled out “oh come on!” Because this time her entire head felt like it was out. (Tony said it looked like one little ear lobe that was holding her back.)
The song on the playlist that I remember towards the end was “love your baby girl” by Sugarland. Holy moly the tears were flowing down my face. I remember feeling like I almost couldn’t push during that song because I was so in touch with the emotions surrounding this delivery- what we had to do to get here, the hope of a lifetime of good times with this sweet baby, that I was overcome with thoughts of joy, gratitude and excitement!
And then Zac Brown’s “Castaway” came on and helped me finish delivering Fiona at 7:21 p.m. I heard that her head was out, which didn’t feel that weird, but when they delivered the rest of her? It felt like a huge part of my body was leaving me! And then this blue, cheesy (sorry), slimy creature was placed on my chest. I couldn’t help myself- I immediately channeled the NRP algorithm of “warm, dry, stimulate” and started stimulating her! My next thought was that she needed percussion and CPAP because her sweet self sounded incredibly junky. But like many babies do- as time wore on she pinked up and cleared those secretions all while doing skin to skin with me.
What did I feel in those first moments? Fear and relief. But mostly I thought how absolutely insane this whole process is! Growing her for 9 months, birthing her, and now she was ours. As I looked at her, I thought “she is my baby- our baby.” She was created in God’s image and is the unique combination of Tony and me. How insane-and how absolutely amazing. She weighed in at 7 pounds and 12 ounces and was 20.75 inches long- my little perfect pink rainbow baby. Blessed much? Absofreakinglutely.
