A special thank you to Laura, Craig and Barbara for sharing their story.
My actual due date was July 7th, but my water broke at 6 am on Friday, July 1st. There was no warning as far as having contractions or anything like that. I woke up, and felt unusually wet. So I went to the bathroom and noticed a small stream of water continuously coming out. Then a big burst of water! I went and woke up my husband and said "I think my water just broke!". He wanted to see for himself, so back to the bathroom, and the stream of water continued, then another burst! About an hour later, after no contractions started, I called our midwife, Katie Isaac. She said to just wait and see if contractions would start and call her back in 5-6 hrs.
Contractions weren't starting! So I called Deb, our Bradley instructor around 8:30-9:00. Deb reassured me that all was okay, and to try nipple stimulation and thumb sucking. I sucked on one sucker so hard that the roof of my mouth became raw! And I didn't actually start the nipple stimulation until early in the afternoon. I must admit, during the morning, my husband and I were so unprepared. Weirdly enough, I had packed my bag the night before, but still had some things I wanted to gather. We had not even taken the car seat out of the box it came in, and we still wanted to purchase a digital camera and some food for me to eat. So, around 10 in the morning, Craig went off to Wal-Mart (our least favorite place to shop), for a quick trip to gather all the odd items. On the way home, he stopped and cleaned out the car--getting rid of nervous energy, and when he got home, he put the car seat in the car. I was relaxed all morning, calling my friends and sister, so excited that our baby would be born today!
I hadn't eaten any breakfast or drank any coffee (I'm a coffee-a-holic!), so I was really hungry, but didn't want to overeat. I ate a sandwich and some soup around lunchtime, then Craig and I went for a nice long walk with our dog. When we got home, I began the nipple stimulation, and did some yoga stretches, and tried to remain calm. At this point, all my friends are calling me now, anxious to hear if anything has happened. I called Katie to keep her apprised of the situation, and she reassured me to remain calm, but that contractions needed to start soon. She said that if contractions hadn't started by 6:00 pm that I should come on in to the hospital.
About 4:00 pm, some weak contractions began! They were anywhere from 4 to 10 minutes apart and would last anywhere from 20 to 45 seconds. Whenever my arms got tired and I stopped nipple stimulation (NS), the contractions got weaker, shorter, and further apart. I called Katie to tell her what was going on and she said "great, keep it up", and to get back to her later that evening. Through the evening, I kept up with the NS but the contractions remained weak, short, and not consistently close. We finally called Katie again in the evening and it was decided to go on in to the hospital and start on a low dose of pitocin. This was due to the fact that my water had already broken which put me on a timeline for having the birth due to the risk of infection. We arrived at the hospital in Frankfort at a little after midnite.
After being admitted, they checked me and I was just at 1 cm. They wanted to go ahead and start the pitocin, but we asked the nurse if we could take a short nap as we had been up pretty much all day. The nurse agreed and said she would be back in at 2:00 am. At 2 am, and after 3 needle pricks to find a vein, they started me on a very low dose of pitocin and contractions started soon thereafter. At about 6 am, Katie came in and checked me and said I was at 5 cm. I asked if I could go off the pitocin as I was pretty much confined to the bed while on it and I wanted to get up and move around. Katie agreed since I was showing progress but told me that if progress didn't continue then I would need to go back on the pitocin. I walked and squatted a lot for about 3 hrs and they checked me again; still at 5 cm. So, back on the pitocin. They checked me again at 12 noon and I was at 7 cm. I asked to go off the pitocin once again since I was showing progress. They again agreed and I walked and squatted for about 2 hrs. At this time I figured out that I was most comfortable laboring while standing up instead of sitting or lying down.
At 2 pm they checked me again and I was still at 7 cm. At this point Katie informed me that it was Dr's protocol that the baby be born by 6 pm (36 hrs after water broke) and that if labor did not progress towards that goal, then a c-section may be needed. I asked if an epidural would help get me there but they said not necessarily, that they needed to know how strong the contractions were and the only way to do that was with an internal monitor. We didn't want that but they pretty much insisted (this is not the internal fetal monitor that they screw in the baby's head, but a monitor that slides up past the baby into the uterus to measure how strong the contractions are). Well, they couldn't get the internal monitor in past the baby's head, so we were relieved.
At that point, I was put back on the pitocin and we really hoped that things would get moving along. It was at this time that Craig tells me I started showing some signs of transition (from 7 cm to 9 cm) as I was having lots of pain and unsure if I could keep going. I was also extremely tired by now. I was mainly standing up next to the bed during contractions, and sitting down to rest in between them. I was so exhausted that Craig had to help me up each time. I would doze off while sitting down between the contractions. At 5 pm, they checked me again, and I was at 9 cm plus. WOOHOO!!!! I then began having feelings of needing to go to the bathroom (#2), but it was the onset of the urge to push. So, soon thereafter, I went into pushing stage. Talk about a LOT of work. I would take a deep breath and PUUUUUUSH, then another small breath and PUUUUUUUSH, and then one more small push and then rest. Finally, they could see the baby's head appearing and then disappearing each time. Then, the baby crowned!!! Katie tried to tell me to ease up on the pushing now but the urge was too strong and I gave one more mighty push and, at 6:42 pm, July 2nd, out popped the baby!!! Craig had two hands there to catch the baby and then the student midwife (Kristi) took the baby and laid it up on my belly (the umbilical cord was too short for the baby to reach my chest). Once on the belly, we parted the legs to find that we had a beautiful baby GIRL!! After about 20 minutes, the umbilical cord stopped pulsing and Craig cut the cord. Then, little Barbara Audelle was placed on my breast where she began nosing around and nuzzling the breast. She weighed in at 7 lb, 1 oz and was 20 inches long. I had to have 6 stitches for some tearing. This was partly due to the last big push, but also due to little Barbara having one hand on her cheek as she came out.
The folks at the hospital were very supportive and never once offered pain meds or an epidural. They all encouraged me throughout the labor reassuring me that I could do this! It was an incredible and very positive experience despite the lengthy and exhausting labor and birth!
She's worth it!
