Oh My!
Second Baby
2008 Women and Infants, changed from OB to Women’s Care Midwifery in third trimester
Boy have I got a story for you all....
I suppose I'll start from the beginning, since you already know the outcome :)
This past Friday morning at around 8:30, (God only knows how I survived until then), my water broke while taking a leisurely shower....which was incredibly convenient might I add! I had just been to see my midwife on Wednesday, and knew that I was fully effaced and 5cm....and the waiting was just killing us! So I puttered around all day, waiting for the surges to start, and when I hadn't felt a single one by about 2 oclock that afternoon, C and I came up with a plan.
We got in touch with a Doctor of Acupuncture in Providence named Sara Ryan, who was absolutely thrilled at the prospect of utilizing her training in Eastern medicine to prick all my pregnancy no-no spots and help boost me into labor. I've never had acupuncture before, and it was such an amazing experience. She brought out the "big guns" and stuck me everywhere from my ears down to my pinky toes, and hooked me up to a small electrode machine, which delivered tiny electrical pulses to the most important of the needles. It was so wild. I remember thinking to myself, even if this doesn't work, this was totally worth it!
So we headed back home with our fingers crossed, each of us trying to pretend that we could think about other things. In reality, we were both just watching the clock,......waiting.....waiting.....waiting....
No surges....So I finally called my midwife around 5pm, was gently reprimanded for not having called earlier that morning, and was asked to come into the hospital so that she could check the baby and be sure that my membranes had ruptured. So we obliged, the baby was happy as a clam, and I had not a contraction to be seen for the entire half an hour we were there and hooked up to the EFM. The midwife could think of nothing to do besides send us home, with instructions to return at about 10 o’clock the following morning.......providing that nothing more exciting come up before then.
So home we went, the time was about 9:30 in the evening......Still no surges.
We stopped to pick up some spicy italian pasta dishes on the way home at our favorite local spot, Pinelli's :) My good friend J had been at our house with V, who was sound asleep by the time we got there. We sat down to enjoy a meal and take our minds off of the impending doom of Pitocin.
I had nearly finished my meal when all hell broke loose.
The first surge hit me like a mac truck.......it literally came out of nowhere! The second surge came nearly 8 minutes later....the third came 4 minutes later...... and the fourth came not even 2 minutes after that. It didn't take us long to realize that we wouldn't be timing these for an hour. We scrambled to get into the car with all of our pillows and towels for the seats and water bottles and overnight bags and everything else we could think of. Well, in all actuality, C did all of those things. I was desperately trying to keep my cool, posted up on the toilet in our tiny apartment bathroom while J held onto me and reminded me to breathe. In my mind, all I was thinking was, "There's no way we're going to make it to the hospital."
We finally got into the car, and all that was left between us and the ABC was 15 minutes.....
So here was C, driving about 90 miles an hour up route 95, somehow reciting scripts for me off the top of his head while simultaneously sleep breathing. And there I was, in the passenger seat, eyes closed, concentrating on his words and my own breaths, when I felt the urge to push.
We were still about 5 minutes from the hospital when I turned to C and said, "I need to push, I need to push!"
His immediate response was, "NO YOU DONT!"
What could I next that would let him know I was serious.......
"Pull over ...you need to catch this thing!" I said.
I repeated myself a few more times while poor C desperately tried to decide whether to keep going or pull over and "catch this thing." It was then that he saw the exit for the hospital, which was 2 miles away. I felt the Jeep's 6 cylinders kick into high gear, and without even opening my eyes I knew he had decided to try and make it to the hospital.
But this baby had another plan...
Just then I felt the most incredible surging (sounds cliche but its truly the only word to describe it) reflex, and when I reached down between my legs, I felt the tiny little head that had just emerged into the world. I threw my feet up onto the dashboard and accepted the inevitable.
"The heads out!" I said to him,
The disbelief was evident in his response, "NO ITS NOT!"
I took a deep breath and felt another surge, along with a set of shoulders that effortlessly wedged their way into my arms. And...well we've all seen the videos, there's not much work to be done after those shoulders are free, so I reached down with my other hand and pulled this little being up onto my chest. She gurgled for a few seconds, and then let out the slightest little cry... which let us know she was all right. It was then that C accepted the fact that the head truly was coming out, and he laughed and laughed and put his hand on her back and the three of us took our first breaths together as he took the exit towards the hospital.
We pulled up the front doors, C ran in to get some reinforcements, and came back to the car with about 40 nurses and doctors. I stepped out of the car, baby in hands, and crawled up onto a stretcher they had brought out. It was then that I realized I hadn't even looked to see if I was holding a boy or girl, and I asked the closest nurse to look for me. :)
It's a girl! she said... It's a girl! I said... It's a girl!! C said. and we proceeded through the lobby of Women's & Infants, undoubtedly giving everyone in the waiting room the show of their lives.
And the rest is history.......less than 10 hours later we took L home with us to meet her big brother.
***Now there are a few Hypnobirthing affirmations that I had along the way, that I feel as though the three of you must know.
1. First of all, I never pushed once. There truly IS an expulsive reflex in the body that will take control during childbirth if you give it the freedom to do so. There was not an ounce of effort exerted on my part, not one single push.
2. Had I not watched sooo many videos of women, giving birth to their own children entirely unassisted, I would never have had the mental capacity to believe that I could do it on my own. There was something totally subconscious that was activated in my mind, as soon as I felt her descending into the birth canal, and felt her head emerge. It was all business, no screaming, I never felt frantic or out of control, I just did it. It was nothing I ever had to think about, it just happened.
3. DO PERENNIAL MASSAGES!
So, even though we expected my labor to be a quick one, 40 minutes was certainly not the time frame I had in mind. Nonetheless, everyone is happy and healthy, and my car desperately needs to be detailed!
Hope this story reaches all of you in good spirits, Thank you Allison for giving me everything that I needed to welcome L into the world… :) Miracles happen.
With Love,
L, C, V & L
