James Conner joined our family last week, Tuesday November 3rd at 7:54am. He weighed 7 lbs 15 oz, and was 20 inches long. Dark hair, and his eyes are already looking brown. We are so happy he is here!! (If you want to know all the details, keep scrolling down, I have a very detailed description of our birth experience.)
We are all doing well. James is a strong, healthy baby. William is loving being a big brother, most of the time. He's doing pretty good, but he has his jealous moments.
(WARNING: this is a VERY detailed description of James' birth, so if words like cervix, birth canal, or water gushing, make you twinge, DON'T read this.)
When we found out we were pregnant earlier this year, I did a lot of reflecting on my birth experience with William. It was not a good experience, and left me a little scarred. William was born almost 4 weeks early, my labor was highly managed by the doctors, I was given pitocin without being told what it was, William had jaundice pretty badly, no one helped me with breastfeeding – which was a miserable failure. I felt like a victim of pregnancy and labor. I felt like it was a medical experience, not a joyful family experience.
I began looking at other options, and I chose to try hypnobirthing for this birth. At first I wasn't sure about going “natural”, I had so much pain with William's birth before the epidural I didn't know if I could handle labor without medication.
Hypnobirthing is essentially using breathing imagery techniques to help the body relax. If the body can relax deeply, endorphins are produced – which are 100 times more powerful than morphine. Also, pain is enhanced by tension, so relaxing should reduce/eliminate the pain. I did a lot of research over the summer and finally decided to have the baby naturally with as few interventions as possible.
Labor started for me on October 18th. I had about 3 intense episodes of the thinning and opening phase of labor, with lots of time in between. These episodes would be between 9-18 hours long and my contractions would go from irregular to regular for a while. Then they would slow down, become irregular and stop. After each episode, I would be more dilated and effaced. On the 24th I was positive I was in labor and we spent the night in the hospital, only to go home disappointed. On Halloween, I had another one that lapsed into the next day.
I wasn't sure how much more of this I could take! On the 2nd of November, after talking to Earl and my hypnobirthing instructor, I finally decided to just let go. (Which if you know me well, that's a hard thing for me to do!) I finally did, I finally was okay with how ever long it would take, and I was okay with whenever the baby decided to be born.
A few hours later, on November 3, at 2 am, I got up to go to the bathroom. While walking to the bathroom I felt something trickle down my leg. “Oh great,” I thought, “now I'm losing control of my bladder”. Sitting on the toilet I woke up a little more and thought, just maybe, maybe, my membranes were leaking fluid. Hope swept through me and I leaned down to smell my leg to see if it was odorless or if it smelled like urine. (Oh, the things you do when you're pregnant!) It was odorless, yay! I kept going to the bathroom every five minutes after that so my bladder would be empty and I would be able to confirm that my membranes were leaking. About 20 minute later I had a gush of fluid on my way to the toilet. I was so excited and woke up Earl to tell him the good news. At this point my contractions were starting and we began getting our hospital bag together. I woke up my sister who was staying with us to tell her we'd be leaving for the hospital within the next few hours. At 4 am my contractions were getting close together and the intensity was increasing quickly. I wanted to stay home as long as possible, but Earl suggested that we head to the hospital because we didn't know how quickly the labor would go. I was scared that the contractions would get irregular and putter out again, but I had a feeling I needed to listen to Earl and go to the hospital.
We arrived at the hospital about 4:30 am, and I was glad I had listened to Earl because my contractions were about 1-2 minutes apart by that time. I was focusing on breathing and relaxing through each of the contractions.
I was 6 centimeters dilated. Not bad. And my contractions were VERY regular and intense at this point. While being monitored at triage, Earl helped me by doing some hypnobirthing scripts, which entails some imagery and breathing techniques to help relax the body and mind. It was working. I was able to relax both between and during the contractions so I wasn't experiencing any pain. What I felt during a contraction was an intense tightness, which was by no means comfortable or enjoyable – I did not like it, but I wouldn't classify it as painful.
The labor nurse arrived quickly and we were off to our room. They monitored the baby and my contractions, again, and gave me a round of antibiotics because I was GBS positive. I really didn't want a hep-lock, but in my little time for research I could find no way of getting the antibiotics a different way effectively. After they were finished, I got in the shower – the doctor didn't want me in the tub because my membranes had ruptured – but I knew if I needed to I would get in the tub anyway. For that time, the shower was doing it. I don't know how long I was in there, but the hot water running down my back really helped me relax deeper as the contractions became more intense.
All of a sudden I had to go to the bathroom, so I jumped out of the shower to go on the toilet. Sitting on the toilet felt amazing. So I stayed there for a few minutes. I think that opened up my pelvis a lot because then transition hit me. Wow, this was the incredibly hard part. It felt like the contractions accelerated exponentially. I couldn't keep up with my imagery and relaxation. These contractions jerked me out of my little bubble and I was in shock. I couldn't handle it. This is when I started considering getting medication and wondering if I could do it. I couldn't talk. Poor Earl would ask me questions and I couldn't answer. He just held me and used touch to help me relax in between the contractions. During these contractions I wanted to push, but instinctively I knew it wasn't time – even though I wanted it to be. Resisting the urges to push made it all the more miserable, so I began giving into my body and letting my abdomen tighten with each contraction, almost a push, but not quite. That was the only thing that gave me relief. After about 20 minutes, the urges to push got stronger along with everything else. I finally got the words out “I want to push”, so Earl called the nurses. The nurse came in to check me, but I pleadingly said “No”, and she respected that and left me alone. Earl and the nurse urged me to get off the toilet so that the baby wouldn't be born there. I really didn't want to get off the toilet, but I got off between the next contraction and went to the bed. The doctor was on her way, and I started giving in more and more to the urge to push.
When the doctor arrived, she briefly check me and told me I could push at any time. I started to half way push during the contractions because I didn't think it was quite time to push the baby out. But pushing was exhilarating. Labor just became more manageable. I had forgotten about “breathing the baby down” as we were taught in our hypnobirthing class. I could feel the baby moving down the birth canal, and when I felt the head near the end, I remembered my breathing for this part. I combined my breathing with some real pushing and after a few of those I felt the baby about to crown. I knew the next time the head would come out, which it did, half way. This part burned like crazy, because the baby's head was half way out, and I did my best to relax until the next contraction. I knew I didn't want to push the baby too quickly because I didn't want to tear. Relaxing between that last contraction was the hardest part, but I knew it would end and the baby would be out. On the next contraction the baby was born. He cried a little but was soothed once he was placed on me. His head was practically a perfect sphere, he was alert, and ready to eat. He recognized Earl's voice and turned his head to see his daddy. James found his way to the food source and latched on pretty good for the first time. I was still in my own little world, because I hardly heard anything the doctor and nurses said. I did hear them tell me they wanted to give me some pitocin to help my uterus contract and help the bleeding stop. I told them no, I wanted to breastfeed instead. They let me be, and breastfeeding did the trick. I did tear a little, now I'm going to sound like a baby, but the repair was painful, so were the contractions from breastfeeding.
I was so excited that the baby was born. I couldn't believe I did it. I had a baby naturally. It was such a healing and empowering experience for me. We felt like it was a family experience, not something that the doctors managed. I felt in control (except for during transition, the hardest part, when I wanted to give up, but didn't).
Earl was such a great bith partner. I could not have done it without him. He did such a great job helping me relax I could almost sleep in between contractions.
Now, as for the question, would I do it again? Ask me next year, I don't know. But, I do know that I'm happy with my two boys now.
