Long labour story

My labour and birth story. This is definitely more for me than for you. I'm not sure if I'll wind up posting this because it is ridiculously long, but I wanted to write it down while I remembered it.

Wednesday, June 10

I had an ultrasound because I was 41 weeks. Everything looked good and they estimated that the baby would be 9lbs 14oz.

Thursday, June 11

At my midwife appointment, it was determined that the baby was still way too high and that a natural labour looked almost impossible. I was meeting with the doctor on Friday who would be doing my c-section, if I would need one. My midwife told me to prepare myself for a c-section possibly that Friday, or the following Tuesday. It looked like my hopes of having a natural labour were being dashed.

Around 2 in the morning, I realized I was having a bad night's sleep, waking up every 10 minutes or so having some pretty bad back pains. I was excited! (Little did I know what would come of this. Perhaps that excitement should have been fear!) I also was pumped to discover that I was losing my mucus plug. Possibly too much information, but you don't understand. With Chelsea, my body showed no signs of labour, ever. This was all me - all my body, doing what it was supposed to. Woo hoo!! The contractions continued every 10-11 minutes, all Thursday night and were intense enough that I had to get out of bed each time to find a better position. It was a long night, but I managed to sleep between contractions.

Friday, June 12

I met with the doctor who would be performing my c-section, if I needed one. I was still having contractions, so we decided to schedule a c-section for Tuesday, June 16, if I needed it. Again, I was told that the baby was still way too high but we were hopeful that the contractions would help bring him down. The contractions were coming about every 10 minutes, but were easy enough to breathe through and continue on my day.

Friday night, around 8:30, the contractions became intense again - every 6 or 7 minutes, lasting a minute or so. My midwives were actually off-call this weekend, so a different midwife (who also was amazing) came to my house to check me and see how things were going. We discovered that I was about 2 cm dilated and that the baby had dropped slightly. Progress was being made. She told me to give her a call when the contractions were about 4-5 minutes apart and we'd meet at the hospital later that night, or by morning for sure.

That night was crazy intense. I was up the whole night, because laying in bed was too painful. I did all sorts to ease the pain of contractions - different positions, showering, a hot bath, using counter pressure (thanks Chris), massage, and breathing. All through this, I remained excited, thinking that this way all progress and signs that things were moving in the right direction.

However, Saturday morning, around 7:30 in the morning, the contractions started to go away. Disappointed, I called the midwife to say that the contractions were again about every 10 - 15 minutes apart. She told me to take the day to sleep as much as I could because it was her experience that the labour would probably begin again at night. I spent the day sleeping, only getting up for a few minutes at a time. I was exhausted.

Saturday night, the contractions began again... slowly at first about every 10 minutes, then 7 minutes, then consistently about every 6 minutes apart. I called the midwife that was oncall and let her know what was going on. She said to phone her when they were about every 4-5 minutes apart, lasting for about a minute. We planned to just meet her at the hospital.

During the night, we tried to sleep but it wasn't working well. By 12:30, we were up and around, labouring mostly in the kitchen. My contractions suddenly went from every 6 minutes apart to every 3 - 3 1/2 minutes apart. Chris wanted to phone the midwife with the first 3 minute contraction, but I wanted to wait. I didn't want to wind up going to the hospital only to have the contractions slow down again.

But after about 45 minutes of contractions every 3 minutes, we called the midwife and set off to good old Hotel Boundary Trails at 3:30 in the morning. We met the midwife there and laboured for a while just moving around, trying different positions. I had to get my dreaded IV put in (I have a serious HATRED of the IV), but the nurse did well and got it in on the first try. I was pretty proud of myself for not crying during the IV process. My midwife began to fill the birthing pool and just before I got in, she checked and I was at 6cm. I was pumped that things were happening, but again, we were concerned because the baby was just too high up. We were hoping the contractions would bring him down.

I got in the birthing pool and it felt like instant relief... for a few minutes. I was able to relax in the pool between contractions, but my contractions were certainly intense and painful. Chris joined me in the birthing pool so that it was easier for him to apply counter pressure on my back during each contraction.

One of the concerns with the baby being so high is that if my water were to break and gush, the cord can come out and over the baby's head. On Thursday night, the midwife had told me that if my water were to break and gush at home (not a slow leak) that I was to get on my shoulders and knees and call 911. That scared me, so I was glad to be at the hospital when my water did break. It broke while I was in the birthing pool, so my midwife checked me right away and everything was good. I'm still a little disappointed that I didn't get to see the gush, but I'm over it.

I have no clue how long we stayed in the birthing pool. I had lost all track of time by now. When my water broke, I had been at 8cm, but we discovered it wasn't a true 8, and when the water broke it was really only 6cm. We decided to get out of the pool and try some different positions to ease the pain of contractions and hopefully bring the baby down.

Easier said than done. My contractions suddenly started coming back to back. I'd have 4-5 minutes of contractions and only 30 seconds to a minute to recover. I thought I was going to die. I'm sure I was saying inappropriate things and making rather odd noises. At this time, my body started pushing, attempting to get the baby down into the canal. It wasn't working, and during each contraction I was being told to stop pushing and breathe, but I swear it wasn't me pushing! It was crazy. I begged for drugs as I was somewhere between 6-8 cm and wasn't getting a break between contractions. While waiting for the glorious anesthesiologist to show up for my epidural, I was given the laughing gas and something in my IV. Even this was such a relief. I was at least able to breathe and felt like I was flying. In response to something my midwife asked me, all I could say was "I'm in la la land. I love this." I remember asking if the midwife was mad that I was taking drugs and she reassured me that all was good and that drugs were for women who had long intense labours and I had earned it. I was happy.

I think I fell in love with my anesthesiologist. I'll call him Dr. K. He was fantastic, although I don't remember too much because I was sucking back the laughing gas like it was a vanilla milkshake. He was reassuring and telling jokes and was encouraging. When I got the epidural, I was sooo pleased because it actually worked. When I had Chelsea, the epidural didn't work like it was supposed to and I could still feel every contraction, but couldn't move my legs. This time, it worked like a charm - almost. I could feel no more pain in my back or belly and could walk around, but because of the way the baby was positioned, I could feel every contraction in my bum. It was painful and odd. Dr. K. came back and put something in my IV for bum pain. Who knew there was such a wondrous drug?

Shortly after the epidural, but before the bum pain meds came, the baby's heartbeat began to show signs of stress. I had to lay on my side and be hooked to the monitors. They told me it would only be for 20 minutes, so I thought I could handle it. Although the epidural was working, the bum pain was ridiculous and it was magnified by the fact that I couldn't move. I had to lay there on my side and not move during each contraction. Although they told me 20 minutes, because they were concerned, I had to be monitored for over an hour. It was horrible, but sometime in there Dr.K. showed up and used his magical powers to take away the bum pain and I was able to relax and even rest a little.

Soon, I was up and walking around, dilated to a full 8 cm. This was around 11:00 in the morning. The problem was that even though I was feeling no pain (it was AMAZING!) my body was still pushing with every contraction. This isn't a good thing. My cervix began to swell and that's when we knew it was over. The baby was simply not coming down and once the cervix swells, it takes too long to recover to let it dilate again. I was given until 1:00 to see what my body would do, but we weren't hopeful. At 1:00 Dr.M. shows up and says that this has gone on long enough and it was time for the c-section. At this point, no one could argue. I had done my best, given my body every opportunity to do what it could, but it wasn't working. Another c-section it was. I was at peace with this. I had tried, but it simply wasn't working.

Suddenly the room was filled with people and I don't remember much. As I was being prepped for surgery, everything caught up with me and I fell asleep. I remember thinking that they must have put something in my IV to make me sleepy but everyone was laughing at how I just slept through it all, all by myself. No extra drugs, just pure exhaustion.

In the operating room, Dr. K. was by my side the whole time - again reassuring me, distracting me and trying to stop my shivering with warm blankets. They didn't need to give me a spinal, they were able to use the epidural. This was great because I still had full use of my hands and arms and I didn't need another injection site in my back. With C, I couldn't feel my hands for a long time after the surgery which made bonding with the baby very difficult.

Chris soon joined me and we waited with anticipation to meet our baby boy. We were all talking and laughing and waiting for this baby to make his appearance. Having a c-section really is a surreal experience because there is so much going on beyond that little blue curtain, but you have no idea what it is.

I kept asking what was taking so long because I had been told that from the first incision to getting baby out takes only 7-8 minutes and it felt way longer. Again, I was unaware of what was really going on. The baby was so stuck that they had to work hard using forceps to get him out. Then, because he had pooped, he was taken away for a few moments to get cleaned up and suctioned out. I'm told they had to work a bit to get him to breathe, but finally we were presented with the most amazing little boy.

What an ordeal. What an experience. What a long blog post.