bnizzlebizzle's birth story (long)
Apr 5, 2015 10:30:47 GMT -5
Post by bnizzlebizzle on Apr 5, 2015 10:30:47 GMT -5
We welcomed Nova Susanne, weighing 8lbs 7oz., to the world on Monday, March 30th at 2:28pm (5 days after my due date). With the help of DH and my amazing doula, I succeeded in following my pain medication free birth plan. From start to finish my labor was about 12 hours including only 2 ½ hours laboring in the hospital. We finally got home Thursday due to a slightly longer stay caused by jaundice - but she's now doing great.
Details for those interested:
Labor was so much easier and quicker the second time around and I didn’t need to get induced this time! I started having contractions around 2:30am on 3/30. They felt more uncomfortable than the Braxton hicks I felt previously, but I wasn’t sure if it was the start of labor. I woke DH up a half hour later because I wanted a bit more support. I texted my doula at 3:30 to let her know this might be it and took a bath. After the bath, I was pretty convinced that this was the start of labor. DH and I decided we should call everyone because we needed to make sure we had care for our older daughter. We also decided now was the time we really should pack our hospital bag.
I called my mom at 5:10 to get her up to drive here (3-4 hours away) so we’d have someone to take care of DD1. Left a message and tried not to panic. I thought I’d be in the house a while. My mom finally called back 30 minutes later and said she’d come up. I called my doula at 5:30. She asked if I could talk through the contractions, which I obviously could. She texted at 6:45 that she was ready to go and we said that would be good.
DH called his sister to drive up in the meantime to take care of DD1. She arrived around 7 and DD1 got up soon afterwards. I was still able to help get DD1 ready as long as I could take breaks. DH's sister did a fantastic job entertaining her while we were waiting for my mom to show up.
My doula arrived at about 7:30. We watched the news, the Aaron Hernandez trial, and the opening of the Edward Kennedy Institute while I labored. I made sure to eat and drink since I didn’t know how long I’d be in labor and need to keep up my strength. Aaron Hernandez’s ex-fiancé is clearly either an idiot or is hiding something. I guess those two things don’t need to be mutually exclusive.
My mom arrived at about 10:30. By then I had to change positions and groan/moan through the contractions. I’m glad she wasn’t called up for a false alarm.
My waters sprung a leak at about 11:15 during Biden’s speech for the opening of the Kennedy Institute. DH said “Joe Biden’s been known to have that effect on women”. We called L&D and they said to come in since I was GBS+. I called my doctor to let her know we were going. I put on the worst outfit imaginable to go outside to the car. I rode with DH and my doula took her own car.
Labor quickly ramped up in the car. I’d been managing the pain by squatting and kneeling and I couldn’t do any of that in there. However, the ride wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be because I guess our route didn’t traverse any of the closed roads for the President’s visit. The Kennedy Institute is about 2 miles from our house. However, it was normal city traffic and DH had a hard time concentrating with a flailing, wailing woman in the back seat of the car.
The drop off was not smooth. My hospital was undergoing construction and the ER drop off was closed. We had to wait in a line of cars at the front of the hospital for several minutes (5?) before I could get out of the car. A taxi nearly cut us in line and my husband rolled down the window and yelled at him that I was in labor. Thankfully he let us go. The valet got the wheelchair and brought me up to L&D while DH took care of the car. I was really feeling the contractions at that point and was moaning through the halls of the hospital. Since this was the valet, she needed directions for where to go and I couldn’t communicate well but I guess it was pretty obvious to the people at the information booth what needed to happen.
I got up to L&D a little after noon. Check-in only took a few minutes. I recognized the woman at the desk, a midwife, and a nurse from an earlier trip to L&D for fainting about 4 1/2 months ago. I irritatingly had to get vitals done, pee in a cup, get weighed, and get asked a bunch of questions before they would check my cervix and admit me, so we spent about 30 minutes in the triage room. I was at 4cm and the contractions were audibly intense so they went ahead and got me a birthing room.
Immediately I had to be hooked up to an IV to get antibiotics for the GBS+ status. Then they needed to inform me of procedures and ask a bunch of questions I could barely answer at this point. I had to sign two papers about anesthesia that took about 2 contractions to do so. At two points I said “I don’t know if I can do this” but my doula reminded me that I already was and communicated my birth plan to the anesthesiologist. My husband made sure they knew that I wanted to keep the placenta and they said they’d have to find the form for that. Thankfully I didn’t need to sign that until after the birth.
My doula asked if I would like some music and DH said he knew exactly the thing to play. Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy” came on and I quickly shut that down. Nova was actually birthed to Beck's new album (Kanye was shaking his head in the waiting room), which helped me relax through the worst of it.
Once the antibiotics were finished and some fetal monitoring could be done, I no longer had to be tied to the bed. The nurse and my doula suggested laboring in the shower to relax and finish dilating. So I got into the shower and was hosed down like a wild animal while I squatted, writhed, and made sounds my husband has never heard come out of my mouth through each contraction. After about 30 minutes I felt pressure and thought I was ready to push.
I hobbled back over to the bed to get my cervix checked again and the attending doctor said I was fully dilated and ready to push. I remember thinking “Really? That wasn’t bad!” – a far different reaction from my first birth in which I said, “Why would anyone do this twice?” After about 4 or 5 contractions I pushed Nova out in the hands and knees position. We didn’t know the sex and I got to see that she was a girl as soon as she came out, which was awesome. I think I told my husband. The doctor asked my husband if he wanted to cut the cord and with terror in his eyes my husband said “no.” The doctor, disbelieving asked him again and he reiterated he didn’t want to thinking the doctor probably didn’t want to treat a head injury from a support person passing out in the delivery room.
My doctor finally arrived just after Nova was delivered. She was at the Kennedy Institute opening and was told she couldn’t leave until Obama left. After a bit of finagling, she found a ride on an EMT ambulance and got out of there as soon as she could. She came in wearing a cocktail dress and my doula remarked that she was the best-dressed doctor she’s seen and my husband wondered “who is this woman in a cocktail dress”. I’d been going to my appointments alone. She was able to stitch up the one small tear I had. I knew I didn’t escape unscathed when I heard the conversation between my doctor and the attending about something being “part of the labia”. Ugh.
The nurse put our placenta into a Tupperware container and put it on ice. DH met up with the woman making my placenta pills a few hours later on the side of the street (right next to the methadone clinic and the homeless shelter) by the hospital to give her the goods. A day and a half later, she came back and he exchanged cash for the pills.
Oh, and we forgot to put out the trash before we left for the hospital and now we’re swimming in it until Monday night. We also forgot to pack the going home outfit in our suitcase and made our poor girl suffer a fashion crisis worse than what we put her big sister through almost 3 years ago on the way home. No pants! And here are some blankets to cover up that mess.
If you made it through this, congrats! Here are some pictures:
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Details for those interested:
Labor was so much easier and quicker the second time around and I didn’t need to get induced this time! I started having contractions around 2:30am on 3/30. They felt more uncomfortable than the Braxton hicks I felt previously, but I wasn’t sure if it was the start of labor. I woke DH up a half hour later because I wanted a bit more support. I texted my doula at 3:30 to let her know this might be it and took a bath. After the bath, I was pretty convinced that this was the start of labor. DH and I decided we should call everyone because we needed to make sure we had care for our older daughter. We also decided now was the time we really should pack our hospital bag.
I called my mom at 5:10 to get her up to drive here (3-4 hours away) so we’d have someone to take care of DD1. Left a message and tried not to panic. I thought I’d be in the house a while. My mom finally called back 30 minutes later and said she’d come up. I called my doula at 5:30. She asked if I could talk through the contractions, which I obviously could. She texted at 6:45 that she was ready to go and we said that would be good.
DH called his sister to drive up in the meantime to take care of DD1. She arrived around 7 and DD1 got up soon afterwards. I was still able to help get DD1 ready as long as I could take breaks. DH's sister did a fantastic job entertaining her while we were waiting for my mom to show up.
My doula arrived at about 7:30. We watched the news, the Aaron Hernandez trial, and the opening of the Edward Kennedy Institute while I labored. I made sure to eat and drink since I didn’t know how long I’d be in labor and need to keep up my strength. Aaron Hernandez’s ex-fiancé is clearly either an idiot or is hiding something. I guess those two things don’t need to be mutually exclusive.
My mom arrived at about 10:30. By then I had to change positions and groan/moan through the contractions. I’m glad she wasn’t called up for a false alarm.
My waters sprung a leak at about 11:15 during Biden’s speech for the opening of the Kennedy Institute. DH said “Joe Biden’s been known to have that effect on women”. We called L&D and they said to come in since I was GBS+. I called my doctor to let her know we were going. I put on the worst outfit imaginable to go outside to the car. I rode with DH and my doula took her own car.
Labor quickly ramped up in the car. I’d been managing the pain by squatting and kneeling and I couldn’t do any of that in there. However, the ride wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be because I guess our route didn’t traverse any of the closed roads for the President’s visit. The Kennedy Institute is about 2 miles from our house. However, it was normal city traffic and DH had a hard time concentrating with a flailing, wailing woman in the back seat of the car.
The drop off was not smooth. My hospital was undergoing construction and the ER drop off was closed. We had to wait in a line of cars at the front of the hospital for several minutes (5?) before I could get out of the car. A taxi nearly cut us in line and my husband rolled down the window and yelled at him that I was in labor. Thankfully he let us go. The valet got the wheelchair and brought me up to L&D while DH took care of the car. I was really feeling the contractions at that point and was moaning through the halls of the hospital. Since this was the valet, she needed directions for where to go and I couldn’t communicate well but I guess it was pretty obvious to the people at the information booth what needed to happen.
I got up to L&D a little after noon. Check-in only took a few minutes. I recognized the woman at the desk, a midwife, and a nurse from an earlier trip to L&D for fainting about 4 1/2 months ago. I irritatingly had to get vitals done, pee in a cup, get weighed, and get asked a bunch of questions before they would check my cervix and admit me, so we spent about 30 minutes in the triage room. I was at 4cm and the contractions were audibly intense so they went ahead and got me a birthing room.
Immediately I had to be hooked up to an IV to get antibiotics for the GBS+ status. Then they needed to inform me of procedures and ask a bunch of questions I could barely answer at this point. I had to sign two papers about anesthesia that took about 2 contractions to do so. At two points I said “I don’t know if I can do this” but my doula reminded me that I already was and communicated my birth plan to the anesthesiologist. My husband made sure they knew that I wanted to keep the placenta and they said they’d have to find the form for that. Thankfully I didn’t need to sign that until after the birth.
My doula asked if I would like some music and DH said he knew exactly the thing to play. Prince’s “Let’s Go Crazy” came on and I quickly shut that down. Nova was actually birthed to Beck's new album (Kanye was shaking his head in the waiting room), which helped me relax through the worst of it.
Once the antibiotics were finished and some fetal monitoring could be done, I no longer had to be tied to the bed. The nurse and my doula suggested laboring in the shower to relax and finish dilating. So I got into the shower and was hosed down like a wild animal while I squatted, writhed, and made sounds my husband has never heard come out of my mouth through each contraction. After about 30 minutes I felt pressure and thought I was ready to push.
I hobbled back over to the bed to get my cervix checked again and the attending doctor said I was fully dilated and ready to push. I remember thinking “Really? That wasn’t bad!” – a far different reaction from my first birth in which I said, “Why would anyone do this twice?” After about 4 or 5 contractions I pushed Nova out in the hands and knees position. We didn’t know the sex and I got to see that she was a girl as soon as she came out, which was awesome. I think I told my husband. The doctor asked my husband if he wanted to cut the cord and with terror in his eyes my husband said “no.” The doctor, disbelieving asked him again and he reiterated he didn’t want to thinking the doctor probably didn’t want to treat a head injury from a support person passing out in the delivery room.
My doctor finally arrived just after Nova was delivered. She was at the Kennedy Institute opening and was told she couldn’t leave until Obama left. After a bit of finagling, she found a ride on an EMT ambulance and got out of there as soon as she could. She came in wearing a cocktail dress and my doula remarked that she was the best-dressed doctor she’s seen and my husband wondered “who is this woman in a cocktail dress”. I’d been going to my appointments alone. She was able to stitch up the one small tear I had. I knew I didn’t escape unscathed when I heard the conversation between my doctor and the attending about something being “part of the labia”. Ugh.
The nurse put our placenta into a Tupperware container and put it on ice. DH met up with the woman making my placenta pills a few hours later on the side of the street (right next to the methadone clinic and the homeless shelter) by the hospital to give her the goods. A day and a half later, she came back and he exchanged cash for the pills.
Oh, and we forgot to put out the trash before we left for the hospital and now we’re swimming in it until Monday night. We also forgot to pack the going home outfit in our suitcase and made our poor girl suffer a fashion crisis worse than what we put her big sister through almost 3 years ago on the way home. No pants! And here are some blankets to cover up that mess.
If you made it through this, congrats! Here are some pictures:
