Monthly Archives: May 2010

When Paula came in and listened to me having one of these crazy grunty, bearing-down, contractions, she happily announced that it sounded like we were getting somewhere – and much sooner than she had expected. She checked me (which, by the way, didn’t really hurt. I’m sure everyone is different, but I thought getting my cervix checked would kill and it really didn’t. In fact, I didn’t really feel it at all) and I was 7cm. She asked me if I wanted to go to the birth center, and I just laughed at her . . . the suggestion was like I get up and fly to Albania. I had spent so much time trying to avoid the hospital and, in the end, it really didn’t matter where I gave birth as long as I was doing it my way and I had my midwife, John, and my doula. So, I ended up birthing Elsa right there on the labor and delivery floor in the hospital – and it was just fine.

Then – transition. Which was just as intense as people say it is. I threw up once (but maybe you wont!) and, while I was throwing up, I was farting like crazy, laughing hysterically and yelling. I felt like the Exorcist, minus the crucifix. I tell you this because, hopefully, if super embarrassing things feel like they are happening to you, then you can just remember that I was throwing up, farting like an old man, and yelling, “This is so violent!!!”. Transition was probably the most out-of-control part but it only lasted about 3 contractions. Paula checked me again – finally 10 cm.

So – pushing. I don’t even know what to say about it. Here is the deal. I read about 600 birth stories before I actually gave birth. And I was expecting some things. I thought I would get a break after transition and be able to gather myself a little before pushing. I thought pushing would feel good (that is what all the hippies say!). I thought I would give birth squatting. None of these things happened.

So – for me – pushing was totally crazy. For you, it might feel good. All the hippies describe it like, “I knew my baby was close so I was happy to push.” To be honest . . . I was totally uninterested in the baby at this point. My midwife kept cajoling me, “Don’t you want to see your baby?” but I wasn’t able to connect labor/pushing with the fact that a baby was going to be the end product. Maybe because Elsa wasn’t planned? Some women work SO hard to get pregnant, so by the time they are pushing, they feel really excited to see their baby. I just felt totally wrapped up in the whole physical experience . . . I almost forgot that a baby was coming out.

So I pushed. And I could feel what I had to do but I was scared to do it. It was very, very intense. And finally, about an hour into pushing, I came to the realization that I was not going to get out of the whole situation unless I faced the scary feeling. There were some dark moments and some quite a lot of whimpering about how scared I felt.

But in the end, you have to go to that horrible scary place. And I did. I pushed. And about 30 minutes later, Elsa appeared. Ring of fire? One of the few things that I read about that was an accurate description. But it’s transient. And it goes away. And a tiny human will be laying on your belly. A human will emerge from out of your body. I don’t think our culture pays enough attention to this fact . . . small humans come out of bigger humans’ vaginas. I mean, what??? Why are people not talking about it ALL the time?

Oh – and the poop? My midwife joked afterwards, “And not even one little bit of poop – I’m dissapointed!”

And a few tidbits that didn’t fit into the story:

1. Stitches are not so bad (I was TERRIFIED of them before I gave birth) – I had a superficial tear and had never had stitches before. I barely felt them. You are somewhat blissfully numb down there initially. Plus she used numbing medicine.

2. It took me about 4 days to be able to walk like a normal person. The great bowling ball of birth that I had in my ass? It stuck around for about 4 days and made me walk like Quasimodo for awhile. By 1 week later, I could truthfully say I felt fine.

3. I gained a lot of weight during my pregnancy. 45 lbs. And in the first 24 hours, I lost 14 lbs. (9.2 of which was baby). That kind of body shift feels CRAZY. I felt all of my organs rearranging and shifting during that first 24 hrs as they took advantage of all the extra room. I had a hard time readjusting to breathing again without a giant baby pushing on my diaphragm. I kept telling the nurses I felt short of breath – especially when I got up to walk around – but my vital signs were all normal and they told me not to worry (which I did anyway). It was all very weird feeling – but like the rest of the whole experience – also very fleeting.

4. Sex after birth is possible – and for me, painless. I know that is not the case for everyone, but I think that natural chilbirth without any episiotomy makes sex more possible afterwards. I remember I really needed to hear that when I was pregnant and immediately postpartum when I was convinced my vagina would be broken forever. Now, having a sex-drive after childbirth? That is a different story – but also varies individually.

5. My vagina is not the same. And that is OK. It’s not horrible – but it is a bit different. And maybe – someday – it will return to its former self. And perhaps it will not. I cried about it at first and spent hours googling “What happened to my vagina after childbirth?” for the first 6 weeks. Four months later, as it slowly recovers and starts looking more normal, I have gotten over it.

John was home by the time I got home, and we both paced the apartment with cottonballs brimming from our ears. We took Stella (the terrible little beast who helped break my water earlier in the story) for a walk in the snow and packed up the car in a daze.

At this point, the storm was in full effect, so we decided to get a hotel room at the Holiday Inn Express (awesome) across the street from the hospital/birth center. We settled into our luxury labor suite at about 2:00PM

To be honest, my main concern during early labor was that John get some sleep. I put him to bed, turned off the lights, put on my Amelie sountrack and went to work as quietly as possible. Which, initially was pretty easy. I was making phone calls and cleaning up the hotel room, sorting bags and hanging out in the bathroom.

Oh – and this brings me to the obsession of my entire labor and delivery: my ass. I was totally obsessed that I not poop while pushing, so I spent about two hours trying to poop. My friend, who had 2 natural births, told me that you spend a lot of your time in labor on the toilet. I kept expecting to do all this pooping and pretty much nothing was happening.

So (this gets super gross) – I tried an enema. Which I hated. A lot. And which didn’t really do much of anything. By about 5PM, I was feeling all of my contractions deep in my ass. Like I was trying to move a bowling ball down my spine and through my butt. I had the urge to poop but nothing would ever come out – it was totally maddening. I was convinced that, once I was pushing, I was going to poop like hell. Looking back, I think that urge to poop was really just labor pain – but at the time, I was totally fixated on bemoaning the state of things in my ass.

So I spent my whole labor on my hands and knees, or standing up, bent over the back of a chair. You know how when you see those videos of birth, you always see women rocking back and forth? That is some serious shit, that rocking back and forth. I spent the entire time swaying to and fro and marveling at the fact that anyone would ever try and do this in bed. I couldn’t have tolerated the pain had I not been allowed to do exactly what my body was telling me to do (which was rock back and forth and groan mightily). And now for a small soapbox speech: That is why it is so crucial to refuse as many interventions as possible (IV, continuous monitoring, etc). Anything that restricts your movement is a step towards needing an epidural – I know that I would have been totally panicked if I had been confined to a bed. The best pain control method is already built into your body and I think, when you are in labor, your body will do what it needs to do (as long as you let it).

So, I labored. And labored. The resting in between contractions was wonderful and the contractions were progressively less wonderful. By 6:30, my doula had gotten there and I was still able to make phone calls to people, though somewhat less coherently and with more huffing and puffing.

I kept saying to my doula, “I think I’m ready to go across the street and have the midwife check me” and she kept smiling apologetically and saying, “You’re not miserable enough.” Oh – and that is one of the many reasons why it is so great to have a doula. Had I not had my doula there, I would have gone to the hospital waaaaay too early. For about 3 hours, I was convinced I was 5 centimeters (the requirement to be admitted to the birth center) and that my doula just “didn’t understand how uncomfortable I was!” Well, she understood. She knew. At one point she told me apologetically, “You might be only 1 cm. dilated at this point,” which was horrifying to hear – but later I would find out she was right. I wasn’t miserable enough. I wasn’t NEARLY miserable enough.

So at about 7:30, I got in the shower and my doula sat there with me, timing my contractions. They were 1 minute long and 2 minutes apart and very intense. I was still only feeling them in my back and becoming increasingly convinced that the bowling ball in my ass was an actual entity. I directed the hot water on my back – which was a godsend – held onto the shower bar and did a lot of deep knee bends. I’m telling you – the bending and swaying and rocking is key! Natures way of getting your baby down and out.

Oh – John was around too, but, to be honest, from a support-standpoint, I didn’t really need anyone during the actual contractions. When I’m in pain, I turn inside myself and shut out the rest of the universe. You asked how John and I made it through the tough spots: We did some of the traditional partner stuff with him holding me up and me leaning on him, etc. but, to be honest, I felt best when I was just left alone with a chair to lean on. I needed to fully concentrate and I couldn’t really incorporate anyone else into that. Plus, I was still worried about how tired John was. In between contractions though, it was nice to have John there, giving me water and telling me I was doing great. John was great at just stepping back and letting me do my own thing – which is what I needed.

Oh – another great reason to have a doula: She forces you to keep eating and drinking. It is so crucial to be well-hydrated! She forced me to drink water and Recharge up until the last half hour of my labor – which was great. I would never have been able to remember to drink on my own, but I was always thankful when she appeared with a straw in my face.

So by 8:30pm, we had a call into the midwife to tell her we were coming over. We bundled up and walked across the street to the hospital (I had a contraction in the middle of the road which was funny and terrible). We got there and my midwife checked me and I was 3 cm. (seriously? 3?) and 100% effaced, but I actually didn’t let it get me down. I felt like I was handling things well – I was only dissapointed that I couldn’t go over to the birth center yet (you have to be 5 cm).

My midwife told me that her plan was “benign neglect” until someone told her that things were changing. They offered me the birthing ball, but I barely made it through one contraction on that thing before I jumped off.
Which brings me to an overarching theme of my labor. Nothing was what I expected. I thought that I would love the birthing ball. I thought I would be doing all this hippy dippy visualizing shit and having spiritual thoughts, etc. I thought I would lay in the tub for hours, finding strength in John. . . . none of that happened. BUT, that is not to say I’m not satisfied with my birth experience – it was perfect – just not what I expected.

So I jumped off the birthing ball and went to the bathroom – foolishly thinking I might be able to poop. I had about 10 contractions on the toilet . . . and they were getting totally wild and I was doing some degree of panicked thrashing. My doula came and rescued me from my throne, and told me that I needed to get some rest (yeah right). She put me in bed, on my side and put John in a recliner (I think really, she wanted John to rest – he was pretty zombified at this point) and told us that she was just going down the hall to grab some food. I think she thought we had hours and hours to go and she didn’t want us to tire out . . . but I was much closer than we thought.

So I had some more contractions in bed. At this point, I was totally in my own universe, blacked-out to my surroundings and had reached that “animal” zone. When I was pregnant, I felt self-conscious about the cow sounds that women made in all the natural childbirth videos I watched. Now I know. Along with all the rocking and hip swaying, cow sounds are key. (I actually watched a cow give birth when I was a few months pregnant . . . but that is a different story.) With each contraction, I would start out making a higher-pitched moan – then, I would remember what they always say, “Make low sounds,” so I would bring it down a register or two. The noise-making was very hypnotic and, in retrospect, one of the ways I dealt with the pain.

So all the contractions were the same and then, all of a sudden, they were VERY VERY different. Very suddenly, my body turned super-animal and I started pushing, totally against my will. It was the weirdest feeling – a contraction would come and I would need to push – but I was fighting against it because it felt like everything was happening too fast. I was also nervous because I didn’t know if I was fully dilated yet and the RN in me was saying, “Don’t push against an unopen cervix! It will get swollen and you will end up with a c-section!” But John – who had also been somewhat hypnotized by all the noise-making – could hear that something major had changed, so he hopped up and went to get my doula – who went to get my midwife, Paula.

To Be Continued . . . Go to Part 3

I should preface this with the fact that this was written as an email first – to a high school friend who is planning her own natural birth. She is my mom pen pal and I am very grateful for her ear.

So here it is. The birth story I should have written MONTHS ago. If you don’t like stories about body fluids, poop [or lack of it] and exploding vaginas, you should probably not read this.

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So my water broke at 9:30AM on 1/28/2010 (3 days before my due date). I was getting ready to go to my 40 week midwife appointment, but first, I was planning on stopping at Wamart to return a Pack+Play we didn’t need. When I lifted the crib, I thought, “Ha, what if this heavy lifting makes my water break!?” So, I was packing up the crib and carried it to the car and, when I opened the door, the dog ran out and jumped in the car. As I was wrangling this 40 pound crib into the car and yelling at the dog, I felt a trickle that was curiously NOT like I was peeing. I say ‘curiously’ because I had been peeing my pants everytime I sneezed/coughed/smiled for about 8 months. This felt different.

So, immediately, my brain started to decompensate and I started to feel like there were cotton balls in my ears (this is a common feeling I get whenever I am nervous or overwhelmed). I called John and his brain also started filling with cotton balls and he was mumbling and pacing, repeating, “Ok. Really? What do I do? Ok. Really? Um. What should I do?????” I think both of us were a little surprised that this was actually happening .

A side note: John is a 1st year Psych resident and he was on-call the night before. So he left for work Wed. morning and worked all day Wednesday and all day Wednesday night. I called him Thursday morning, at which point, he had been awake already for 24 hours. I called to tell him I was in labor and that he could enjoy another 24 hours awake . . . it was really poor timing. Elsa was born at 1:14AM on Friday, so by the time she was born, he had been awake almost 48 hours

I told John to finish up his work and come home whenever he was ready. He asked me, “Are you sure your not just peeing?” and, at that point, I had gone to the bathroom and was SURE it was not pee. The minute I sat on the toilet, nonsese gushed out (maybe 1-2 cups) and was clearish, milkyish colored. Also, there was a little pink blood (which is normal) – no contractions at this point though.

I decided the plan was that I was going to go to my midwife appointment and pretend like nothing had happened. So I got in the car and started driving. About 10 minutes later, I started feeling really, really mild cramping. It didn’t hurt – the best way I can describe it was like a warm tightening that started low in my pelvis and then reached around into my lower back. I knew they must be contractions though, because I was watching the clock in the car and they were EXACTLY 10 minutes apart.

That is the weirdest thing about labor. Your body becomes this really well-designed machine – I mean, how did my uterus know it had been 9.5 minutes since my last contraction and it was time to start going again? How does your body tell time!? And you have ZERO control over the whole process – it is like this secret world that your body has hidden inside and you don’t know about it until labor starts. Then all these little goblins appear and start controlling the wheels and cogs inside you – looking at their little watches and starting the wheels turning on a very rigid schedule. And I think it is best to just leave it up to them because, oddly, they know exactly what they are doing.

So about 10 minutes after my water broke, I was in the car, driving to my midwife’s office. And it was snowing. Really, really hard. Like white-out snowing. And I realized that, perhaps, my brain full of cotton balls had made a stupid decision. So, at a loss for what to do, I called my midwife’s office and told them that my water had broken and I was on my way. She receptionist looked out the window – at the weather, I imagine – and said, “Your water broke and you are driving? Yourself? You are driving yourself here?” And I shrugged my shoulders and kept driving.

I got there and no one had communicated to my midwife that I was in labor. They strapped me into a continuous monitor for a few minutes to check Elsa’s heart rate, which was fine. I told her I didn’t want her to check my cervix (risk of introducing infection since my water already broken) and she was fine with that. She collected some amniotic fluid from the puddle that I was now sitting in – and looked at it under the microscope to confirm that it was not pee (which was obvious at this point). She said I had 24 hours (9:30 AM the next morning) to have this baby or I would need a dose of antibiotics. She sounded like she was pretty sure I would still be pregnant at the same time the next morning – but I was pretty determined not to be.

Basically, the appointment was just a big, “Why are you here?” and she sent me back home. In the snow. Which was awesome.

To Be Continued . . . Go to Part 2