Arrival Day

First bath around 8pm

My June 20th due date came and went so we scheduled a day to be induced. Thursday, June 30th, was set for our induction. I really wanted to have an all-natural birth and hoped I would go into labor without the help of medicine. As it turned out, the day arrived and we were set to go into the hospital and check in at 4:30am. Hello early morning! I called the hospital at 2:30am as instructed to see if they had a room/bed available for me. The nurse asked that we come in at 5:30am which was fine by me since I was pretty tired. The entire last month of pregnancy, was rather sleep-deprived so I welcomed the extra hour. I hung up the phone took up the couch, careful not to disturb my love in bed so he could rest. I sat lying awake for some time and began having contractions, only these were actual contractions! Not just the Braxton Hicks ones! I fell back asleep until the alarm went off at 4:30am. I took a long, hot shower while counting the contractions/minutes. By the time we were out the door, they were about 5-7 minutes apart.

We checked into the hospital at about 6am. We were led into our delivery room and I was handed a fancy hospital gown and asked to lay on the bed after changing. I went into the bathroom and began disrobing and stopped. My eyes began to tear up and I felt like I was out of my own body. It was strange. My thought sequence flowed, "Is this really happening? What do I do? Ok, calm down, stop crying. Breathe. You've been preparing for this moment for a long time. Relax. Steve's here, that's all that matters. You CAN do this." I washed my face, attempting to hide the redness from my tears before hopping into bed while the nurse started asking me questions. Steve is near the bed in the rocking chair and I feel the tears coming again and look over at him. He is whispering, "You will be fine. You can do this. It's ok." I thought the nurse would look at me like I was a wreck but she didn't one bit and continued through the process of questions, paperwork, hooking up the heart monitoring equipment, etc.

At 7am, entered a new nurse, Song-Sook. She started me on Cytotec. This is a pill that gets inserted into your cervix to help with dilation. I believe I was at 2cm when she inserted the pill. I was told to lay down fairly flat for the next two hours. Contractions and heart rates for baby and I are monitored while we waited. Steve and I played Mancala, ate breakfast, and breathed through the progressing contractions. By 10:30am, I was 4cm dilated and could sit up, use the restroom and have an hour break before they put me on Pitocin.

At 11:30am, the Pitocin drip began and so the ride begins. I do not recollect much when I started feeling the Pitocin intensify the labor. I'm not going to say it was easy, it was definitely work. The contractions were intense, right on-top of each other, and I was nauseous. My entire body shivered and shook uncontrollably. I was doing my best to breathe, more like trying to catch my breath. Steve was encouraging me, guiding my breaths, and being gracious in anything I needed (mostly hand-holding, massages, water, chap stick and mouth wash). He really helped me focus and I couldn't imagine doing it without him. The nurse gave me something for the nausea but it didn't help unfortunately so she tried another nausea medicine and that one wasn't helping either. Close to 1pm, I began questioning whether I could do this without pain relief. I eventually called Song-Sook in and asked for an epidural.

It was roughly 1:30pm, the epidural began to kick in and Song-Sook said I had reached 7cm and was 90% effaced. She said we would definitely be having the baby by the time she got off work (at 7pm). By 2:30pm, I was 9cm dilated. A part of me wonders if I could have gone without the epidural had I known how much I had progressed before asking for the relief (eh, shoulda-coulda-woulda). My doctor came in and broke my water around 3:00pm and at about 4:15pm, I did a few practice pushes/breathing with the nurse while she paged the doctor for delivery and the epidural was turned off. Two other nurses arrived, as well as the baby's nurse, and soon the doctor was ready to go.

It was go time! I asked for them to provide the mirror so I could watch the birth of our son. Steve was to my left, I had a nurse on each side, and the doctor was in position. I grabbed both of my legs and we waited for contractions to begin pushing. Watching in the mirror and seeing our progression with each push was amazing! Seeing his hair at first, then his forehead, then his head popped out, and finally his entire body - no words can describe watching what the human body can do so effortlessly. I gave 4-5 pushes and he was out in 13 minutes. Mr. B arrived at 4:39pm. Immediately, he was placed right on me and Steve cut the cord. A nurse wiped him down and so quickly I was breastfeeding him skin-to-skin. We were high on love (still are of course!) and it was the most magical experience. Those first moments with him were so special. I wish we could relive his birth again and again because there is nothing in the world like giving birth. The doctor finished sewing. I had two small 1cm sized tears and received two stitches for each tear. We were given about an hour to bond with our son before the nurses checked out his stats. He weighed in at 7 pounds, 13 ounces and measured 20.5 inches long - a happy, healthy, beautiful boy.

We both checked out wonderfully in the hospital and were able to be released the very next day just in time for dinner.