Birth Story

So for those of you who haven't had the joy of hearing our long, drawn out birth story, here goes...

Tuesday (9/9) Chloe was being unusually quiet so the doctor sent us to the hospital for monitoring. We got there and she looked great, she was just sleepy, evidently. Unfortunately, we hadn't made any progress from the previous week and we were already at 41 weeks. We didn't want to wait until Friday only to have to come back and be induced anyway, so we decided to just start the process that night! Chris and I wouldn't be leaving until we had baby!

We settled in for the long haul, they gave us cervadil to finish thinning out the cervix and let us know the plan. They would check us in 12 hours at 7 am to see if it worked or if we needed a second dose. At that point, they were planning on starting us on Pitocin to get contractions started if the cervadil had worked.

We didn't get to 7 to find out if it worked. This is where my idea of time gets fuzzy. At some point that night, I started having contractions. Immediately after, my water broke. Then all hell broke loose. Our contractions were immediatey close together; most labors take a while to get to 5 minutes between them; ours started out 2-3 minutes apart, sometimes not even that. In any case, the next couple hours were a blur; I think I was in denial that my body was doing it on its own.

All I know is that I was screaming bloody murder. I was the crazy lady in labor that you see in movies. Poor Chris.

I asked for an epidual at some point but I was only 3 cm and they don't give them until 4. What a joke! I had no idea how I would EVER make it to 10. Not long after asking for the epidural, I had the WORST urge to push. Nothing after this point was my finest moment and I'll spare you the details for the most part, but after this point, we dialated from 4-10 cm in about an hour. The anesthesiologist never did make it in time. He came at some point and according to Chris, he took one look at me (screaming bloody murder, don't forget), said there was no way he'd be able to get me to hold still and I remember telling the nurse I didn't want him anyway...(This is all going on as my body is refusing to wait for the doctor to start pushing; at this point I couldn't stop it). The doctor arrived a little before 7 to complete chaos - nurses everywhere, me screaming, and Chloe on her way out with or without him! The nurse told us later that I pushed for 10 minutes and she was out. The doctor hardly had time to get his gear on. Pushing was the most amazing feeling EVER. After not being allowed to push earlier on, finally getting the go ahead was unreal.

Nobody expected us to actually go into labor from the first drug. Nobody would have guessed we'd have had our baby before that 7:00 timeline for being checked. I'm so grateful for the anesthesiologist being late; I'm grateful for the experience of pushing her out; I can't believe we didn't have a C-Section...Labor actually turned out to be a fun experience, Chris said that beween contractions I still had my sense of humor, and yes, I've already forgotten the pain of delivery...

If you put up with this post this far...you deserve a gold star. Please enjoy the following picture of Chloe as your reward :).