The Best Day of My Life!

With Holden's quick departure to Little Rock the day after his birth, I never took the time to share our birth experience.  After reading our neighbor's birth story- I was motivated to share mine finally.  I'm hoping that my story will help anyone who's wondered about trying natural childbirth.  If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask.  The pictures are to show what it's like.  There's nothing too icky... hope you're not offended.

Leading up to Holden's birth was a whole bunch of crazy.  I had pre-term labor and was on bed rest for several weeks.  I finally moved to modified bed rest and then finally back to exercising like crazy to get that boy to come.  As my due date approached and then passed, I became very upset that Holden hadn't come yet.  Really upset.  I had to keep myself busy each day with another activity.  I kept getting all kinds of physical signs that my body was preparing for birth.  But still nothing.  So at my 40 week appointment, my OBGYN and I had the talk.  We decided that we didn't want to go much further than 41 weeks, and she was going on vacation that next Friday; couple days before 41 weeks.  I knew that I wanted my physician at the birth.  She has taken such good care of me and I felt very close to her, so I couldn't imagine her not being there with me.  Although I have the luxury of knowing all the OBGYNs at our hospital very well and I love all of them, I still wanted her there.  I'm silly, but I wanted her to be the first to touch him, to hand him to me.  I daydreamed about the first time I would get to see Holden, touch his ear, hear him cry, look at Bryan when he'd officially became a father!  I had worked myself up anticipating this momentous event.  We decided that we would induce labor Thursday morning if nothing happened.
So came the old wive's tales...  It was miserably hot, so I walked every morning.  Serious walking... 45-60 minutes as fast as I could.  Pineapple, by the can full.  I found an excuse to do activity all the time.  I even convinced the family to not play cards and instead play croquet.  Pressure points, Mexican food, and my wonderful Charla even treated me to a pedicure. 
Monday morning, we did an ultrasound to make sure everything was still going well in there.  He looked marvelous!  She stripped my membranes, once again.  We left and I was wanting barbecue, so we went to Penguin Eds.  I was cramping, like I did before.  After we finished eating, I starting having contractions about every 4-5 minutes.  They were easy though.  After a couple hours they slowed again.  So we went for another power walk.  Things began again.  Around 8pm I called my doc to ask if I should go in.  I had contractions every 4-5 minutes for about 6 hours by then.  I went in to just be checked.  I was at a 3 and 90% effaced.  We hung around walking the halls for an hour when I was rechecked at 100% effaced.  So, we were for real and staying.

We spent the night walking a lap in the hall then coming back to the room and walking in there. 

The contractions had gotten a lot harder.  I had to stop and I franticly searched for Bryan at the onset of each one.  I would give him a big hug around the neck and he would repeat to me, Ah He, Ah He, Ah He, Ah Who.  We called our parents to let them know that in the morning we would have a little baby boy!  I also called Charla, but told her to sleep and that we could catch up in the morning.  I had to leave a message with both my parents, because it was quite late at that point.  About 6 am I called my best friend Christina. 
Washington Regional was wonderful!  We brought a birth plan but never had to pull it out.  I just notified the nurse that I wanted to avoid an epidural.  I was given free range to roam the halls, sit on the thera ball, and try any position I wanted.  They popped the monitor on me once an hour for just a couple minutes to see how Holden was doing.

After Charla arrived I started having back labor. 

Unfortunately, it was the kind that stayed constant.  I, of course, did not believe it was back labor and instead thought it was musculoskeletal in nature.  It was my entire right side that ached.  I couldn't walk or keep moving because the pain was so overwhelming.  The only way to alleviate the pain was to get down on my hands and knees and lift my toosh into the air. 

At this point, I really doubted my ability to continue this naturally.  I started crying and telling Bryan that I couldn't do it.  I wanted an epidural but was too afraid to ask for it.  Thank goodness Charla was there!  She encouraged me to continue.  I ended up taking a dose of staydol.  It helped relieve the pain and let me snooze for about an hour.  When I woke up, the pain was still present.  Bryan suggested we get into the tub.  The tub was wonderful.  All my pain went away.  I was so exhausted, that I slept in the tub propping up my head on the side.  The tub was so wonderful that my contractions stopped.  I don't think it was the tub that stopped them.  Instead, it was likely the toosh elevating that caused Holden to slide higher and stop engaging as much.  Looking back, this combination helped everything because it allowed Holden to turn and labor to work better for me.

After a couple more hours of slowed contractions, we decided to break my water.  I think it was around 3 pm.  My doctor told me that the contractions might get more intense.  That first contraction was amazingly powerful and I was not prepared.  I don't remember much after that.  It was a whirlwind of checking my dilation, keeping my eyes closed to maintain my focus, Bryan telling me to get up during contractions, Charla telling me that I didn't need more medicine...  Later Charla told me that I jumped to 6cm almost immediately after my water broke.  Then each hour I progressed another centimeter or so.  The few details I do remember were: pain and obsessing over having more stadol, Bryan making me stand up during contractions, and then the realization that I was pushing.  To explain these, I kept asking for more stadol.  Looking back, I was wanting something that would give me some relief.  At that point I'm confident I still would have declined an epidural, but the stadol was like a piece of magic that I knew would help me continue on.  In reality, it didn't do much once the big contractions started.  Instead it was the persistence of Bryan and Charla that pushed me to the next contraction, the next minute, and the next hour.  Once I had gotten to an 8 or 9, Charla instructed Bryan that I needed to stand up to continue to progress and help Holden engage more.  He would hoist me up on my feet and say that I had to stand for five or ten seconds.  I remember counting very quickly while forcing my butt back to the bed.  The bed gave me a sense of security and control.  After standing for come contractions I began feeling a new sensation that scared me tremendously.  It was more powerful than anything I had felt in my life and that's what was scary.  I would start making a sort of grunting noise when the sensation occurred.  Then I realized that I was pushing!  I didn't have the smarts to tell anyone what I was doing.  So each time Bryan hoisted me up, I would stand and push.  Grunting and everything.  My doctor checked me again and I was complete but had an anterior lip left on my cervix.  I must have expressed my readiness, because she said she felt she could move the lip out of the way. 
Then the pushing began.  Once I felt the urge to push, all my pain was gone.  Instead of pain with each contraction, I had an overwhelming urge to push and see my baby.  My contractions began piggy-backing, meaning another would start before one had ended.  Each time, my doctor and Charla would tell me how close he was, how much hair he had, and how I was almost there.
Here are the things I remember about pushing: 
-I really thought they were lying to me with, "He's almost here, He's sooooo close!"  I expected each push to be the one.  I was for sure he was coming out on that one. Seriously, even after thinking that for like 15 pushes, I still thought the very next one was it. 
-I apologized during pushing- I'm ridiculous!  "I'm so sorry, I'm so tired."  I'm pretty sure I repeated that several times.  I was so tired that I felt it was too much energy to open my eyes.  They even pulled out mirrors for me to see him, and I refused to open my eyes.  And you know me- I'd love to see that. 
- I was really annoyed and thought they were lying about him being so close.  I kept thinking to myself, "then why isn't he here yet?"  I  did have the sense not to say it out loud because I knew they would laugh at me.  And you can bet I was saying it with great amounts of attitude (in my head, of course.)
-I felt like superwoman.  I felt so strong at the same time I was exhausted.  It was unreal.
After about an hour of pushing, he was here.  My physician placed him immediately on my tummy.  I'm having the hardest time putting into words what it felt like at that moment.  I felt amazing, ready to tackle anything, completely overcome with love for Holden, more in love with my husband than I have ever been.  I replay that emotion everyday in my mind.  I feel complete, happy, part of a miracle.

Call me crazy, but I would do the same thing again.  The power and rich emotion I felt was awesome.  The alertness and natural high was amazing. 

Not only was this amazing as God intended our bodies to be able to perform, I believe that natural childbirth is the safest for both baby and mom.  And the research supports it:
Epidurals tend to lead to longer second stage labor and increased need for instrumentation and csection.
Epidurals numb you from the pain.  Pain is what drives a woman to move which progresses labor.  Your body knows what its doing.
CSections are a major surgery.  The abdominal wall is tremendous to your body's support.

In the end I truly believe that natural childbirth is not for every woman.  I believe that CSections are wonderful and very much needed during medical emergencies.  My true desire is that every woman be given the facts before making choices regarding delivery.