Birth story, part I

I apologize now for being too wordy, descriptive or graphic in this account of Elle's birth. Some of the details might be wayyy more than some of you want to know, but they're important to me, and since I've recorded pretty much everything else about my pregnancy here, I want to be consistent.

I have been mentally drafting versions of this post since the day before Elle was born, even, and wanted to get it down before I started to forget details (especially as I become increasingly more sleep-deprived!). And after I started to write it, I realized it was reallllly long, so I'm breaking it up in to a few posts.

To give proper background, I'd have to go back a few weeks. I started having more intense, frequent and regular contractions around 37 weeks. Nothing was worth timing or really getting excited about, and I was surprised that they just felt like bad menstrual cramps. I was expecting (and later got!) much more.

And after our appointment last Tuesday, when I was slightly more effaced and 2 cm dilated, I figured we were in for the long haul and would need the scheduled induction on Monday. I hoped for *some* progress before that but figured it would only help in the induction, not result in anything that caused me to go in to labor. (Because really, people, let's not kid ourselves - this child has been anything but cooperative on the labor front.)

On Friday, though, I woke up and did a few things around the condo. I thought that I might have actually lost some of my precious bladder control, though, and hoped that maybe the baby was just dropping and putting more pressure on my bladder. Tim and I went to the gym, we lifted weights and I hit the bathroom before we did cardio.

That's when things started to get interesting.

I had some bloody show, which is a sign of impending labor. The thing is, you can have it three weeks before labor or when you're already in labor, so this wasn't a really definitive indicator of things to come. But it was a sign! And I hadn't really had any of those. I practically skipped out to Tim on the gym floor and told him. He thought my water had broken with how giddy I was, but he asked if I wanted to stay and work out or if I wanted to go home/to the hospital. We decided to skip our cardio workout and head home.

I called Labor and Delivery when we got home. They told me the "loss of bladder control" I thought I experienced earlier could actually have been me losing my mucus plug, and the bloody show was part of that as well. While I didn't need to come in to the hospital unless I started having contractions or more fluid leaking, it "sounded like things were happening." Since bloody show is also a sign of "cervical change," I hoped that maybe I was dilated a bit more, figuring it would help with the induction on Monday.

I decided to head to work, because I wasn't having contractions and I really thought I'd drive myself crazy if I stayed home. I stopped to get gas on the way because I didn't want to be in active labor and realize I had an empty tank. While I was at the gas station, I had my first real contraction. People had told Tim that "real" contractions were different, and I'd be able to tell. I kind of scoffed at that until Friday afternoon. But I knew this was different, and as I drove to work and had several more, I started to loosely time them.

I got to work and continued timing the space between and the length of each contraction. (Photo at left is of my loosely timed, scribbled notations.) Tim was on high alert and kept texting me to ask how many I had, how frequent they were, etc. I made sure my coworker (the one who would be saddled with extra work if I had to leave early) was aware of what was going on, as well as the manager who was in charge of figuring out what I'd be doing at work on Saturday (the answer: nothing. I think it was easier at that point for them to plan that I would be out instead of worry about putting me on the schedule and having me not show up or leave early).

The rule of thumb for first timers is that you're supposed to go to the hospital when the contractions are 5-1-1: Five minutes apart, one minute in length for a period of one hour. I had contractions that lasted about 45-50 seconds every 5-6 minutes apart, but they hadn't lasted an hour yet. I prepared to leave work (after only being there for about three hours), but just as I was getting serious about leaving (because the hospital is an hour south of where I work, and I didn't want to wait until they were five minutes apart for an hour; I was hoping to leave when they were 7-9 minutes apart), they slowed down.

Of course.

I had some at 8, 10 and 15 minutes apart. They lasted 30-50 seconds. They weren't consistent. I was frustrated but glad that I had stayed at work to keep myself occupied. Tim continued to freak out (and later freaked out more when he saw my noted contractions had been very close to meeting the 5-1-1 rule), but I left work around 11, stopped at Walmart for a few things to finish a craft I planned to work on over the weekend (because I still didn't think I'd be having the baby before Monday) and came home, still having contractions at varying intervals and lengths.

Last belly shot, in the hospital parking garage on Saturday morning.

Tim was supposed to cover something for work early the next morning, so he headed to bed around 2 a.m. I tried to sleep, but the contractions were getting longer and stronger again. I timed them and they were still 10 minutes apart, so I figured this could be another false alarm. The best part? I had to go to the bathroom after. every. contraction. I felt like my frequent pee breaks were probably interrupting Tim's sleep, and on the off-chance that we might be headed to the hospital sometime in the next few hours, I knew one of us should be rested. I headed to the couch, where the contractions (and frequent potty breaks) continued. At some point, the pain was so bad and the effort to get off the couch to go to the bathroom so great that I tried to get comfortable on the floor. It wasn't working.

Around 5 a.m., one of my bathroom breaks showed that I had more bloody show. At this point, I knew *something* was happening, and I was excited, nervous and scared. I knew even if the contractions let up or my bladder calmed down that I would not be able to sleep. I kept timing the contractions, and by 5:45 they were about 50 seconds long, 4-5 minutes apart and had been for almost 50 minutes. That was close enough to 5-1-1 for me, and I decided to take a quick shower.

Of course, at that point, the contractions seemed to slow down again. But I woke Tim up anyway and told him I thought we should probably head to the hospital. After asking if we could sleep a little longer (and my short reply that at least he'd gotten *some* sleep), he took a shower while I grabbed a few last-minute things, and by 6:45, we were out the door. I started timing the contractions again, and while they were now about 35-50 seconds long, they were still happening every 5 minutes or so, and they were gaining in intensity.

We got to the hospital and made our way to triage. I told them I thought I was in labor, and they pulled my paperwork and asked a few questions. Then Suellen, the triage nurse, took us back to a bed and had me change in to a gown. We'd been told in all of our childbirth preparation classes not to bring our bags in until we were admitted to labor and delivery, because it wasn't worth lugging everything in to find out that we weren't staying. We figured Tim would have time to get our bags once I was settled in L&D.

We were wrong.

Suellen hooked me and the baby up to monitors and watched my contractions. It was explained to us that while my doctor wasn't working that weekend - another doctor from his practice was on call - our doctor likes to manage his own patients if he was available. They said the doctor on call would Dr. S and let him know I was in labor and see if he was able and interested in coming in.

Meanwhile, I was extremely uncomfortable - the bed made my back hurt, and the contractions were more intense when I was lying flat - but she chatted to us about supplements she takes for her diabetes and we shared fish oil nightmares. Suellen was obsessed with the fact that an ultrasound tech, Anthony, in the curtained area next to us looked exactly like Tim. She yelled over to Anthony to stop over and meet his twin. While there were definitely similarities, I was amused most by the fact that I was preparing to have a baby, breathing through contractions that I hoped were behaving and not slowing down again, and Tim was meeting his alleged look-alike.

After the meet-and-greet, Suellen did an internal exam and exclaimed, "Wow. You're definitely staying. You'd never know from your contraction patterns, but I'd say you're six centimeters dilated and you're fully effaced. It's baby day!"