In honor of baby #2's due date being one month from this past Thursday and four weeks from today, I figured I should probably get baby #1's birth story up on the blog before more chaos ensues in our life and I write posts even less often than I do now (lol is that even possible? ;) ).
This post is of course long overdue (like 16 months LONG) and I am a little afraid that I have forgotten some of the details by now, but at the same time I think that most of them will come back to me when I start writing. Ever since Monica was born, I have loved reading other people's birth stories, and I have wanted to write hers for so long but just kept putting it off when I didn't have the time and forgetting to actually write once I did! So no more procrastinating and onto the story!
*Fair Warning* This is a birth story, so there may be some TMI details ;)
When I woke up on Thursday, May 19, 2016, I didn't feel particularly different, but when I went into work that morning, my coworkers all told me that it looked like the baby had dropped. Being 3 days away from my due date, this seemed to me like a good thing to be happening now! The downside was that I needed to pee constantly - like more than I had already needed to on a normal basis! And because I was constantly needing to pee, I started wondering if my water had broken. In our childbirth class, the teacher stressed that when your water breaks, it could easily be just a slow trickle, rather than a gush of water like you sometimes see in movies. So I was a little bit paranoid that this might have happened.
Finally around lunchtime I called the midwife center in Pittsburgh (which is where we were doing prenatal care and planned to give birth) and explained that I wasn't sure if my water had broken or not. I spoke with Amanda and after I described how I felt, she seemed doubtful that my water had actually broken, but since it is a time-sensitive issue, she suggested that I come in and let them check it out. She also mentioned that we should probably bring our bags just in case they decided to keep me there. So I left work mid-afternoon and stopped by our apartment to picked Joel-Michael and we headed to Pittsburgh. As silly as this sounds, since we were so close to the due date, we still hadn't packed our bags for the birth, but I was running late getting out of work, so Mickey actually packed both our bags before I got to the apartment and we tossed them in the car with us.
When we arrived at the midwife center, we were seen by Dia, who asked me some questions and then did an internal exam, as well as some tests on the fluids that she gathered from the exam. There were 4 or 5 tests (I can't remember now!) and all of them came back negative for my water having broken, except for one, which is can be a false positive, but we determined that it was also a negative result after discussing it. Dia told me that I was 50% effaced and my cervix was very soft, and also that I was 4cm dilated! But since my water hadn't broken and I wasn't having any contractions, she told me that I should go home and just rest while I could because it was quite possible the baby would be born in the next few days. So while we were disappointed that it was a false alarm, we were also super excited by the very real possibility that our baby girl would be born soon! So we headed back to Steubenville.
Up until this point in my pregnancy, I had only been having Braxton-Hicks contractions sporadically, with no pain or regularity. On the way back to Steubenville, I started having a few mild contractions. Nothing intense or regular, but definitely different than the Braxton-Hicks, which was almost nice to experience because while I knew there would be a difference between BH and real contractions, it was good to have that confirmed!
When we got to Steubenville, we decided that since the baby could be coming so soon, we should stop by Kroger and pick up a few things so that we had food available for snacks, breakfasts, and lunches. Dinners were going to be covered for the first few weeks by friends and family, but we knew there were things we'd like to have in the house. As we walked around the store, my contractions started increasing in their intensity and they felt very much like mild to moderate period cramps. By the end of our shopping trip, I was breathing heavier and telling myself to just keep breathing and relax.
After we got home, we tried timing the contractions, using an app that I had downloaded, but they just seemed to be all over the place. I decided to take a shower and go to bed early so that I could get some rest in case we were going to be heading back into the birth center that night. My contractions had lessened slightly and I fell asleep. When I woke up in the morning, I was so disappointed - I had ZERO contractions and I felt AMAZING. I had really wanted to be in labor and making progress. But instead I was heading back to work. And it was a Friday, which meant the longest day of the week.
All day at work, I kept hoping that my contractions would return and I would be able to leave work, but no luck. Instead, I had a TON of energy and the day went relatively fast. I was in a good mood most of the day and felt better than I had in a while. I was hopeful that this might be a good sign. Before leaving for the day, I made sure to explain where I was at with various clients to my manager so that she could pick up where I left off once I was on leave. I was scheduled to work the next morning, but I was praying that I wouldn't need to and that today was my last day.
I went home that evening, ate dinner, and hung out with Joel-Michael. Around 9pm, I started having contractions again, similar to what I had experienced the night before. I decided I should take a shower and try to get some sleep, since that was what had had stopped the contractions before. Joel-Michael was watching a sports game on TV (I honestly have no idea what team or sport it was!), so he stayed up for a little while.
Around 11:30pm, I came back out to the living room because the contractions were definitely increasing in their intensity and I was having trouble getting comfortable and actually sleeping. We started trying to time them, which was a bit challenging since I wasn't entirely sure at times how to tell if it was starting or stopping or continuing lol.
The midwives, as well as our childbirth class instructor, had said to time the contractions and page the midwife on call when they were 5 minutes apart, lasting 1 minute, and had been going on for 1 hour. But when we got to 45 minutes (around 12:15am) and they seemed to be 3-4 minutes apart (even with our tentatively faulty calculations), we called the midwife, who happened to be Dia, whom we had seen on Thursday, and since we live an hour away, she suggested that we come in now. But she sounded so calm and unconcerned over the phone, that I thought I must still have hours to go, or at least a decent amount of time. I found out later that she really didn't think I was that far along because apparently I sounded fairly calm on the phone. Lol. But my memory of it was just trying to take deep breaths while I talked to her and stay calm. Apparently it worked haha.
Sometime before we left, Joel-Michael had texted my mom and possibly his mom as well on the status of things. I really wasn't in a position to be updating anyone and I don't know if it even occurred to me until we were in the car! Anyway, we grabbed our bags and headed into Pittsburgh. It was hands-down, the worst car ride of my life. Like the longest, most intense, most uncomfortable car ride ever. When we had still been at the apartment, I was walking around, doing my best to breath deeply. I was sitting or standing depending on what helped (even if only slightly), and I was standing at the back door that went out onto our back deck, taking deep gulps of the cold air because somehow that was helpful. Oh and I was attempting to listen to my Christian music playlist on spotify for a distraction.
But the car ride was rough. I couldn't move around, except for twisting around in my seat uncomfortably. I was hot, so hot. It was raining outside and of course dark since it was the middle of the night, but for most of the car ride, I had the window open and the cold air rushing over my face. Poor Mickey must have been freezing! I had Audrey Assad songs playing loudly throughout the ride to help me try to focus on something else, and there was definitely a lot of groaning going on, and if I'm being honest in my memories, some yelling too. Joel-Michael definitely has a different memory of that car ride than I do (in my mind it wasn't so bad in the end, but he says it was definitely bad lol. He's probably more accurate than me in my recollections!)
About 15 minutes into our drive, we passed the exit for Weirton Hospital (the last hospital before Pittsburgh - at least that I knew of), and I almost told him to pull over there. But I had already decided to go to the midwife center and I really wanted to have our baby there. So we continued! We got to Pittsburgh in the least amount of time we've ever taken. I think the 60 minute trip took us about 45 minutes? But as Joel-Michael likes to say, God was helping us almost the whole way there with green lights and no traffic or other issues, but once we actually got to downtown Pittsburgh, he says God must have fallen asleep because we suddenly hit all red lights! And since things were definitely feeling intense, he drove right through them (after checking for other cars of course) and we made it!
As soon as we pulled up in front of the center, he said he'd be right around to get my door, but I said, "no I can't wait!" and threw open the car door and ran to the center door, leaving my flipflops in the car! As we had been nearing the midwife center, I had started feeling pressure, almost like I might need to push, but I tried to dismiss it, telling myself that I probably still had hours to go since first labors are always long, right? Besides, I couldn't have this baby in the car!
Anyway, I ran up to that door and hit the buzzer so they could let me in. It was a good thing that Mickey was right behind me because I had a contraction and couldn't say anything when they spoke over the intercom. They buzzed us in, and I was almost crying at this point because I was just so happy to finally be there and I knew everything was going to be okay. Dia came out of the room they had prepared and told me to relax, it was going to be okay.
They walked me into the room, and I said, "I feel like I need push," breathing heavily. Dia said, "What? You can't push yet, I need to check where you're at!" To which I responded, "no I really need to push!"
The next 2 or 3 minutes are a little bit of a blur. I was standing, facing forward, leaning slightly over on the queen-size bed, trying to calm down, while Dia and the nurse (whose name I can't remember right now unfortunately), helped peel my gym shorts and underwear off me (they were stuck because I was sweating so much. I was too uncomfortable to sit or lay down or really do anything other than stand there. And somewhere in the middle of that our nurse was trying to listen for the baby's heartbeat while Dia put her hand up to feel what was going on. Next thing I knew she said, "Oh my goodness, yes that's the head! You can push!"
So I pushed! And I yelled. At the top of my lungs. I don't really think I yelled any words; it probably sounded more like some aaaargggh type of yell. Lol. And Dia told me it was okay because no one else was there. But at that point, I really couldn't have cared less if anyone was there. Yelling just felt so good. Dia told me to push deeper, lower, not so much from my chest. Once I did that, out shot the baby with a huge gush of fluids and blood going all over the floor, my legs/feet, and the midwife. Just 3 or 4 pushes total and our little baby girl was born. 7 minutes after we had arrived. Because I was standing up, she just shot straight down, and I was so glad they caught her! We had hoped that Joel-Michael would be able to catch her when she was born, but everything happened so quickly that it just wasn't possible!
I remember them handing her up to me (Joel-Michael might have even gotten to help with that part) and helping me to turn around and get on the bed so I could lay down. By this point I think I was laughing a little, but mostly from the intensity and "what just happened"ness of it all. I don't remember crying at all once she was born. I really was in a bit of a state of shock. But I do remember Joel-Michael getting up on the bed next to me and we just looked at her. Her little scrunched up, red face, her perfect adorableness. He said she had my nose. I didn't know who she looked like, but I knew in that moment that all newborn babies do not look the same after all, and she was totally perfect.
Joel-Michael got to cut the cord a little later on. And when they did the weight and height, she was 8lbs, 3oz, and 20 inches, born officially at 1:23am on Saturday, May 21, 2016. Unfortunately, I did end up with a deep second degree tear that Dia had to repair. They tried to numb the area as best as possible, and I did use Nitrous Oxide (laughing gas) during the repair, but it was still quite painful in my opinion - even after giving birth to a child lol. Here's hoping for a smaller or no tear next time!
The next few hours went by fairly quickly. We did our best to rest a little in between the nurse and midwife coming back in every so often to check vital signs and help me go to the bathroom. I don't remember when this happened, but at some point they made me an omelet and toast to eat, and I did also try nursing Monica at least 1-2x while we were there. It was not as easy as I had imagined or hoped, and I just felt so awkward trying to figure it out/hold her, especially on the left side, but she didn't seem too upset so she must have gotten something :) We also had to fill out paperwork for the social security card and the birth certificate. After Monica was born, we just looked at her and I tested out her name, as well as another name that we had considered. But we decided that Monica was the right name for her, and Joan was the middle name we wanted as well. Still, it was strange officially deciding it!
Around 6 or 6:30ish, Dia told us that we could stay longer if we wanted and the next shift of nurses/midwives would be coming in, or we were free to go home if we wanted to. As much as we had really no idea what to expect once we got home, we opted for leaving as soon as we could because we really just wanted to get home and try to sleep and begin recovering! Our nurse went over some information with us about various things to pay attention to regarding our baby and myself, and what dosage of ibuprofen I could take to help with the pain management. Before leaving, we asked the nurse to take our first family photo, and then we were discharged from the midwife center around 7am. Since we weren't sure how Monica would do on the hour ride home, I sat in the backseat next to her.
We made it home safely and she slept most of the way home and then continued sleeping once we arrived. We should have been exhausted, having been up all night, but for some reason we were both on a bit of a "high" from the event and had lots of energy! Plus, our families both gone on vacation together and were still waiting for pictures, so we decided to sit down and update them, as well as Facebook. Unfortunately, once we decided we should probably sleep while we could, Monica woke up! And that was the beginning of figuring out what being parents to a newborn was going to look like ;)
Our first night was quite rough since she wouldn't sleep unless someone was holding her, so we took turns sitting on the couch holding her, while the other person slept. Somehow we made it through the night and were eternally grateful when our friend, Sarah, came over the next morning for a few hours to hold Monica while we slept!
There's probably so many details that I have left out or perhaps forgotten since 16 months have passed since the big event, but I hope this post does the experience some justice. They say that women forget the pain and that's partially why we keep having babies. lol. I don't think I will ever forget the pain completely, and for the first several months after Monica was born, I could still feel certain moments so vividly. But at the same time, I look back on the time of being in labor with positive, perhaps even excited feelings. There is something empowering about having a baby.
I could say more about my choices to use the midwife center/pain medication options, etc. but I think it would be best saved for a different post since this one is already so long! But I will say that I don't think there is any one right way to give birth. You have to choose the options and the ways that will help you to be most relaxed and most able to let your body do what it was created to do.
Having Monica has been such an amazing and challenging and fun experience. She makes us laugh almost every day, and I can't wait to see how her brother brings even more joy to our lives.
