We have a long and complicated birth story, so I'm going to start with the actual labor and delivery.
Friday 8/23
5:30 am
I woke up for one of my several nightly bathroom visits and noticed contractions. They were consistent, every 10 - 15 minutes, but not too painful. After timing them for about an hour, I went back to sleep.
8:30 am
Woke up with Stephen and told him he probably shouldn't go in to work. We ate a high protein breakfast and started to walk around our neighborhood. Some of the contractions were strong enough that I had to stop walking, but I could talk through them. Stephen wrote an app that kept track of the contractions and they were consistent, but not getting much closer together. We had lunch and finished packing the last minute stuff in the hospital bag.
2:00 pm
We had an appointment at Kaiser (scheduled the week before), to hook me up to the monitors and watch the baby's heartbeat since I was a week overdue at this point. The contractions were stronger, but not getting much closer together. We packed everything in the car just in case and headed in. They monitored me for about 20 minutes and said the baby looked great then sent us home.
The rest of the day we timed contractions, walked, bounced on an exercise ball, tried to eat high protein snacks and meals, and kept thinking it would be any time.
10:00 pm
The contractions were getting much more painful and were every 5-7 minutes apart. We watched a lot of Friends episodes and kept timing the contractions. They would get down just under 5, then go back to 6 or 7 minutes apart.
Saturday 8/24
12 am
We were trying a lot of the coping strategies we'd learned and read about. Sitting/bouncing on the exercise ball worked for a while. On my hands and knees or with my elbows on the ottoman worked for a while, too. It helped to have Stephen push my hip bones together (it actually opens up the pelvis, they showed us with a skeleton in one of the labor classes).
We called labor and delivery because we were consistently 5-6 minutes apart and had been for a while. They said since I wanted to labor naturally, it would be better to labor at home longer.
I was laying on the floor in between the contractions and eventually we decided to try to sleep. We went upstairs and tried to lay down. Stephen slept for a while, but every contraction woke me up. So I would doze off for a minute or two, then wake up to a contraction. At this point I couldn't talk through them, and just did some of the coping stuff.
5:00 am
My teeth started chattering during the contractions so I called labor and delivery again. The nurse said since it had been so long we should come in and just see what was going on.
5:30 am
My OB was actually the one who checked me and I was only 4 cm. But because I was 4, I was technically in "active labor," so they let us stay. We got moved into a room and started walking the halls. The mobile monitor kept losing the baby's heartbeat, so we would walk a lap around the hall and our nurse would meet us at the room to try to fix the monitor. Throughout the day I think every nurse attempted to make the monitor consistently find the heartbeat, and no one was successful.
The monitor shows everyone who's in labor. Mine is the one that's inconsistent :)
12 pm
We did a lot of walking, some rocking in the rocking chair, and the midwife came in to check me around noon. She said I was 6 cm, which was far enough to get into the pool to labor. (They don't want you getting in too early because it can stall labor.) So we moved into the room that had the pool. And by "we moved," I mean Stephen, my parents, and my sister moved all our junk...I just moved myself.
Our view. We joked that if there were construction workers on the scaffolding it could be really awkward...
The pool and one of the nurses we had through the day. She was holding the heartbeat monitor trying to get a good read. Judging by my face, I'm having a contraction, too. This nurse also helped a lot after the delivery in bringing Kaitlyn up to breastfeed in ICU.
4 pm (approximately, neither of us can remember the exact time)
The midwife came back to check me and told us we were 8 cm! So not only were we in transition already, we were getting really close.
My brother in law, dad, and father in law in the waiting room. (Stephen, my mom, my sister, and my mother in law were in the room with me)
6 pm
At this point we've gone through a shift of doctors, nurses and midwives. Most of the nurses knew who we were because we were walking the halls and were the only ones laboring naturally for most of the day/night. And many of the nurses had tried to get the heart rate monitor to keep an accurate reading. (with little success)
The new midwife who came on decided to check me. When she checked me, she matter of factly said "I can't give you an 8, I would say you're a 6 or 6.5."
I lost it.
As in hysterical, uncontrollable sobs. I had been awake 34 hours at this point, laboring actively for 20 hours, had thought we were really close to being done, and now we were at the same place we'd thought we'd been 6 hours earlier. As if all that laboring had been for nothing.
The nurses tried to console me by saying how subjective the measurement was, how great we were doing, etc. We had the OB come in and check me in hopes that the new midwife was under estimating. But he agreed. Apparently our first midwife has a tendency to be "generous." It certainly did not feel like generosity at that point.
Also, the heater on the pool had gotten turned off somehow, so I couldn't get back in the pool. They tried to get it working again, but it never heated up enough.
8 pm
I still hadn't really recovered emotionally. I was prepared and had been able to handle the pain with Stephen coaching me and using the techniques we'd learned. It hurt, but I was still in control. Up until we were only 6 cm.
The midwife and newest nurse were pushing an epidural, and the midwife thought we needed pitocin as well. I know that I don't react well to drugs, and I have seen several people close to me have bad things happen to them because of epidurals. I know statistically they are safe, but I really wanted to give birth naturally.
Stephen and I had discussed a "safe word" before going into labor because I wanted him to talk me out of getting an epidural if I was starting to lean towards one in the pain of the moment. He did exactly what I needed him to do and we decided not to get any medications yet. I was still handling the pain (not as well, though), so we would wait until I couldn't handle it anymore.
We did decide to have them break my water. Like Stephen said, one step at a time. If that didn't work, then we'd do pitocin. Then if I couldn't handle the pain, I'd get an epidural.
After they broke my water, things got really intense. Time is pretty much a blur for me after that. Stephen was my rock and voice of calm comfort, just like he had been all day. My mom rubbed my leg through the contractions to try to calm me down. It got to the point that the contractions were right on top of each other and I couldn't relax between the contractions.
I have no idea what time this was at, but we decided to have a shot of Fentanyl, a narcotic. It was short term pain relief that would just take the edge off and the midwife assured us it would not hurt the baby in any way. It really helped in between the contractions, so I was able to rest for a minute before the next contraction hit.
The pain of the contractions was so bad that I felt like I had tunnel vision. I got into a rhythm of shaking my leg and sort of half getting up on my hands and knees. I couldn't tell you how long I did that. After the first shot wore off, I got a second shot. The nurse was really pushing both the shot and for me to get an epidural. It's unfortunate that she was the nurse we had through transition and birth because all the others were really supportive and encouraging.
Sunday 8/25
3 am
The midwife came back in to check me and I was 10 cm. Finally! Stephen and I wanted to have everyone out of the room for the pushing and birth. We were going to have the first hour after birth as a family of 3. We had decided on two names and wanted to see the baby before we named her. So the plan had been to decide on a name, get sewed up, breastfeed for the first time, and just be us for that first hour. That definitely didn't happen, but that was the plan.Anyway, my mom and sister left for the waiting room. On the way out, I heard the midwife tell my mom it would probably still be several hours. Great.
She told me the baby would move down faster if I pushed from my knees. So we brought the head of the bed up and I had my arms on the top of the bed (facing the bed) on my knees. When I would push, I would sort of squat down so my knees (which were on the bed) were by my chest. (This is really hard to describe...)
Everyone says there's an uncontrollable urge to push. I never felt it. And for some reason, was having a hard time even telling when the contractions were happening. An hour earlier I was barely coping through the pain of the contraction, and now I was doubting when they were starting. I wanted them to tell me, but the monitors weren't picking up signals anymore. (Par for the course for our labor). They put an internal monitor on the baby. At first I protested, but with all the trouble we'd have keeping track of her heartbeat through all of labor, it made sense. We needed to make sure the pushing wasn't too hard on her.
I did my best at guessing when the contractions were fully happening and started pushing. After a couple of pushes, the midwife seemed very surprised, said I was a great pusher, and left to get ready for the delivery.
They told me I could turn around so I was lying in the bed like normal. I didn't want to leave a position that was working, but the midwife said the baby was far enough down that the position wasn't going to matter anymore.
After a couple more pushes, they told me to stop. It definitely burned, but it wasn't the unbearable "ring of fire" I was expecting. Stephen said the cord was wrapped around Kaitlyn's neck, but they just slipped it off. Once her head and shoulders were out, the midwife actually had me reach down and pull her up. It's cool that I did that now, but I the time I remember thinking "just get her out!"
4:18 am
Kaitlyn Denise Washburn was born! Just an hour of pushing and she was here. They put her on my chest (well, I kind of did, but the doctors and nurses helped) right away and dried her off there. Stephen cut the umbilical cord and it seemed like everything was perfect.
Excuse the close up, it's the only ones that don't have a lot of side boob :)
And that is when everything started to go wrong. But you can read about that here: The Trauma
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