I feel like sharing my the story about the birth of my beautiful daughter Maddy. She’s pretty stinkin’ cool and I’m quite convinced she is a genius.
We went into the hospital on Sunday morning Oct. 2nd, 2011 at midnight. I was being induced — and I thought I would go in, get some pitocin and pop the kid out– right? Wrong. They had to efface me- which was (for me) the WORST part of the whole experience. They started effacing me at 3:30 am on Sunday Oct. 2nd. The first round of drugs took 12 hours to complete. At 3:30 pm, I still wasn’t effaced, so they did another round that took four hours a pop. I needed two more rounds of this. During the effacing process, contractions were triggered– painful and annoying.. man very painful and annoying. Super uncomfortable. Approximately at 1 am on Oct. 3rd, they decided to start the pitocin. (I also got an epidural! Hallelujah!) They said I should dilate to 6 cms in 6 hours. When they started the pitocin, I started my vomiting regime.. man.. I probably lost about 10 pounds in the time I started and stopped the pitocin. Nasty reaction. By 8 am, I had only dilated to 3 cm — my cervix had stalled. Also at this time they noticed that when I had a contraction, Maddy’s heartbeat would go down. This was of concern so they opted for a C-Section. (It’s funny because when a woman is laboring, time goes by SO slow, painful and boring and it’s hard to get the nurses to do much if anything for you– mostly they can’t do anything anyways .. but when they call for a c-section, EVERYONE hops. That was neat to see.. I felt like I was on my own episode of Grey’s Anatomy or something). Oh a complete side note– the Labor and Delivery beds were SUPER DUPER uncomfortable — like laying on a metal surgery table.. but the recovery beds were AWESOME, FLUFFY and COZY. On another complete side note, and this is NO joke … the underwear they give you in the hospital .. the mesh granny panties are THE MOST comfortable pairs of underwear I’ve ever put on in my life. Super comfy.
Anyways, they prepped the OR and the husband got scrubbed up in greens. They finally wheeled me down to the room and I had to maneuver (with worthless fish legs do to the epidural)) over to this table that resembled a lethal injection death chamber table with arm wings and they made J stay outside until they were ready to start. I swear it was the smallest/thinnest table EVER. I actually told the attending assistant surgeon that there was NO way that my fat ass was going to fit on that table– and I surely wouldn’t be able to get over there by myself. They (the assistant and some nurses) helped me over. That kind of annoyed me because they didn’t offer to help me in the first place– but oh well. That was the only real negative about this experience. They put the curtain up and I got the major anthesia— I couldn’t feel myself breathe and that almost made me panic. They warned me about that and it was true. I felt a small tug, but that was it. (Yay for no pain!)
The doc then called J in and he sat at my left shoulder. They began working on getting Maddy out and all of a sudden I had to vomit again. J had to hold my head up and help me with the bag — I was thinking to myself “REALLY!?!?!? RIGHT NOW!?!?!?!? RIGHT IN THIS MOMENT!?!?!?” That got old real quick. Then all of a sudden, the doc said — “get ready daddy!” Then we heard a cry in the room. For a second I thought to myself “Who’s baby is that?!?!” — I was kind of out of it between the meds and the whole process. Then I realized it was MY baby (Born at 10:42 am Monday Oct. 3rd– 7 llbs 11 oz and 20 3/4 inches long). J leaned down and said “she has a full head of dark hair!” J went over and got to watch them clean her up and get swaddled. They then brought her over to me and I got to see my girl. Man it was great. So many different emotions .. I did cry and part of it was from panic because I was so emotional and I couldn’t feel my lungs. I think part of it was panic thinking was going to die (HA!). That was a weird feeling… not being able to feel your lungs.
Anyways, after they got me fixed up they wheeled me back into our room (I was partly expecting a nurse or nurses to be in the room surrounding her but it was quite the opposite) and the first thing I saw was J holding Maddy in our room– and they were the only ones in there. It was so special– so sweet. After I got situated back into the recovery room, J brought maddy over to me. Nothing compares to holding your kiddo for the first time– nothing. Amazing experience.
The pic above was taken after we got back to the room. Ignore my big nose but admire my eyebrows. Don’t they look great?
The bay-bay is pretty cute too. hee hee!
Before I had Maddy, I was totally thinking “perhaps I can do this naturally without meds.” I even studied a little bit of the “hypno-birth” technique from a pal. However, when the threat of great pain and the “not knowing” factor comes out, you learn lots of things about yourself. One thing rang true as time drew closer to go to the hospital. That one thing was that I had NO desire to push anything out of my vagina. Hell no. Squeezing out a baby is NOT a rite of passage for me. Actually being able to hold my baby and being a mom? YES. That is a rite of passage. But pushing out a large watermelon out of my va-jay-jay was not.
I have a lot of pals who are naturalists when it comes to giving birth. No meds, all push, you get it, right? I cannot begin to applaud and say how much I respect those women enough. I don’t think I could do it though I realize that that if I had to, I would have no choice. But still, to think that a gazillion women before me have done this naturally since the beginning of time …. ack! I don’t wanna! I have three fears in life: 3) Tornadoes 2) Sharks 1) Child Birth. See? Natural child birth and me just wouldn’t get along.
I read a lot of posts and articles talking about how c-sections are viewed negatively. Personally, I am THANKFUL and HAPPY that I had a C-Section. My doctors were great and the hospital was very nice. It’s funny, when I walked into the hospital I told the doc on call, “Look doc, first sign of trouble, wheel me into C-Section, mm’kk? In fact if you wanna go ahead and sign me up for c-section, I’m cool with that.” The doc of course said, “wait and see– we have a long way to go before we can make that decision.” Luckily, it worked out in my favor. I’m excited because when I have my next kiddo, I’ll most likely be guaranteed a one way ticket to c-section.. Hopefully, no VBAC (vag birth after c-section) for me! Hoo-ray!
Whichever way you sway on the birthing scenario, good for you. I’m super stoked about mine. Plus, I got one heckuva kiddo outta the deal. 🙂
Tags: birth, c-section, vbac
Mad Time Mama! 