OUR Labor Story

Another disclaimer: I didn't post any pics in this post that I wouldn't share with a stranger, however I did write about things that some people might find awkward, so heed my warning now!! Labor and delivery is not exactly the most prettiest thing ever...just sayin!

Ok, fine, one more disclaimer. My personal opinions and views are simply that. Just mine. I know a lot of people have different opinions and views when it comes to labor and delivering a baby, just know that when I tell this story, it's simply the view that John and I shared in the arrival of our daughter and even though things did not all going according to plan, we couldn't be happier with the outcome!

Like my last entry said, I got my membranes stripped on my 40 week appointment on January 25th, 2012, which was actually my "due date."
After the doc appointment we all (the mom's as well) went out to eat at On The Border.
My mom insisted on spicy food to get that baby out!
I already started having more intense contractions from the time leaving the appointment to the restaurant.
Didn't take long for the stripping to work!
The contractions were more intense, but still "workable," where we got through dinner just fine, with me pausing and grabbing the table every once in a while, all while staring at some random object in the restaurant and focusing on deep breathing.
I'm sure it was quite a site for anyone watching us, and I won't lie, on occasion I wondered if I could get free On The Border for life if I gave birth there, haha.

40 weeks. Transitioned into "real" labor that night. :)

Not knowing what to anticipate John had to plan for work as normal for the next day, so I assumed my position on the exercise ball, once we got home, while the mom's worked on the baby room, and while John got ready for work the next day.

John and I went to bed around 9 pm and by then I was in so much pain. While in bed, no matter how I laid down my back and tailbone/hips were just absolutely killing me....plus the contractions on top of that.
I moved in all sorts of different sleeping positions trying to get comfortable and nothing worked. I finally propped myself up in a straight sitting position and managed to drift to sleep for a little bit but was awakened by the most intense pain ever in my lower back/tailbone area.
I went to our master bathroom and used our towel bar for about half an hour to grip and grimace with as things grew more intense. I stayed in there about half an hour before I decided I needed to sit on my ball, so I went out to the living room.
Almost instantly the mom's were out there too helping me time these contractions (good ole mommy senses, I didn't even wake them up, I was planning on hanging out there in the living room alone), all while poor John was dead asleep to the world.

Deployments have done this man no good when it comes to sleep.
They are so sleep deprived sometimes, that I swear that man could not only sleep through anything, he could probably sleep standing up.

At this point, around eleven pm-ish, the contractions were in and out at 5-8 minutes apart.
We contemplated waking John up....we had a plan--he, the doula, and I--about how all this would go and honestly the mom's weren't really part of it, but I wanted to "make sure" this was 100% real so I welcomed their company while things progressed.
From what I remember, around 2 am we finally agreed to wake up John so he and I could talk to our doula and determine a game plan with how things were going so far.
Within half an hour of him calling her I was in the car headed to the hospital. Not exactly what I had envisioned!
I had "planned" (funny how the words "I had planned..." keeps creeping up in this story...sigh...) to labor at home as long as possible. Although I had been laboring at home I didn't have any of the "true" signs besides contractions that I had transitioned into what I considered labor.
No mucus plug....my water had not broken....these were the things I personally was waiting for before I wanted to go to the hospital.
Doris Ann, the doula, met us at our house before we made started of to Womack just to make sure that she and John were making the right call for us to head there.
John got her thumbs up approval to head to Womack, so we trekked out on the most uncomfortable car ride I have ever been on in a long time!

Womack is only about 10 minutes from our house give or take, but thanks to no traffic at 2 am, it was a clear shot and we were there in no time.
I was dropped off with Doris Ann at the entrance where we slowly made our way to the third floor (Mother/Baby Unit) one measly contracting step at a time.
TYL that Womack has railings along their long hallways.
I'm convinced that's the only way I made it to the third floor without crawling on my hands and knees!!
Once we got to the third floor Doris Ann and I started "walking laps" up and down that hallway, using the hall rails as my squat support bar during contractions.
I wanted to delay admission into the hospital for as long as I could, progressing on my own without any doctors or nurses input. Just simply let my body do what God created it to do, even if it's in its own slow time...

Pushing on her head through my back
to try to make it move.

Once John and the mom's caught up with us, John started walking the laps with us.
Doris Ann whipped out some lavender lotion to rub my lower back/tailbone area while I was squatting thru contractions....it was then that she said the dreaded words that would mark the rest of my day and labor experience...."Something feels weird. From what I'm feeling on your back, this baby is OP, and maybe crooked--John come feel this...."
He came over and started pushing on the right side of my back just above my tailbone....shooting pain came all over my body causing me to cry out a little for the first time...(all those breathing exercises tend to seriously go out the window in this whole labor process so I learned!!).
Not only was our little bug OP, but her head was tilted to the right side as well, giving Doris Ann a full baseball size lump in my back that was all baby head.

Not the greatest news ever...all the sudden her "lack" of droppage made sense to all of us and now had totally pissed me off.
How had no one not noticed this before?!?
How many doc appointments had I been to in the last 30 days where they totally "feel you up" and no one thought to feel THAT part out? I had a doc appointment not even 12 hours prior to this moment 2 floors beneath me....and just now this is all making horrible sense.
We continued walking the halls, making potty break pit stops along the way. At one point I finally lost my mucus plug on one of these breaks which was a relief to me among the new stress we had "found."
At least things were happening on their own, even if I wasn't at home like I had wanted.
After a couple hours of hall walking we finally made our way to the delivery side of the wing and got admitted and the party really started and some things start to get blurry.

We got admitted around 4 am from what everyone remembers.
I got put in a room to change, got a capped off IV (which was one of my "I don't wants" but Doris Ann made me--turns out with good reason!!), and made my way to the shower where we labored there for a while using the rails again as support.

Alternated use of the exercise ball, hall rails, bed,
and shower during labor. 

I don't know how often the contractions were or anything, I just know that they were definitely there, and progressively throughout the day Doris Ann kept checking my back to see if the baby's head had straightened at all--it hadn't.
At some point we were put in an actual delivery room (not sure how we got there to be honest!!) where I continued to labor in the shower, using the exercise ball, using different positions on the hospital bed--trying anything and everything to get the baby to move.
At about 10 am I got checked and had progressed to 9cm (unmedicated) but the pain was beyond contraction pain at this point. Something was just not right.
Looking back now, I can remember seeing it in their faces.
My water had still not broken and her head was still not turned.
At the time, I thought the pain I was going through was "normal" so I soldiered up and kept doing anything and everything they told me to do to get the baby to turn and drop, but to no avail.
They went ahead and broke my water (another let down for me unfortunately, I really had wanted it to break on it's own) and not only did they express a worry that there was possible meconium in the water but now with baby girls water bed gone, her sunny side up/cocked to the side head went directly into my pelvic bone as she descended down a bit.
Within the hour my body was taken over, out of my control, and naturally went into push mode on its own causing her head to virtually head-butt my pelvic bone over and over and over with every contraction I had....because her head was cocked there was no relief of the pressure which made me to dry heave with every contraction that came and went.

Doris Ann went into super doula mode trying anything and everything to get the baby to turn her head and nothing was working....I couldn't sit, the pressure was too much. I couldn't stand because of the contractions and her head butting my hips and pelvis...With every squat I did her head would grind into the bone causing me to dry heave more....
All along at this point I was waiting, hoping, almost praying that someone would suggest I get some medication. I wasn't going to ask for it, that wasn't the plan.
Fortunately (Unfortunately??) everyone knew my plan and no one offered. Based off that I continued to think that this pain I was feeling was normal and that this was part of the experience.
I was stuck at 9cm, unmedicated, for over 6 hours.
Not only was she still not dropping, but because my body was so naturally tense from things, she almost couldn't drop if she wanted too. I just couldn't naturally relax against the pain enough.

At this point Doris Ann suggested trying some medication.
She knew I was extremely against any type of medication in my labor experience, but I was needing something that would help me relax and hopefully in turn allow the baby to move and hopefully drop into position.
(No one mentioned this until later, but they were already prepping a room for me to have a emergency c-section if things didn't start to change soon...Most everyone that I've talked to knows that I'm very anti c-section unless it was a absolute true emergency, so this would have been like hitting the ultimate panic button if someone had brought it up...).

I agreed to the drug Fentanyl, which would only stay in my system for no more than half an hour and would help take the "edge off."
With this, I had to lose the belly heart monitors and resorted to the fetal scalp electrode along with a catheter so they could monitor the baby better and make sure she wasn't in distress. The first two didn't attach to her head correctly, which resorted to a third attempt that finally stuck.
Well, apparently Fentanyl doesn't phase me in labor, cause it didn't relieve a single thing and so I continued to labor on my own for a while longer....

Finally Doris Ann had a "come to Jesus" meeting with me suggesting that even though it wasn't what I wanted, to get an epidural, because most likely it would relax my body enough to quit naturally trying to push and could potentially allow the baby to at least turn her head straight.
At that point, I didn't care anymore. I had lost all motivation and will to continue on the way I had been.
I agreed to the epidural and was all fixed up within 20 minutes plus fluids.
Apparently I went through two bags of fluids in less than an hour...

Pre push power nap!

They turned me on my left side, once I was set up, hoping that gravity would take over and help the baby shift down some and get her head to correct.
The doped me up so "bad" (IDK if it was my natural reaction or if I got some sympathetic extra happy drugs) that I dozed on and off for an hour. I remember feeling pressure from contractions that would jolt me awake, but I couldn't move anything from the belly button below, so I'm sure it looked hysterical.
I remember my mom putting a cell phone to my ear, telling me it was my dad, and that's when I finally broke down.
I started crying telling him I had tried my best and I couldn't do it anymore....I don't remember anything he said back to be honest....but that was the first time that it hit me.
I tried my best, I couldn't do it, and that really sucked.
At the time I felt like a failure. I felt like a phony, and I felt like a pansy.
I mean, this is what our bodies are made to do, right?
What did I do wrong in all of my pregnancy to make this not go right?
Did I sleep on my right side too much? Did I not exercise enough?
All this seems ludicrous now, but at the time, I was playing a major blame game on myself and it took a lot of selflessness on my part to let it go. This was about having a healthy baby girl, not trying to be a laboring woman hero.
The drugs did the best consoling of my guilt. :)

After my hour long "nap" the midwife came in to check me.
With just the epidural and being laid on my side for an hour, our baby's head had turned!
Within the hour, I finally progressed to the full 10 cm and 100% effacement, plus the baby was now at a +1 and progressively dropping.
What a relief this was to me. The guilt was gone. It had worked and I could naturally deliver our baby girl. That's all I really wanted. I realized that although it wasn't all going my way, I was thrilled beyond words that I could actually "have" her.

A little before 4 pm, I started pushing (on purpose this time!).
I had been in "true" labor over 21 hours and I couldn't wait to get this pushing game going.
I requested that a mirror be brought in so I could watch and "know" that I was truly pushing since now I couldn't feel it.
I tried multiple pushing positions all of which gave progress to the cause.

I eventually had to have oxygen because I was having such a hard time catching enough air to push her out through the contractions.

After a little over 2 hours of pushing our baby girl was delivered to me, skin to skin, at 5:54 pm.
Her head was the most oblong coned head I had ever seen and thanks to my pelvic bone had a dent in it about as thick and as long as my index finger.
Her coned head aided in her measurement being an extra half inch on her length too!
Awesome.

TMI time, just FYI.
As I was watching her come out, the first thing I saw in that mirror was the fact that she had dark hair!
OMG, so not fair.
I was so wanting a red head!
After the three final pushes, and that little girl, in all her dented head glory, was placed on me, I just started bawling.
She was perfect!
She gave out a couple "cries" and I just lost it.
I was so relieved, exhausted, terrified, happy--anything and every emotion you could ever imagine was rushing though my body at that point that I couldn't not break down.
It was awesome and I will never forget it.

More TMI time.
I wasn't able to have the private alone time with just her, John and I wanted right away like we requested.
I had so much "damage" down there that it took about half an hour to stitch me up before they would finally bring her to me. I asked the midwife how many stitches I was going to have to have for the "damage" in which she replied, "You really want to know?"
Sigh, maybe not...still don't know to this day, and although I get curious at times, I'm ok with my ignorance.

After I was "set" and Brynlee was all measured and swaddled and brought to me, everyone cleared the room and dimmed the lights so it was just us three.
I was able to nurse her then, and she latched on immediately and perfectly that first time.
This was such a relief to me.
This was really important to me to be able to do and it really made the experience complete for me.

After about an hour alone they wheeled us into our recovery room. I was still numb from the epidural for the most part but was starting to get some feeling back. I would actually startle myself awake in the night by my legs moving in my sleep and not knowing I had feeling back in them!
Once settled in our room (and meeting our awesome roommates! The dad was a Bronco fan, so he was automatically cool in my book) the nurse and her assistant left us to finally get some rest.
Womack doesn't have a baby nursery, so you are in "possession" of your baby as soon as it's born and it's only taken from you when they are doing tests/shots/etc.
I was so thankful John stayed in the hospital with us the two days we were there.
If I remember right we woke her up every two hours to feed her.

The next day I had all the feeling back in my body and Oh Em Gee.
There is no way to ever put into words the pain that was going on down there.
Thank you Lord for hospital beds because the process of walking from the bed to the bathroom and back was enough to make me want to nap.
Along with that, they wanted me to walk laps around the hospital wing, at least three laps a day, to get moving etc.
My Dad had caught a red eye flight from Colorado Springs to Fayetteville around 1 am that morning and had arrived in NC in time for my mom to pick him up from the airport and bring us some Panera breakfast (my first non preg meal request!).

It was so awesome to have my dad there.
I never realized how calm/secure he makes me.
He sat next to me in the hospital bed holding that little baby and it was the neatest thing ever.
She was so tiny with him!

We had several visitors that first day which was so neat--and Bryn was such a good sport.
Doris Ann came by as well to check in on us (mainly me I think) and gave me a clearer picture of what went on the night before!
I had no idea that there was so much concern over my labor that everyone was preparing for a c-section.
I'm so thankful, looking back, that no one said anything to me about it.
I'm not sure, after how hard and how far I had gotten at that point, that I would have been able to handle it.
The c-section, alone, would have consumed the guilt ridden me.
Forget the epidural, I'll take 10 if I don't have to have the c-section!
So yeah, glad she and I could talk about it after the fact, and SO thankful that she was there to support both John and I as well aiding us in our delivery of our little Brynlee.
My Army wife friends and their kids came by that day, as well as John's higher ups, all bringing goodies for the new bebe.
John's mom came by that evening (the labor wore her out as much as me, lol) with more grandma gifts--this little bug is so spoiled already.
We settled in for our last night there at the hospital continuing our feeding schedule with her but SO anticipating getting home already.

By the next afternoon we were being discharged and ready to get home.
Bryn had some "on the fence" jaundice numbers, but it wasn't enough to keep us there at the hospital.
Dad picked us up and drove us home.
Mom and Connie had decorated the outside of the house some and made sure the inside was spotless.
That was almost a relief in itself.
Coming home to a spotless house like that was worth it's weight in gold!
The animals.
Our poor furry babies.
To this day they still aren't quite sure about all this baby stuff.
Hurley is just very concerned, but very curious.
He won't go near her unless we invite him over and even so, he's still very unsure, but still SO gentle.
She's definitely already gotten some Hurley nose kisses.
Bella is just mad at the world, and that's what we expected.
She and I have had to have it out several times.
When I'd be feeding Bryn and Bella would try to jump in my lap.
Needless to say we've had to give her lots of cat treats to make up for our parental neglect.
Jax, well, he's just himself.
I'm not sure he's phased one bit by the madness.
Especially if someone is there to make sure he has food, I think he could honestly care less!

Well that's really the crux of our labor/birth story.
Now onto the new mom adventures I've already experienced!
And man, as many of you know, this little booger of a baby is really testing me on my stuff.
More to come.......

Brynlee "Bryn" Paige Christian