Birth Story

This post includes the details of Gabriel's birth. If that is not something you want to read, please feel free to just look at pictures. Don't worry, there are no... ahem... invasive ones.

As you know, we were scheduled to be induced at 6:30am on Friday the 7th. I was a full two weeks overdue and my doctor was not comfortable letting me go any longer. And I was OK with that. All along we thought we would deliver at St. Agnes, but my doctor was on call at Clovis Community that Friday, so he had me go out there. Kind of funny that we have had 4 babies in 3 hospitals!

My mom arrived at our house at 6:00, and by then I had already been having strong contractions for about a half an hour. This was nothing too new, since I'd been having them for months, so I just expected they would go away. They didn't.

At 6:30 we arrived in the ER to check in. Clovis Community is remodeling, so there are a few weird things there right now, like having a woman ready to deliver check in with all the really sick people. But check in was quick, and we got right up to the room, where my contractions kicked up a notch. By the time the nurse checked me at about 6:45, I was dilated to 5 cm. This is always good news, but I tend to dilate really quickly through the first 6 cm. It's the last 4 that kill ya'. And historically, those last 3-4 cm take hours for me. But my body was obviously doing its job all on its own, so I asked the doctor if we could not do pitocin, and just break my water. I was still hoping to have another natural childbirth, and pitocin doesn't make that easier. The doctor, however, said that the baby was still really high for some reason, and he was concerned that if he just broke my water, the baby might drop quickly and get a cord wrapped around his neck, so he wanted to do pitocin to see if a few really strong contractions could move the baby down. The nurse, Linda, said she didn't think it would take much pitocin anyway, and came to start my IV.


Here I am, settled into my bed, watching The Today Show on television, having contractions, but doing alright.

At 8:30 Linda came to start my IV. As she put in the line, I had a vasovagal response. You can click to read what that means, or I can just tell you that I almost passed out. Pretty soon the nurse is calling for help, everyone is rushing in to my room, and I'm thinking, This can't be good. My blood pressure dropped to something like 80/40, they started pumping the fluids in, waving alcohol under my nose, and strapping on the oxygen. The nurses came in with the birth cart and started getting everything ready because they thought we were going to have a baby pretty immediately! It only lasted a few minutes, and then things were fine, but in that time, the baby's heartbeat dropped, too. He recovered quickly, but the nurse did not want to start pitocin until he had some time to recover.


In the meantime, my contractions began getting really close together, about 2 minutes apart, and when they checked me I was about 7cm. I was able to sit on my birthing ball, which was much more comfortable and helped move things along. Unfortunately, I still had to be tethered to everything because of that earlier drama. I had the blood pressure cuff, the fluid line, and the fetal monitor all on me. The monitor didn't always cooperate because I was sitting on the ball; it made it hard to get the little pads in the right spot. At one point the nurse had to sit on the floor in front of me, holding the monitor in place for about 15 minutes.


Everything was moving along great, my contractions were obviously working and I was breathing through them all pretty well. I even still had the TV on, which is not typical for me. But I couldn't get up and move much, which I would have liked to do, and I knew the pitocin was coming soon (the baby was still high, even after all that), so I decided, with Aaron's help, to get the epidural. I had tried an epidural with Levi, but it got kinked in my back and so after about 7cm, I had no pain relief at all. It was not enjoyable, and I did not want to repeat that experience.

At 10:00 the nurse started my pitocin. She didn't give me much at all, which was great. At 10:45 I got the epidural. The anesthesiologist assured me there would be no malfunctioning this time, and he taped my back from neck to tail! But it was a good epidural. I could move my legs the whole time and still had quite a bit of feeling, just not so much pain. The nurse checked me as soon as I had the epidural. She had said she thought I'd be pretty close, but I didn't want to get my hopes up. My labors don't typically move so fast. But sure enough, I was complete, a full 10 cm. And my bag of waters still totally intact!


At 11:45 the doctor came in and broke my water. He had me try to push a couple of times to see if the baby would move down more, but since I'd never pushed with an epidural before, it felt really strange and I wasn't terribly effective. He said he'd let me get used to things for a bit and then be back. At 12:15 he came in and said, "We're going to try to have a baby here." The nurse, bless her, looked at me and said, "We're going to have a baby. Let's do that." I pushed about 4 times, and Gabriel's head emerged at 12:24. His shoulders were so broad that they couldn't make it out on their own, so the doctor had to reach in and corkscrew him out. The rest of his body was a full minute later, 12:25 pm.


Gabriel had facial bruising like Levi, though not as extreme, so the doctor handed him to the nurse right away. Then he looked at me and said, "Next time I'm inducing you at 39 weeks," to which Aaron replied, "Next time?"













Worth every minute.