This week both of my babies celebrate birthdays, and even though I was going to write about something else this week I can’t help but be pulled in this direction. I can not believe as of a few days ago we have a one year old and in just a few days we will have a three year old. It only feels right to celebrate by sharing the stories of how my babies were born and how I became a mama.
Anderson’s Birth Story
I should probably admit that although I really wanted to be a mother and we had tried for a year to get pregnant, birth was one of my biggest fears at this point in my life. I read a few books while pregnant that made me feel pretty empowered and like my body was made for this. So towards the end of my pregnancy, thankfully I had this sense of calm that came over me. I’m not sure exactly where it came from, but I think reading those books helped make birth less of a mystery to me. Like they say often the unknown is a lot scarier than reality.
With Anderson we decided to have a hospital birth with a midwife. I was intrigued by the idea of having a home birth, but with no prior experience I wasn’t sure if I would be able to have an unmedicated birth. So anyway it felt right to have our first in the hospital and get some experience and see how my body handled the birth and everything. I was also pretty excited that this hospital had a nice big tub to labor in. I’ve always loved to take baths so this felt like a comfort of home.
At around 6 in the morning, the day before our little man was born I woke up with some back pain. I didn’t think much of it until I realized it was on and off. It wasn’t super uncomfortable, but uncomfortable enough that I couldn’t go back to sleep. I think I also couldn’t sleep cause I was so excited to meet and snuggle our first baby at that point.
My husband had to go to work, so my Mom who lives super close came over and we hung out all day. We had a nice lazy day watching Fixer Upper and Bachelor, and lots of HGTV. By the time my husband got home from work, things had definitely progressed.
The contractions were still far enough apart that we decided we had time to have some dinner before heading out to the hospital, which I should note was an hour away. Pretty much any hospital our insurance covers is an hour away from where we live. We do live in a rural area, but there is a hospital about 15/20 minutes away from us if anything were really to go awry. Anyway, my Mom made pancakes and scrapple, I think by my request.
After dinner my husband, Mom and I headed to the hospital. I had decided that I wanted my Mom to be there as our sort of doula. I thought it would be nice to have her there since she is naturally a very nurturing and calming person, and has had more experience in this area than we had at that point in time. Obviously I thought that it would be special to have my Mom there too. On the way there it began to snow.
I don’t think the snow started until we were on the road of course. So that made the ride to the hospital a little more stressful. I was definitely having some contractions in the car, but it was a relatively peaceful car ride there given the circumstances.
Once we got to the hospital, my fear of hospitals really came to light. I don’t know why hospitals and doctor’s offices always make me super nervous. As soon as they had me sit in a wheelchair to get wheeled to the labor/delivery room my whole body started to shake uncontrollably. I believe I was dilated only 4 or 5 cm when they got me in the room and checked me. I’m not positive, I didn’t really want to know. I didn’t want to be discouraged or freaked out, all I knew was I wanted to get in that warm tub.
Thank goodness for that tub, and its jets. Those jets helped so much when I would have contractions. I was mostly feeling my contractions in my back so when I felt one coming on I would sit with my back facing the jet and it made a huge difference. This gave my husband and mom a break from putting pressure on my back during contractions too.
I felt so well taken care of in that tub. My Mom brought me snacks and my husband was there making sure I was hydrated and taken care of. Honestly this part of labor felt like a dream in this very weird way. I would have stayed in that tub the whole time if I could have. Unfortunately it was only a laboring tub and the midwife told me that when I felt pressure drop that I needed to get out and get checked out.
After some time in the tub, I was feeling more pressure and got out as directed. I don’t remember what I was at that point, I’m not sure she even said. This is when the really hard part started. I was so uncomfortable and there was so much pressure I was not really aware of my surroundings and not able to move much.
The midwife had me try lots of different things, I was on one of the exercise ball for a bit, I was hanging on a squat bar for a little bit. I was getting really exhausted so it came to a point where we tried different positions on the bed.
During these hours of labor my husband, mom and midwife were all working really hard to make sure I was as comfortable as I could be. They were taking turns putting pressure on my back. My mom was getting me fresh cool washcloths that smelled like lavender until I got to a point where smells made me super nauseous. She was also rubbing my feet and legs which felt incredibly good.
I felt like such a princess haha, labor/birth is so weird. My fears of labor being this excruciating pain subsided, for the most part it was just a lot of waves of pressure and thankfully there were breaks in between where I could kinda catch my breath and reset. I remember I just kept repeating “this is temporary” in my head.
Around 4 in the morning the midwife broke my water and had me start pushing. We switched positions a few more times, and I didn’t know how much longer I could do this for. I just wanted to go to sleep. A couple hours later, after 24 hours of labor our sweet Anderson finally made his way into this world. He was a little over 9 pounds of pure perfection.
Elizabeth’s Birth Story
Elizabeth’s birth story may be a bit shorter. Still super special, but it wasn’t nearly as long of a process as our first born’s birth. We decided again to have a hospital birth with a midwife, even though I would have loved to have a home birth we just couldn’t swing the cost at the time.
This time the closest hospital with a midwife was an hour and a half away. We were excited that this hospital had a tub to labor in again, but also it had nice big queen size beds in the recovery rooms. Last time around it wasn’t very comfortable trying to squish into the hospital bed with my hubby for the couple of nights they required us to stay there.
At around 2 or 3 in the morning on the day of Elizabeth’s birth I started having some contractions. Since the hospital was so far away we decided to head to that way. The contractions were 7-10 minutes apart so we figured we would get there with some time to spare. I text my sister in law who came to stay with our oldest, and we picked up my Mom on the way out. We had decided to have Mom as our “doula” again. Of course it was snowing again, because it’s January in upstate New York.
When we finally got checked into this much larger hospital, I had the heartbreaking news that I was not even dilated. I laid there hooked up to the machines for an hour and a half and they checked me again and said I was still not dilated even though I was clearly having contractions. I was really tired at this point, and stuck in this tiny little triage room with my Mom and husband and felt defeated so I asked if we could leave.
We headed back home where I managed to sleep on and off for about an hour, but when I woke up things were intense. I went to make some eggs, figuring it had been awhile since I had eaten and I could use some fuel. About half way through making eggs, I was having a really hard time making it through the contractions. Remembering how amazing the bath felt during my first birth, I went and started the bath water. I took the eggs in with me, and ate in the tub.
Things seemed to keep progressing so I quickly got out of the tub, and called my husband who was upstairs sleeping still. He came down and helped me through some contractions. At some point I text my Mom and let her know we needed to get to the hospital, and to be ready. We left again for the hospital, but I had this feeling in my gut that I was not going to make it an hour and a half without having this baby.
I told my husband this, and he was not very happy to hear it. All I knew was I did not want to have this baby in our car. I called my midwife to see what she thought, and after hearing me go through a contraction she agreed that I should stop at the hospital closer to our house. Thank goodness we did.
I couldn’t talk during contractions anymore, so getting checked in and into the room was interesting. My Mom and husband had to do most of the talking for me. I remember the nurse wanted me to try and pee for some reason, and I tried and could not at this point. Also they were trying to get me to lay on my back to push and I did not want to.
I was again having mostly labor pain in my back, so I needed my husband or mom to have access to my back to put pressure on it. At some point they broke my water. My water doesn’t seem to like to break on it’s own. I was laying on my side for a bit and trying to push, but they didn’t like me in that position. I’ve heard of other people birthing that way, but they didn’t seem to think that would work. So then I was on my knees on the bed and hanging on the top part of it.
Unlike my first birth, this time it felt like such a relief to push. Also unlike my first birth it only took a few good pushes and she came right out. I think it also helped that she was smaller than my first. So only an hour after we left our house our baby Elizabeth was born. If you remember with the hospital we planned on delivering in, we would have still had a half an hour left in our trip if we had stuck to our original plan.
Thank goodness I went with my instincts to go to the hospital closer to our home. We didn’t get the nice big comfy bed, but it worked out nicely because we were so much closer to home my husband could easily go home at night and stay with our oldest. It was also a lot easier for my family to visit this way.
So there you have it, I hope you enjoyed my birth stories. I always enjoy reading these because they are always so intense and different. Stick around for more of our usual home renovation posts in the upcoming weeks, and if you missed our house tour and bathroom demo make sure to take a peak at those.