I am going to give a brief history of my labor and delivery per request of Pilch...so only read if you don't mind some disturbing details.
I went into my doctor on July 7 (yep, 5 days overdue) only for him to tell me I wasn't dilating at all. I was pretty upset. I had a non-stress test that afternoon, however, that I failed (low amniotic fluid) so they sent me to the hospital immediately (by the way, that nurse was crazy and made us feel overly worried about the situation). I got into the hospital around 4pm and waited for an hour to be admitted. So much for it being an emergency.
They shot me up with some gel to hopefully get my cervix going. They told us it could take a long time (like they'd check in 6 hours, etc.) for anything to happen. But within 5 minutes, I was getting contractions 3-4 minutes apart. I dealt with them for a few hours until I thought I was going to die. Apparently I'm a wuss, because after they broke my water, I was only dilated to a 3 or 4. Kudos to all you who do this whole birthing thing natural. But I think you're crazy.
The epidural man came in and answered all my prayers. Holy cow, what a difference it made! I felt great after getting the epidural.
By the way, I dealt with all the needles way better than anyone thought I would (note: I passed out getting my ears pierced when I was 15). I did throw up a few times throughout this whole process, however.
Anyway, they pumped me with Petocin and I went from a 4 to a 10 in an hour! It was crazy and I didn't feel ready to push. They had us wait for 2 hours, however, for the baby to descend more. I pushed for about an hour with the nurse and Kevin (details omitted) and then another 15 minutes or so with the doctor. The baby's head was transverse (not looking down), so they had to use forceps to manually crank his head in the right direction. Felt that. Yes, I had an epidural but I don't know about the rest of you, but I think pressure kind of feels like pain a little. I felt incisions made, the crowning, all of that...I'm sure not to the extent if I hadn't been drugged a bit though.
Once his head was out, I broke down and bawled for about 15 minutes. It was quite an overwhelming, spiritual, and relieving experience. The Doc made fun of me for crying so much, because I was crying more than Reed. We had him at 5:30 am on July 8.
So that's the story. Hopefully I was able to give you all the details without being too over-the-top. Again, the experience was awesome and indescribable, but all that nonsense about forgetting the pain...I still remember it.
6 comments:
Oh my goodness! Thanks for sharing-- I always find it fascinating what we women have to go through! Props to you, Rhiannnon!
I knew you'd do great! I'm proud of ya!
Great job, Rhiannon. Your son will be grateful...in about 24 years!
Thanks for sharing your story :) You did great! And I totally know what you mean about feeling it all and remembering it! And I had an epidural, too. Yikes.
Yeah, you are a champion! I think it took almost a year before the details of Ethan's birth were foggy enough for me to decide I might try the whole birthing thing again! The one convincing thing for me was that statistically, subsequent births are faster(I think about half the time) so I held onto that little fact as I plunged myself into another pregnancy and it was awesome! Shortly after Annalise was born I said to Jeremiah, "I think I could do that again tomorrow if I had to." Also, epidural (and still lots of pain) with #1 and drug free with #2 and 3! Trust me when I say I was one of the people who though Cindi was crazy to even consider squeezing out a baby without any pain medication, but look at me now!
Sniff. Yay.
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