bpmom
Feeling Blessed
Member since 6/07 2963 total posts
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natural, Stony Brook, midwives - LONG!
Sorry it took a little while – DS is now almost 4 weeks old!
I wanted to go as naturally as possible and not be induced chemically. But when I got to 41w3d and was only 3cm dilated, the midwives scheduled an induction for later in the week. DH and I decided we would use castor oil to move things along. I drank 3oz of castor oil mixed with 3oz of orange juice and BOOM five hours later I was in labor. The contractions were about 7 min. apart when I was at home and around 3am I thought my water broke. We called the midwives and we went to L&D. We were admitted around 7am after finding out I was 6-7cm dilated, 80% effaced but my water had not yet broken. By 11am the contractions had stalled but were still painful. I got in the shower and labored there for about an hour and the pain was getting pretty intense. My midwife recommended nipple stimulation (sorry – TMI) to help move things along and boy did that work! I walked several laps around L&D and we did the nipple stimulation and the contractions intensified and came a lot closer together. I could feel that the baby was getting lower and lower and I felt what I was thinking was back labor pains and I (again) felt a gush of water and thought my water broke. The midwife came in to check me and said that I was still only 6-7cm dilated and my water still had not broken. (The midwives think the gushes of water I had been feeling were the result of DS pushing on my ureter and making me pee myself. Lovely. DH and I think my water had broken earlier in the morning but DS had his head acting like a cork to keep the water in place. Whatever.) I was really disappointed that I had not progressed and that I appeared to still have my water – I felt like I was ready to push and get the baby out because the pain was so intense. I couldn’t get comfortable no matter what we tried (pelvic rock, squatting, walking, side to side, etc) and I was afraid that I couldn’t last for another 12 hours of labor.
Our options at this point were to have the midwife break my water, get some Pitocin, or just wait it out. We decided to wait it out. DH went to the cafeteria to get some food for us, watched some TV (News12!) and we took about an hour’s nap. Then we started doing the laps around L&D again, and did some more nipple stimulation and BOOM. The contractions came back even more intense than before and much more painful and close together. The midwife came in to check me (and I was freaking out because I was afraid I wouldn’t be able to handle the labor) and she told me that I was “beautiful”. ???. I was nearly 10cm dilated and 100% effaced and could push at anytime I was ready. As she said that, even more water gushed out…my water had been broken the entire time, but the baby’s head had been acting like a cork – as DH and I had thought!
Thank goodness we didn’t do any of the interventions because then I would have needed the IV, the internal fetal monitor, the blood pressure cuff, etc. As it was, we only had the fetal heart monitor on 10 minutes per hour. I loved not having anything attaching me to the bed or a fluid line (DH made sure I drank two sips of water between every contraction).
By now it’s about 7 or 8 o’clock and I went through the remaining active labor and waited for the urge to push. The pain was what I expected – the hardest thing I had ever done. My contractions were 2 minutes apart but I only had a rest for 30 seconds in between because as my uterus contracted to move the baby further down into the pelvis, this would go on for about a minute, then I would have about 30 seconds of DS trying to rearrange himself and push himself back against the uterus. This was the most painful part, but I kept telling myself it can’t last for more than two minutes, and I’ll get a quick rest. I was able to rest in between the contractions, and I had some water and tried to really relax my body. I found it very helpful that DH could tell me exactly what my body was doing (we had learned this in our Bradley class). I could make it through the pain because I knew that the baby was coming very soon and that it would not be much longer before the pain was completely over. I also felt great knowing I had made it through “most” of the pain already.
Around 9 o’clock I felt tremendous pressure and the urge to push. The pressure felt like my hips were splitting apart and I thought I was going to die because of it…that was my crazy-woman-in-labor moment… The pressure was indescribable – I couldn’t wrap my head around why it was hurting so much, but DH was aware that I was starting to lose my focus and he reminded me that the baby’s head has to turn and he has to fit like a key in a lock in order to get out. The imagery might not work for every woman in labor, but it helped me deal with the pain.
The midwife came in and set up the room for pushing. I had told her previously that I thought the squatting position would be best to try first so they set up the squatting bar. Now, I had done a lot of squatting during my pregnancy to prepare for this, so I was good at the squatting part – I was really bad at the pushing part. I couldn’t focus my energy on the part of my body where I needed to push so instead I wasted energy by pushing with my face and neck. In the beginning I was nervous I might pee or have a BM on the table so I wasn’t really pushing as hard as I should have. The pushing phase lasted more than three hours because of this. I wish I had practiced pushing more – I’m not sure how you do that, but I wish I had. I pushed with the contractions and went with my body instead of going by the monitors. The midwife and DH could tell when a contraction was coming by looking at the monitors, but I sometimes felt the urge to push in between contractions as well. First we did the squatting bar, but I felt like I was sitting on the baby between contractions. Then I tried to push on all fours and that was too painful. I turned on one side and pushed through many of my contractions this way and then alternated sides. Ultimately, the midwife convinced me to lie on my back (which I thought was the worst position to deliver in) and that’s the position that finished the delivery. The squatting position had helped DS move through my pelvis the most, then I helped it along with the side positions, but the back position wasn’t bad at that point. I had read that during crowning you feel an intense burning sensation like a ring of fire in your perineum and that’s exactly how it felt. It was like someone lit the area on fire and asked me to push my baby through it. The midwife did perineal massage throughout my pushes but she always told me what they were doing before they did it, which I appreciated. I had always thought that once the baby crowned and the head was visible, I would want to keep pushing until he was out. I needed to rest so even though the baby’s head was almost out, I was able to sleep between contractions. I thought the women who recommended that were crazy, but I actually fell into such a deep sleep between my contractions that I had dreams! Crazy, right? DH said I looked like I passed out between the contractions and I know I felt completely spent. I really needed those 30 seconds of rest to have the energy to keep pushing. So once the baby’s entire head was out, I knew it would only be a few more pushes before DS was born so I felt a little more energized to keep going. I know I asked the midwives to just pull him out at one point because I was tired of pushing. The midwife was very encouraging and told me to lean over and pick up my baby. I was so excited/anxious/delirious that I stopped pushing and just leaned over to try to grab the baby and they reminded me that I still needed to finish pushing. Whoops.
I gave another big push and DS was here! I picked him up and placed him on my chest – It was magical and sincerely the most beautiful moment of my life. Oh, and the pain was over!
We were given time to enjoy the moments and were not rushed to move to the post partum floor. The placenta delivery took 2-3 seconds and then the midwife “massaged” my uterus to expel any extra blood. This was painful but it was nothing compared to labor. I had some secondary tears so they needed to do some stitching, but they did it with DS on my chest.
DS was put on the scale and that’s when we were shocked by his size – 9lbs, 11oz….
I’m very happy that we went with the midwives and that I was able to do it naturally. I’m sure that if I had stayed with my OB instead of switching midway through the pregnancy they would not have let me go to 41w4d, and they would have pushed me to have a section because of DS’s size. And I can guarantee that they would not have let me labor for 29 hours. But going with the midwives allowed me to have the natural delivery we wanted, DS was healthy and had no drugs in him until he received his Vitamin K. I highly recommend Bradley classes because they educated us to the process and encouraged us to become involved in every decision along the way instead of just agreeing with what the doctors recommended. BFing has been going well and DS is gaining weight like a champion.
For the girls who think they can’t go naturally, I have to say I am amazed at what my body went through. In my opinion, this is what my body is made for and I have a new respect for myself and my body. It might not be for everybody, I don’t think I have a crazy high pain tolerance, so if I can do it I think many others can too….
--I want to clarify that we chose to do the castor oil "cocktail" induction ONLY with the advisement of my midwife. It was dangerous to try it, but I was being seen in the office every 48-72 hours and was under close monitoring by my midwife...
Message edited 6/23/2011 6:45:32 AM.
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holy cow. that was one amazing birth story! i am so glad you had the birth you wanted and congrats on your little boy!!!!!
