It really started on Wednesday when Jon made the eggplant parmigiana from the Scalini's recipe. We had Kyle and Lauren over for some dinner and kept our fingers crossed for labor to begin soon. Supposedly their dish will put you into labor within 48 hours. We ended up being right on the cusp...
Friday afternoon after a full day of work, Jon and I took Bessie and Darby on a long walk around the neighborhood. It was about 2 miles long and I was sure that walking that much was bound to get some results. Nearly through with our walk, we came across some teenagers throwing sticks and taunting dogs behind a short fence of a house. My maternal instincts kicked in and I ended up screaming at them from down the street. They probably looked at me like a pregnant lunatic (which I kind of was) and shortly thereafter, I was a pregnant lunatic in labor. My back started really hurting by the next block and came in strong waves of back pain. Every book I've read said that true labor pains start in the back and radiate to the front. Since these weren't radiating anywhere, I just assumed my lower back had had enough of the third trimester and long walks. We decided to go inside and get some dinner. By the time dinner was heated up, I was in enough back pain to feel nauseous and not much like eating. Jon just looked at me and said, "this could be a long night. Eat it down."
Flash forward to 9:30pm when the back pain finally radiated to the front. I started feeling waves of pain every 5-8 minutes that required that special breathing they teach you in the birthing class. We called our midwife and she just laughed when we told her that it had been going on for an hour. She said, "you'll probably have a lot longer to go but come in or call back whenever you'd like." Well, I'm no wimp and I was determined not to be that woman who goes to the hospital immediately and then labors for 90 hours. I jumped in the shower to freshen up my hair and to relax a bit before attempting to get any sleep. We were going to try to stay at home as long as possible. The food is better here.
Jon downloaded a contraction timer app on his phone and managed to time a few before falling asleep completely. From 11pm-1am, I either poked him in the ribs to start the timer or I just timed myself. Overall, the contractions weren't horrific. I was expecting them to be much worse than they were. They were tolerable and lasted only a minute. You can almost survive anything in 1 minute doses as long as it ends at some point. The difficulty I was having was that I was really tired. Unlike Jon, I couldn't really sleep the 2-5 minutes in between contractions. They were still sporadic but were increasing in intensity and frequency. We decided to head to the hospital at 1:45am. Fortunately we didn't have to worry about any Atlanta traffic (Jon's worst pregnancy nightmare).
One thing I have to say about the hospital is that it's just cruel to ask a woman in labor to check herself in. I mean, really? I pre-registered and my insurance information hasn't changed. My preferred language is still English. What is the point of entering all of the paperwork beforehand if you're just going to make me wait another 20 minutes while I'm having contractions. You'd think they would streamline this a bit...whatever. Short digression.
After checking in, the exhausted midwife on call said I was 3 cm dilated and 60% effaced (aka, still a long way to go sweetie). It's now 2am, I haven't slept and she gives me the option of getting an epidural and pitocin. For some reason, I'm not ready to go there yet and decide to try to progress things "naturally." Basically, Jon and I wander the halls of Northside Hospital for 2 hours, stopping every 4 minutes for me to breathe and overcome another contraction. We're shuffling along and I've had enough. I'm just too tired to continue. We head back to the room at 4:30am where I tell the nurse that I'm throwing in the towel and that I want an epidural so that I can sleep through some of these ridiculous contractions and rest up for the delivery.
Fortunately at 4:30am, the lab isn't really busy, so my blood was processed quickly for platelet counts and the nurse started the IV drip to boost my blood pressure before calling in the anesthesiologist. The anesthesiologist was a very nice woman who was very helpful and let me know exactly everything she was about to do before she proceeded. I thought that was a good tactic considering she was about to shove a needle into my spine but what she understated was how painful the shots of lidocaine was going to be. I jumped when she put in those shots as it felt like hot oil bubbles under my skin. She said, "you can't jump during the next one." The actual epidural didn't hurt at all -- it just felt like pressure. I can handle pressure.
After the epidural, I settled down for some napping. How wonderful to sleep through the contractions! Thank goodness for medicine. I would've really struggled to keep my sanity had I not been able to sleep an hour or so. I just needed a nap. Jon went to find breakfast at 7am so he wouldn't pass out later. I kept munching on my ice chips.
Around 9:15am, I woke up to a cutesy alarm from the epidural machine. I couldn't really see what it said but it was flashing red and I had the sinking feeling that the red light and alarm meant that it was running out. I pushed that nurse's call button 20 times until someone arrived. Umm...fix that please! It was also around this time that I mentioned to the nurse that I was feeling "weird down there." She took one look and was like, "Oh, you're about 10 cm. Don't push yet we're not ready." Sure -- no problem. I'll just ignore the pressure and breathe shallowly. The nurses got all suited up, Jon grabbed a leg and it was go time. After pushing like a "super start pusher" for 18 minutes, I delivered our little boy at 10:02am. He came out all blue and icky but he was the most beautiful thing ever. Jon got to call out the sex and cut the cord and was really a part of my delivery.
The nurses cleaned him up while he was on my chest and we got to spend our first moments bonding together. He was 7lbs 14 oz and 20 inches in length when he was born. The midwife couldn't believe that he was so big as she was sure I would have a small baby.
Overall, my labor was 14 hours long -- 10 of which were unmedicated. The last 4 on the epidural were well worth it as it allowed me to sleep, push with my contractions and really reduced my stress and Jon's anxiety. It was a great experience and is something that I can definitely do again -- with an epidural ;-)
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