Raphael Adam is here!
Your Name/Screenname: Mary Rose/NolipajoliBaby's Name: Raphael Adam
Date of Birth: 10/23/10
Original Due Date: 10/6/10
Weeks Pregnant: 42 weeks 3 days
Weight: 8 lb 4 oz
Height: 21.5 inches
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This is a very long story for a very long labor!
I was 42 weeks and still no baby, even after 3 weeks of prodromal labor, so I had to get induced. We scheduled the induction for 10 am on Thursday, October 21. On the morning of the 21st, though, I woke up at 5 am with regular, strong contractions, about 10 minutes apart--just enough to keep me from sleeping! Ugh!
When I got to the midwife's for my appointment and got checked, I had finally had a little progress: 1.75 cm, soft, and no longer super duper posterior! The contractions weren't speeding up, though, so she did recommend we go ahead with the scheduled induction. I took the first dose of Cytotec around 10:30. She also put in the heplock and gave me the first dose of antibiotics (I was GBS +). I was very proud of the way I handled getting the IV in, since I have a pretty bad phobia of needles and it took her a few tries to get a good vein. When I saw that Nat was turning white, poor guy, I had him go sit down across the room and handled things by myself! We then left with instructions to call when the contractions got to be 4-1-1, or come back for another dose at 5 pm if they didn't. I had strong contractions all day, sometimes as close as 3 minutes apart for a long time. By 5, I was seriously exhausted. I was too nauseous to eat, and the contractions were too strong and frequent for me to sleep. I was really, really hoping to be almost done. When we went in at 5, though, I was only a stretchy 2!! I almost cried. Seeing that I was at the end of my rope, the midwife offered me a shot of Nubain to help me sleep, warning that it could slow the contractions down. However, it could also relax me enough to make them more productive. I was incapable of making a decision at that point, so Nat decided for me that it was a good idea. That stuff was AMAZING. I'm sorry that I needed it, since I'm pretty adverse to medications in general and especially during birthing, but it really did give me the strength I needed. I felt like a human for the first time in many hours. I was able to eat, and although I wasn't able to actually sleep fully, I did doze between contractions (which spaced out to 10 minutes at this point) and got some good rest. I rested until it wore off at some early hour of morning (2 maybe?) then labored fairly calmly until a decent hour to call the midwife in the morning. The contractions were definitely back labor by this time (I don't remember when they started being in my back) and very intense. I began vomiting after each contraction. Nat went to the store to get me some pedialite to see if I could keep that down for some sort of hydration, and I did manage to keep a little down, I think.
By the time we got to the midwife's again around 11, I was just as badly exhausted as I had been the day before, if not more so. But I was dilated almost to 4! I had told myself I would be happy with 3 cm, so I was very happy with the progress. I was ashamed of myself, though, because I really wanted another dose of the Nubain to see if I could rest again, and to take away the awful back labor for a little while. The midwife reassured me that it was not a bad decision and gave me both another dose of the Cytotec and the Nubain shot. It was just as good the second time, and I went home and rested for several hours. The contractions were about 8 minutes apart for most of this time, but were lasting for longer and longer-- around 2 minutes sometimes, but always over a minute long. It had worn off by the time we went back at 5 pm for another dose of the Cytotec, but I was getting the hang of this labor thing, I guess, because I felt pretty calm and in control of myself. I was finally able to use my Hypnobabies effectively and relax through my contractions. I still felt the pain, but it was much easier to get through when I was totally relaxed.
The midwife didn't check me this time, since she said that contractions as far apart as mine had been the whole time were unlikely to make much change. She gave me another dose of the Cytotec and I stayed at the center for a while to see what the contractions would do. They started lasting. We decided to stay at the birth center to see if they would keep up. The midwife left us there for a little while so she could take her kids home, since there was someone else in labor on her way over. When she came back, she checked me, and I was at a SEVEN!! I think it was around 6 pm on Friday. I was incredibly happy. She filled up the birthing tub for me and I got into it…amazing! I turned up the jets for counterpressure on my back and just floated. We were by ourselves for a long time, then, while the other mom delivered. Nat said he could hear screaming, but I thankfully couldn't hear anything over the jets.I just relaxed as much as I could, using my own hypnosis cues and having Nat use his birth partner cues. His "relax" cue was especially helpful, as it became more and more difficult for me to relax myself. My nausea came back around this time and I started vomiting after contractions again. Eventually the contractions were so painful that I didn't think the tub was helping anymore, so I got out and got into the rocking chair with pillows jammed into my back for counterpressure. It helped some, and I just kept trying to relax. At some point I ended up on the bed lying on my side so Nat could rub my back, but it didn't help very much. I really retreated into myself and got through each contraction by telling myself that it was almost over, and the contraction would be over soon. I breathed my peace cue, moaned, and did some Lamaze breathing, but nothing was really working at this point. Thankfully, my contractions never did get very close together, so I had rest between them. They still were lasting around 2 minutes each. I think my body was just too tired to handle a whole lot of contractions, so it made the most of the ones it had!
The midwife checked me several times throughout the night, and I progressed very slowly to an 8 and finally to a 9 with a lip of cervix on the right side. I started feeling very slightly pushy, and I was getting pretty impatient to get to the next stage, so after I'd had that same lip for about 2 hours we decided I would start pushing and she would try to move the lip of cervix out of the way around his head. This was a little before 4 am Saturday morning-- 42 hours after we started inducing. At this point, I wasn't as beat down as I had been at times the past couple of days, but I was REALLY tired. I had had some "I can't do this" moments during some contractions, which Nat talked me through beautifully, but at this point I was calm and ready to move on.
We pushed on the birthing stool at first, but the midwife was having trouble reaching my cervix to move it aside and I was starting to swell from the position, so she moved me to the bed to push on my back. I was a bit leery of it, since I've heard so much about pushing uphill etc., but we tried several positions (side, all fours, maybe more?) and that one really was the most comfortable. Pushing was REALLY hard work! I still felt every contraction in my back, and pushing only intensified the pain. I couldn't really feel him moving down the birth canal, and had trouble pushing the correct way. The midwife is pretty sure he was sunny side up for the first hour of pushing. I had quite a few "I can't do this" contractions in this time period, but my patient husband just kept talking me through!
At about the 1 hour mark, though, suddenly I could feel the proper way to push and gave a really strong push that moved him significantly. When they checked his heartbeat afterwards,though, it was low-- in the 60s, I think. I had to lie on my side and wear an oxygen mask and try not to panic. That did the trick, though, and he was back up to the 120s soon. The midwife is pretty sure that's when he turned, and caught his cord somewhere in doing so. After that, I could push more effectively. My pushing contractions were irregular but fairly far apart, so I got to rest a little between pushes, but I'm still convinced I would have had him out way sooner if I weren't so completely exhausted. I knew how to push, but I didn't always do it because it was just too much for me. Eventually, though, the midwife could see his head when I pushed, and we moved to the birthing stool to let gravity help bring him the rest of the way.
I don't really know when he "crowned". It took many, many pushes to get his head all of the way out, but it was encouraging to be able to reach down and feel his head right there! At the end, when he was "hanging on by his earlobes" as the midwife said, his heartrate dipped again and I put the oxygen mask back on. His heartrate improved some, but kept going down again. I pushed as hard as I could. After a little while (my time sense was nonexistent, so who knows how long) the midwife said if he didn't come out with the next contraction we would have to "do something". So with the next contraction I pushed like I'd never pushed before, and his head came out! I saw it, and just thought "What IS that?" because it looked so odd-- purple and oddly shaped. The midwife got the cord off of his neck and with one more push he was out! It was the weirdest feeling when suddenly he just wasn't inside of me anymore at all.
The next lapse of time seemed like hours as the midwife tried to get him to breathe and to get his heartrate up. She had oxygen on him and was moving him all around, rubbing him, tickling him, spanking him. He was moving a little in response but not breathing, until finally he let out a little squeal. I think my heart started beating again then, and I finally got to hold my precious baby. I checked and told Nat "It's a boy!" which he could see for himself. Our little Raphael! I stayed on the birthing stool waiting for the the placenta to detach, holding the baby and saying things to him and Nat which probably made no sense. I was so happy, and so relieved! We finally looked at the clock and it was a little before 7:30. His official time of birth is 7:26, but that's just a guess since no one was looking at the clock.
Once the cord stopped pulsing, the midwife cut it (she offered to let Nat or I do it, but we weren't really up for that). I don't know how long we waited for the placenta; I remember the midwife asking if I felt any urge to push, which I didn't. Then, suddenly, a HUGE gush of blood poured out of me, all over the floor and the midwife, mostly missing the basin that was under me, I think. I have no idea how I was so calm about the whole thing, just watching as the blood left me, but it didn't even occur to me that this was a problem. The midwife had Nat hold my arms on Raphael in case I lost consciousness, and kept making me talk to keep me awake while she massaged my uterus (ow!) and sent her assistant to get some sort of drug ready. The bleeding finally slowed, so she cancelled the order for the drug and gave me a shot of pitocin instead. She asked how I felt and I told her I was probably about to faint (still calmly!), so she had Nat take Raphael and helped me onto the floor, on my side. After a while on the floor I felt well enough to be half carried to the bed where she started an IV of fluids and I got to hold Raphael again. I tried to feed him but he wouldn't latch (he didn't latch for about 8 hours, but he's been eating 24/7 ever since!!).
Anyway, it was all more dramatic than I'd hoped, and WAY longer and more difficult, but now we have our little man and he's just perfect! I did have to resort to narcotics, and obviously with the induction it wasn't intervention free, but I'm still pretty proud of getting through that whole thing. The midwife told me that at a hospital I would almost certainly have been sectioned; I doubt I would have had the strength to protest during that long, slow dilation process.
posted by Noli at 9:57 PM
