A little over a year ago, I was hugely pregnant…
(It’s a birth story, Gentle Readers, as is my tradition.)
One year ago, I was in the hospital, hooked up to IV’s and a pitocin drip and all sorts of fetal monitors. This may sound like a normal birth story to you, but it was extreme for me.
I’m a homebirther. My oldest three children were all born at home, under water. I’m not a hippy. I wear make-up and I shave my legs and I wear sassy high heels. I also believe that every woman is entitled to give birth where she feels the most comfortable. For you, that may be in a hospital with monitors and such a strong epidural that someone has to tell you to push, because you can’t feel it yourself. For me, it’s at home, in a warm, deep birthing tub, completely in tune with my body–mastering it, and surrounded by my outstanding midwife and my loved ones.
But towards the beginning of this pregnancy, something in my gut felt unsettled about homebirth. I was never really sure why–just sure that this time it wasn’t for me. So I looked for someone who could give me a similarly natural experience, but from a hospital bed. I found a wonderful group of Certified Nurse Midwives (CNM) who worked out of a little local hospital where each room had a jacuzzi for labor and other natural birth-friendly amenities. They knew of my commitment to going naturally and they were there to support me in that.
But as I was sitting in the Akron, OH airport on my way home from my Grandma’s funeral, I looked down at my feet and noticed that they were gigantic. My normally loose-fitting flip-flops were digging into my flesh. My ankles looked like those of an elephant.
Well, pregnant women get swollen, right? I tried to pass it off as just being due to the stress of the last few days, plus all the airplane riding. Still, this was alarming in its swollenness. I was wearing glasses, and I realized that they felt particularly uncomfortable–pinching my nose. I finally excused myself and looked in a mirror–and was greeted by the Sta-Puft Marshmallow Man.
When I got home from my trip, I stopped by the grocery store to take my blood pressure on one of their fancy machines. My results were astronomical.
I was sick.
I was put on bed-rest and spent lots of time under observation in the hospital. (By the way, “bed-rest” is a joke when you have three tiny children at home and no one to help you take care of them. Just so we’re all clear on that…) No one had actually diagnosed me with anything because, even though I was alarmingly swollen and had tremendously high blood pressure, my lab results kept coming back fine. So… bed-rest.
One day, things were particularly bad. I was seeing stars, my head was throbbing, and I felt faint. It was Bubba and Fluffy’s first day of preschool, so I was going to drop them off and run to the hospital for some tests and then go back and pick them up. My sister-in-law was home from work that day and would help me by taking Scooby.
When I got to the hospital, the on-call doctor did a thorough examination and pronounced, once and for all, that I did indeed have pre-eclampsia. I was only 37 weeks along, which is still considered “full term” but for someone like me, who normally delivers between 42 and 43 weeks, it was very early. They would have to induce me. Immediately. After many frantic phonecalls, Brian was on his way, and his sister would pick up the other kids and keep them all at her house overnight.
When my CNM arrived, I just looked at her and said, “so, basically, I take this beautiful birth plan that I wrote out, about wanting to be able to walk around and find positions comfortable for me and labor in the water, and I shred it and throw it in the garbage.”
“Yep. Pretty much.”
I was still determined not to have any pain medication, even though I would have pitocin flowing through my veins–a drug that forces hard and painful contractions–more hard and more painful than the already almost unbearable pain of regular labor. But I still wanted to be able to work with my body, not ignore it.
I confess that I was scared to death. I would be forced to sit almost completely still, strapped to all sorts of beeping monitors, with IV’s of antibiotics (I was also beta strep positive) and an IV of pitocin. I had no idea how to labor under those conditions.
As it turned out, my body was NOT ready to go into labor. It took 13 hours of the strongest available dose of pitocin being pumped into me before I was even considered “in labor.” 13 hours of that hideous bed and those wicked monitors. 13 hours of watching Brian sleep comfortably (and snore loudly) in his own hospital bed.
When I did finally go into labor, I was all alone. Brian was fast asleep, the nurses had forgotten I existed, and I was in hardcore pitocin labor. I became my own doula, reminding myself to drop my jaw, unclench my fists, work with the contraction. This went on for three hours. Somewhere in here, my sister Laura showed up and I told her that if I hadn’t made significant progress, I was going to give up. I wasn’t yet at my breaking point, but I was about to be. I would need some help with the pain if this labor was going to go on much longer. She assured me that that was okay–that I wasn’t a failure. So I called in the CNM and told her what was going on. She decided to check me before we really talked about my pain options.
“This baby will be here in less than an hour.”
Suddenly, people were breaking down my bed and I was allowed to stand up! Ahhhhh! Such a relief! I walked around, I swayed, I squatted. I was in my element. And I. could. do this.
By the time I sat down again, I was ready to push, with Laura holding one leg and Brian holding the other. Four minutes later, my beloved baby was born.
It’s as though a piece of my soul was finally found that day. This little baby is the joy of my life. I don’t know how I ever survived without him.
That’s not to say he’s been an easy baby–oh no!!! From jaundice to RSV to not being able to breastfeed, he has been an extremely difficult baby. Perhaps it’s the pain and the sacrifices and the tears I’ve shed that make him so very special to me.
I can’t believe a whole year has gone by. How is that possible?
Happy, Happy Birthday, Dear Fuzzles. I love you more than I could ever possibly express.
(And here are a couple of pics that make me laugh…)
