Benjamin's Birth Story
This is (obviously) a birth story...if words like 'dilated' and 'cervix' make you squirm then stop reading now. ;)
I knew the moment I found out my due date that I'd go late, and sure enough, September 5th came and went with no sign of labor. Even though I was expecting to still be pregnant then, I was really, really wanting this baby to come. As much as I love being pregnant, I was exhausted, swollen, dealing with pregnancy carpal tunnel and did I mention exhausted? My doctor's appointment on Friday the 8th showed that I was about 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced. Baby was head down, and if I recall correctly, anterior (facing my back). All there was to do was wait to go into labor. The doctor wanted to do a non-stress test and talk about induction the beginning or middle of the following week, but wouldn't you know, the next Friday was the only day they could do all those tests? ;) I was miserable, but I absolutely wanted to go into labor on my own.
Sometime Friday night I woke up to pee and noticed an awful lot of painful pressure going on inside me. I didn't think anything of it, until it happened a few more times between 10 pm and midnight. Unbeknownst to me (because I hadn't turned on the light) I had some bloody show, which I realized around 1 a.m.
At first I didn't think I was in labor, because the pain was definitely not like my contractions with Timmy and Isaac. This pain was more intense and deeper, coming from inside me, not my uterus. Around 1:30 I finally realize that these pains were coming regularly--every 6-7 minutes--and that it might actually be labor. My water hadn't broken, which I sort of assumed would be my first indication of going into labor since that's what happened with Timmy and Isaac. Chris woke up and some point and asked if I was ok, and I told him I thought I was in labor.
He offered to pour me a bath and that was probably the most relaxing part of the next 14 hours. Sitting in the tub (in our recently finished master bathroom!) with a few candles lit, my birth playlist in the background and Chris holding my hands during contractions...I see why people want to have babies at home. :) After a couple hours in the tub the contractions spaced out a bit so I got out of the tub and we both tried to sleep some more. Around 5:30 they picked up again, both in speed and intensity. At this point I was moaning through the contractions and needed to focus on them. Chris texted our friend Abbi who was going to watch the big kids and let her know what was going on. She got to the house around 6:30 or 7 and loaded up everyone. We took off for the hospital not long after they left.
Side note: if you can't find your birth plan and ask your husband to grab the childbirth book, he may accidentally think you mean for him to grab the emergency-having-a-baby-on-the-side-of-the-road instructions and slightly panic. ;)
On the hour long drive to the hospital I sneaked a quick snack since I knew they wouldn't let me eat at the hospital and alternated between trying to rest and silently cursing a) Eve b) Cal Trans for the bumpy roads and c) the city planners every time we hit a red light (which was every.single.intersection in town). I told myself that I had to be dilated to at least a 3.
We got to the hospital around 8:30, parked and made our way inside. A lady walking out asked if I needed a wheelchair (at first I thought she was a hospital employee) but I told her I thought I could walk. She said she was dilated to a 4 and they were sending her home. I told Chris if they tried to send me home I was going to cry.
The person working the front desk asked if we were there visiting someone, to which Chris responded "No...we're here to have a baby..." Apparently the pregnant woman wearing pajamas and unable to walk through contractions wasn't very obvious.
We made it to the maternity floor where a kind nurse asked a few questions and admitted us. She checked me and I was 6 1/2-7 cm dilated. Considering that I'd only been in labor for about 7 hours, I was thrilled and everyone hoped we would have a baby by noon. The nurses had their shift change, and our new nurse was equally wonderful. She had been an L&D nurse for 43 years, taught childbirth classes, attended lots of natural births and had delivered over 300 babies the doctors didn't arrive in time to catch.
The next several hours passed with me laboring on the bed with the 'peanut ball' as she called it. (Here's a visual). The theory is that it opens up the pelvis and in her words "helps that baby just swim right now.") Apparently Benji didn't feel much like swimming, because noon came and went and still no baby. Progress was slow, and the pain excruciating, nothing like my labors with the first two boys. At some point they realized he was posterior, which explained the intense pain and the fact the he wasn't dropping. My water was still mostly in tact (may have been leaking earlier, and there was concern that there was meconium present). At this point I was done. I told Chris that at the end I knew I'd be glad I'd done this naturally, but right now I was really, really wishing I'd opted for a repeat c-section. I begged for an epidural or anything to make the pain go away. The nurse told me that an epidural would make my body relax too much and Benji wouldn't be able to get out, so if I wanted to avoid the operating room I needed to do this naturally. She reminded me that my body was made for this and that I could do it--in fact I was doing it.
Around 3 the nurse did ask if I would be open to a dose of fentanyl to "take the edge off the pain" and help me relax. I knew I needed to relax so this baby would come out, but relaxing when you're in the worst pain of your life isn't easy. We agreed and she started the medicine. Honestly, I barely noticed a difference. The details are a bit fuzzy, but the doctor broke my water sometime around then as well in an effort to help Benji descend. I definitely noticed the contractions becoming more intense and closer together after that happened.
The fentanyl lasted for about an hour, wearing off around 4 p.m. Pretty soon I had a slight urge to push, even though I wasn't fully dilated. Before long I couldn't not push, despite being told not to. There was still a lip of cervix in the way, so the doctor held it out of the way (that was...unpleasant ← understatement of the year) and I pushed. After 2 pushes I asked if he was here yet--only pushing 3 times with Isaac spoiled me, haha. After a few more pushes it was discovered that Benji's cord was around his neck and it was tight. I had to deliver his head, wait for the doctor to cut the cord and then finish delivering his body. Let's just say that was a few but very, very intense and painful moments. Because of the cord issue and the suspicion of meconium, they brought Benji to the warming table right away. He needed a little bit of oxygen but his Apgars were good. I'm not sure if there was meconium before he was born, but he definitely pooped on the way out, hitting the floor and narrowly missing the doctor's shoe.
We hadn't totally settled on a first name, knowing that we wanted to see this little boy before deciding for sure. Benjamin had been one of our top choices, along with Joshua and Nathan. Once I finally got to see and hold him, we decided for sure that he was Benjamin Lowell, named after Benjamin in the Bible and my maternal grandpa.
The Lord was gracious and sustained us through what was by far the hardest and most painful labor and delivery. Remember how I said I couldn't find my birth plan? I never ended up figuring out where it was, which worried me because I was trying for a VBAC and was concerned the nurses or doctor on call wouldn't listen to me unless I had that magic piece of paper with my doctor's signature, but praise the Lord I never once felt pressured for a c-section. We had a nurse who was incredibly pro natural birth (even when I was begging for drugs--ha!) and never felt like we had to fight to get what we wanted.
I knew the moment I found out my due date that I'd go late, and sure enough, September 5th came and went with no sign of labor. Even though I was expecting to still be pregnant then, I was really, really wanting this baby to come. As much as I love being pregnant, I was exhausted, swollen, dealing with pregnancy carpal tunnel and did I mention exhausted? My doctor's appointment on Friday the 8th showed that I was about 2 cm dilated and 50% effaced. Baby was head down, and if I recall correctly, anterior (facing my back). All there was to do was wait to go into labor. The doctor wanted to do a non-stress test and talk about induction the beginning or middle of the following week, but wouldn't you know, the next Friday was the only day they could do all those tests? ;) I was miserable, but I absolutely wanted to go into labor on my own.
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| 40 weeks |
After my appointment, I stopped by Costco and WinCo and sometime at WinCo declared to myself that I wasn't going to a grocery store again while pregnant. Walking was so difficult, I don't think I would have made it if I hadn't had a cart to lean on. When I got home I told Chris that we needed to do something fun to take my mind off the fact that I was still pregnant, so we had pizza, homemade ice cream and a family move night that evening.
Sometime Friday night I woke up to pee and noticed an awful lot of painful pressure going on inside me. I didn't think anything of it, until it happened a few more times between 10 pm and midnight. Unbeknownst to me (because I hadn't turned on the light) I had some bloody show, which I realized around 1 a.m.
He offered to pour me a bath and that was probably the most relaxing part of the next 14 hours. Sitting in the tub (in our recently finished master bathroom!) with a few candles lit, my birth playlist in the background and Chris holding my hands during contractions...I see why people want to have babies at home. :) After a couple hours in the tub the contractions spaced out a bit so I got out of the tub and we both tried to sleep some more. Around 5:30 they picked up again, both in speed and intensity. At this point I was moaning through the contractions and needed to focus on them. Chris texted our friend Abbi who was going to watch the big kids and let her know what was going on. She got to the house around 6:30 or 7 and loaded up everyone. We took off for the hospital not long after they left.
Side note: if you can't find your birth plan and ask your husband to grab the childbirth book, he may accidentally think you mean for him to grab the emergency-having-a-baby-on-the-side-of-the-road instructions and slightly panic. ;)
On the hour long drive to the hospital I sneaked a quick snack since I knew they wouldn't let me eat at the hospital and alternated between trying to rest and silently cursing a) Eve b) Cal Trans for the bumpy roads and c) the city planners every time we hit a red light (which was every.single.intersection in town). I told myself that I had to be dilated to at least a 3.
 |
| Better than photos of me in labor, of which there are none, |
The person working the front desk asked if we were there visiting someone, to which Chris responded "No...we're here to have a baby..." Apparently the pregnant woman wearing pajamas and unable to walk through contractions wasn't very obvious.
We made it to the maternity floor where a kind nurse asked a few questions and admitted us. She checked me and I was 6 1/2-7 cm dilated. Considering that I'd only been in labor for about 7 hours, I was thrilled and everyone hoped we would have a baby by noon. The nurses had their shift change, and our new nurse was equally wonderful. She had been an L&D nurse for 43 years, taught childbirth classes, attended lots of natural births and had delivered over 300 babies the doctors didn't arrive in time to catch.
The next several hours passed with me laboring on the bed with the 'peanut ball' as she called it. (Here's a visual). The theory is that it opens up the pelvis and in her words "helps that baby just swim right now.") Apparently Benji didn't feel much like swimming, because noon came and went and still no baby. Progress was slow, and the pain excruciating, nothing like my labors with the first two boys. At some point they realized he was posterior, which explained the intense pain and the fact the he wasn't dropping. My water was still mostly in tact (may have been leaking earlier, and there was concern that there was meconium present). At this point I was done. I told Chris that at the end I knew I'd be glad I'd done this naturally, but right now I was really, really wishing I'd opted for a repeat c-section. I begged for an epidural or anything to make the pain go away. The nurse told me that an epidural would make my body relax too much and Benji wouldn't be able to get out, so if I wanted to avoid the operating room I needed to do this naturally. She reminded me that my body was made for this and that I could do it--in fact I was doing it.
Around 3 the nurse did ask if I would be open to a dose of fentanyl to "take the edge off the pain" and help me relax. I knew I needed to relax so this baby would come out, but relaxing when you're in the worst pain of your life isn't easy. We agreed and she started the medicine. Honestly, I barely noticed a difference. The details are a bit fuzzy, but the doctor broke my water sometime around then as well in an effort to help Benji descend. I definitely noticed the contractions becoming more intense and closer together after that happened.
The fentanyl lasted for about an hour, wearing off around 4 p.m. Pretty soon I had a slight urge to push, even though I wasn't fully dilated. Before long I couldn't not push, despite being told not to. There was still a lip of cervix in the way, so the doctor held it out of the way (that was...unpleasant ← understatement of the year) and I pushed. After 2 pushes I asked if he was here yet--only pushing 3 times with Isaac spoiled me, haha. After a few more pushes it was discovered that Benji's cord was around his neck and it was tight. I had to deliver his head, wait for the doctor to cut the cord and then finish delivering his body. Let's just say that was a few but very, very intense and painful moments. Because of the cord issue and the suspicion of meconium, they brought Benji to the warming table right away. He needed a little bit of oxygen but his Apgars were good. I'm not sure if there was meconium before he was born, but he definitely pooped on the way out, hitting the floor and narrowly missing the doctor's shoe.
We hadn't totally settled on a first name, knowing that we wanted to see this little boy before deciding for sure. Benjamin had been one of our top choices, along with Joshua and Nathan. Once I finally got to see and hold him, we decided for sure that he was Benjamin Lowell, named after Benjamin in the Bible and my maternal grandpa.
The Lord was gracious and sustained us through what was by far the hardest and most painful labor and delivery. Remember how I said I couldn't find my birth plan? I never ended up figuring out where it was, which worried me because I was trying for a VBAC and was concerned the nurses or doctor on call wouldn't listen to me unless I had that magic piece of paper with my doctor's signature, but praise the Lord I never once felt pressured for a c-section. We had a nurse who was incredibly pro natural birth (even when I was begging for drugs--ha!) and never felt like we had to fight to get what we wanted.
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| Family of six! |
We've adjusted well to being a family of six, Benji is a perfect blend of all his big siblings, which is a remarkable feat since they don't look very much alike. He is relaxed, a good nurser, sleeps through noise and doted on by everyone. We are so thankful for our Benji Bear!
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