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Mouse, tell me a story.
Mouse, tell me your superbirth story. I've seen it mentioned a few times over the last few weeks, and I'm insanely curious. Did Dimi come out in the parking lot?
Re: Mouse, tell me a story.
Baby Boxer is coming! 5.23.12
www.focushunting.com
Sorry, Dimi has dropped his afternoon nap, so less time here for me. And not quite the driveway, so this will be long but not that exciting.
Hmmm, well my first birth was three and a half hours from my water breaking. It was pretty freaking intense, I think I got one contraction that was the kind you can breathe through and the rest were like transition contrax. The nurse (and everyone else) didn't really think I was that far along and didn't want to give me anything because I had "a lot longer to go". After a half hour I was begging for relief, but by that point I'd gone from 3 to 8 cms and there wasn't time. I remain bitter.
I was not going to repeat the mistake, so the plan with Dimi was to induce. Except I remained at 1 cm two days before my due date and the midwife wussed out. I didn't have Braxton hicks with Bug, but I had them with Dimi. Finally the night after my last exam, they got regular enough to go in. Yay! But I was still at 2 cms, and they weren't strong contrax, just regular. They kept me there walking for two hours before giving up and sending me home. dammit.
We tried to get some rest, and they kept waking me up, but I didn't want to get Mr M up when I was going to need him the next day. So I tried for about two hours to just work through them, but I guess they got more intense (I hadn't slept in almost 24 hours at this point and was a little out of it). Mr M realized what was going on, and tried to coax me the car, but I didn't want to go and just be turned away. Besides, I had to pee really bad, but nothing was coming out. Then I started shaking uncontrollably and we both went "oh ***.". He raced Bug to the car and guided me down the driveway. I couldn't walk with the contrax, and yes, I did worry I was going to give birth in the driveway.
We take off for the hospital and there's a fuukcing train on our usual route. Mr M panics, so inbetween contrax I direct him t he backway. At some point, we were stopped and I looked over and there was this huge flock of Canada geese and that was the only time I ever found anything that distracted me during a contraction. Back rubs, encouragement, whatever, but a flock of geese at the side of the road and in the middle of a contraction I paused to say "whoa, that's a lot of geese" before going back to moaning.
So we get to the hospital and I can't walk, so Bug runs in and a team of nurses runs out and gets me in a wheelchair. They wheel me in a room, yank my pants off me, check me, the nurse says "uh, I'll be right back" and bolts, and the midwife comes in and says "so you're ready to push?" no.... I just got here. Mr M comes in from calling Pdx to get Bug, and tries to get me something for the pain, but no dice...AGAIN. <-----bitter. We got there at 8:06, and Dimi was born at 8:26.
Pdx shows up 10 minutes later and Bug asks if she wants to meet her brother. "he'll be here soon, huh?" "no, he's already here."
ta-da!
"The meek shall inherit the earth" isn't about children. It's about deer. We're all going to get messed the fuckup by a bunch of cloned super-deer.- samfish2bcrab
Sometimes I wonder if scientists have never seen a sci-fi movie before. "Oh yes, let's create a super species of deer. NOTHING COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG." I wonder if State Farm offers a Zombie Deer Attack policy. -CaliopeSpidrman
"The meek shall inherit the earth" isn't about children. It's about deer. We're all going to get messed the fuckup by a bunch of cloned super-deer.- samfish2bcrab
Sometimes I wonder if scientists have never seen a sci-fi movie before. "Oh yes, let's create a super species of deer. NOTHING COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG." I wonder if State Farm offers a Zombie Deer Attack policy. -CaliopeSpidrman
I know I've heard this story before but damn, that's crazy! It makes me very thankful that the hospital is right down the road.
My friend was in labor for a really long time with her first so when she went into labor with her second, everyone was all "stay at home, take your time." The baby was born in the car in their driveway. When asked "So who delivered him, your H?" She replied "My yoga pants."
The poster formerly known as PDXPhotoGrl
Crap...I Mean Crafts
Your dream birth experience???
Dude, A, you were not alone. I might be remembering wrong, but didn't I say something inane like "hey I just had a baby, really fast!" when you came in? It took me like a week to get over the shock and wrap my head around it.
And i didn't even tear! But really, your body has no time to prepare, no easy contrax, that perenium numbing from the pressure just doesn't happen, so it's a total ring of fire. And it can be riskier: driveway babies, bleeds, driveway babies, more tearing (unless you have a Super Vag), driveway babies. And sadly, you don't know it's going to be quick, so you're thinking the whole time there might be hours and hours more of it.
I dunno, it could have been worse, but I don't think it was ideal.
"The meek shall inherit the earth" isn't about children. It's about deer. We're all going to get messed the fuckup by a bunch of cloned super-deer.- samfish2bcrab
Sometimes I wonder if scientists have never seen a sci-fi movie before. "Oh yes, let's create a super species of deer. NOTHING COULD POSSIBLY GO WRONG." I wonder if State Farm offers a Zombie Deer Attack policy. -CaliopeSpidrman
Well, I'm planning to go med-free, and I think I'd prefer quick and really intense to drawn out and still intense but not *as* intense. In reality, I will end up going in early because a) I'm a first timer and will probably think I'm way further along than I am, and b) yeah there's a whole lot of unnecessary risk involved in birthing in a driveway. But I could know with 100% certainty that baby and I would be completely fine, hell yeah I'll take 20 minutes from hospital door to delivery.
Crap...I Mean Crafts
Baby Boxer is coming! 5.23.12
www.focushunting.com
Baby Boxer is coming! 5.23.12
www.focushunting.com
How about my virtually med-free c-section? (epidurals don't always work, y'all).
I didn't poop, and my actual labor in the hospital was really short, but yeah, I wouldn't wish that week leading up to it on anyone.
They broke my water to jumpstart my labor, and he was born five hours later with maybe 15 min of pushing. I'm kind of afraid of how fast it would have been if I had waited until it happened on its own. I was already at 6cm when I went in.
In reality, my labor experience was pretty ideal. I went med-free and when I was first checked at the hospital I was 4 cm and after an hour and a half I was ready to push. I did have to push for an hour and a half but only had a small tear that required 1 stitch. I had been having mild contractions on and off throughout that day, but wasn't even really convinced that's what they were at the time.
2/20/2011
Not pain-free, but not bad. Med-free, 7 hours labor, 15 min pushing, 1 small tear, exhilarating endorphin high that I wish I could get back again. I was in the hospital for an hour and 45 min before he was born. I felt like that was a perfect, safe margin. Of course it's not like I could possibly plan that and do it again, but at least now I know what transition feels like.
Sleeping through the night, though...yeah. Not so much. Sean woke up at 1am last night and he's 19 months.
The poster formerly known as PDXPhotoGrl
I had the same problem with Delilah at first. She'd always fall asleep when nursing and lost weight the first two weeks (born at 8 lbs 2 oz, was 7 lbs 9 oz after 2 weeks). Luckily I only had to pump every 3 hours, but that sucked big time too.
We stopped waking her every 3 hours to eat after the first 2 months though and she's been pretty much STTN since then. Of course she has her days/weeks where she wakes like this past weekend which suck, but overall I can't complain. The child is infuriating to get down for a nap though and wants you to hold her when she finally does nap. And she also thinks her bedtime should be between 9-10 pm.
2/20/2011
Smart lady.
Mine was very similar to PDXria's, about 12 hours from the time my water broke (that was the first sign of labor) to delivery, hard but not unbearable, and really only bad the last 3 hours, arrived at the hospital at the 10.5 hour mark, pushed for 15 minutes, no poop, superficial tearing. I did have to have pitocin and IV fluids after because I was a bleeder, which sucked (and is thie one thing holding me back from going the homebirth route next time), but in the grand scheme of things it was pretty awesome.
I think Mouse makes an excellent point on the cons of precipitous labor. If I went from zero to transition level contractions in less than a half hour, I'm pretty sure I'd be begging for mercy, terried that I had 12 more hours of that ahead of me, since that is pretty typical for first time moms. In hindsight, it's easy to say "wow, wham bam thank you ma'am" sounds good, but in the throes of it, you just never know how long its going to be. That's why the various coping methods often have you try to stay present in the moment and focus only on working with the contraction you're having or enjoying the rest period. It is really easy for your mind to start thinking about how much more work you have to do.
Mucho likes purple nails and purple cupcakes
Mucho likes purple nails and purple cupcakes
Same here. I had almost no rest between contractions after my water broke. I was terrified that I would get to the hospital and they would tell me I was a 3. Nope, I was an 8.
The poster formerly known as PDXPhotoGrl
They gave you pitocin after birth? I didn't know they did that. And it helps to stop bleeding?
Baby Boxer is coming! 5.23.12
www.focushunting.com
Yep. You can get a shot in the thigh or via IV. They waited for my body to do its thing (meaning uterus contract down and not hemorrhage) as long as was safe. When it was clear I needed a little help, they put in an IV (I didn't get one until that point). You have post delivery cramping regardless, these were just a little more intense thanks to the pitocin. But I was still pretty high on the post birth endorphins, so it wasn't that bad. and the fluids also perked me up (I was a transition puker), which was an added bonus.
And just a heads up, some OBs give post-delivery pitocin as SOP.
I do wonder if the midwife wasn't a little aggressive with yanking on the cord to help me deliver the placenta and if that was the cause (or simply exacerbated) my bleeding. In retrospect, I'd probably ask her to wait a little longer before pulling the rip cord. That said, memories from that first hour post birth are very rosy/hazy, and I know I was pretty occupied with the baby on my chest, not pushing the placenta out.
Mucho likes purple nails and purple cupcakes
Ohhh I want to share! My story is a lot like Mouses except it was my first child. Which makes me fear if I ever had a second!
As a slight back story, I didn't really ever have Braxton Hicks except for what I suspect would be once or twice and both times I drank and ate and the discomfort went away.
I woke up at about 4:30 AM because of lower abdominal and lower back pain. Went to the bathroom. I laid back down and the pain became really hard. I texted my husband (who worked third shift) and said, I think something is happening, could you please come home and lay with me, I don't feel well.
Luckily he raced home and within a half hour, the contractions were timing at exactly 3 minutes apart. After 45 minutes of this, we decided to call our midwife and ask what we should do. She advised a hot shower and to lay down on my side to see if the contractions would space out some. I got into the shower and after about 10-15 minutes there was no change. I got out of the shower and while toweling off, they start coming in at about 1.5 minutes. My husband started freaking out and was like, we need to finish packing our stuff and just go. While in the babies room, grabbing some clothes to take with, I got a really hard contraction and went to sit down. As soon as I bent down to sit, my water broke.
I went to the bathroom and immediately started puking. It was awful. Being the drama queen I am, I insisted I was going to have the baby on the bathroom floor. My husband finally convinced me to walk to the car and we started on our way to the hospital and I thought for sure we weren't going to make it with contractions 1.5- 1 minute apart. Thank goodness we got there, we get into the emergency room and this lady starts checking us in all slow. I told her we preregistered and that was I in active labor, but she ignored me and kept trying to check us in. I am sure she is probably used to people coming in thinking their babies are coming any minute only to be dilated to like 2. Another contraction hit and I got down on all fours in her office and started mooing like a cow. That made her call someone to get me to labor and delivery.
By the time we hit the room, I told the nurse "I just need to push, this baby is coming. I have to push" and just tore my pants off and got into bed. The nurse needed to check how dilated I was and I was a bit past 8 cm. The midwife came in, asked how I felt, I said, "I feel like I need to push" she checked me again within a few minutes and told me to push. 20 or so minutes later and she was out. Insane, quick, scary, amazing.
Emerson was born at 7:32.
A quick birth was definitely terrifying. Everyone always says it's so lucky and they wish that happened to them but I don't think I adjusted as well as I could have, had I time to really labor. I know that probably sounds stupid. I did tear (and poop). Just minor tearing. The scariest part was the blood loss. Apparently it was so quick because her placenta started to detach.
"If you wanna win then you shoulda put a hat on it. Don't be mad when you see a knit cap won it. If you wanna win then you shoulda put a hat on it."- Fenton
Bethietears. I'm really happy that I came into work early today, so there's no one around to hear me snortlaughing.
Baby Boxer is coming! 5.23.12
www.focushunting.com