i would love to document & share our birth story of baby atlas while it’s fresh in my memory so i can cherish the little details forever, as it was one of the most insane days of my life! my due date of 10/1 had come & gone and i felt no signs that he was coming anytime soon. i was anxious about feeling contractions and going into labor but tried to keep calm and enjoy the last few days just me and dek and my family. my mom and i had been meeting for breakfast every friday for the last few months and that week was going to be no different, except that she needed to meet on thursday instead of friday because she had a repair-man coming to fix something at her house friday, so we planned to meet for breakfast at yolk on thursday (10/4) morning at 7 am.
i showered the night before (wednesday evening) but didn’t wash my hair, i wanted onnneee more day with my amazing birthday blowout from drybar, which i had gotten done on friday for my bday (i reeaallly made it last!) and went to bed around 11 or so. i was used to getting up to pee several times in the middle of the night, but that night i was woken by a gush of fluids coming out of me…while i was still laying in bed. i knew it wasn’t pee so i shot up and ran to the bathroom and yelled to dekel “dek! i think my water just broke!” i sat on the toilet shaking and crying because i was so scared for what was to come. he hugged me in a foggy state from being frantically woken up & told me that everything was going to be ok and that he would start packing the car with the hospital bags. my doctor told us if my water broke to come in immediately but it was 4:09 am & her office was obviously closed so we would need to go to the emergency room to check my dilation.
after the initial shock of my water breaking, i was weirdly calm. i was not feeling any contractions & was not in any pain so i took my time getting ready to go to the hospital. i swiped on some mascara and bronzer, ate cereal, folded laundry and loved on peanut, our pup. dek packed the car, made coffee & took out the trash. we left the house around 5:15 and on the way there i was in disbelief that we would soon meet our son. the drive to the hospital only took 5 minutes since we live so close and it was so early. we checked into the ER, sat down in the empty waiting room & just waited while holding hands. they finally called us back & put us in a room, had me change into a hospital gown (which i put on backward- ha!), asked me a million questions, checked my vital signs and had the doctor on duty come in to check how dilated i was and to confirm that my water did actually break. she confirmed that i was dilated to 3 cm and that we weren’t going to be going back home that morning and that we would be sent up to labor & delivery to start receiving pitocin, which is a synthetic version of oxytocin that acts to “kickstart” contractions & get labor going. they put an IV into my wrist vein in preparation for the fluids and drugs i would be receiving later on and immediately a rush of fear came back over me. while alone in the room waiting for the wheelchair to whisk me upstairs i cried again to dek who hugged me & held me close.
{me & peanut having cereal for breakfast before leaving for the hospital to have baby atlas!}
{in the ER waiting to go upstairs to labor & delivery}
{being whisked away!}
we got up to labor & delivery and once we rolled into that room where i would give birth it all became SO real! i looked at the clock and it was already 7:30, like where had time gone?! i went to the bathroom before laying on the delivery bed because i was terrified i would poop during delivery and wanted to try to avoid that at all costs. once on the delivery bed they hooked me up to a machine so they could monitor my blood pressure, baby’s heart rate & my contractions. i started feeling crampy but the pain wasn’t that bad at this point so i just tried to lay there and relax and wait, breathing softly through the cramps that would come in waves. at around 8:30 or 9 my mom and sister showed up and were in the room with us and my contractions were getting stronger & stronger and i was uncomfortable. at this point they checked me and i was only dilated to 4 cm so i wasn’t even in “active labor” yet & just needed to keep having contractions to move the baby down the birth canal. the nurses hooked me up with some drug to my IV to mask the pain i was feeling until the anesthesiologist was free and could come to give me an epidural. the pain drug made me feel drunk and i remember one of the nurses talking to me and my eyes kept wanting to cross and my brain being foggy, but it did help with the pain. they kept adjusting my pitocin levels and made sure i was getting fluids so there would be no delay for the epidural. the anesthesiologist came in around 10:30 and gave me the epidural which i was so worried would be painful, but i only felt a prick. along with the epidural they needed to insert a catheter since i wouldn’t be able to get up to pee until hours after birth. after getting the epidural i felt immediate relief from the cramping but after a few hours of laboring i felt intense pressure down below (not necessarily pain, but intense pressure like i had to poop) and i remember thinking to myself “my body wants to push” but the nurse needed to check me again to be sure i was actually ready to start pushing.
{strapped up for contraction & heart rate monitoring}
{getting an epidural}
lunchtime had come and gone and while i couldn’t eat anything, my mom, sister & dekel had gotten food to eat in the room and fed me some ice chips. i mostly tried to sleep, relax and concentrate on breathing and i remember my eyes were closed most of the time and just feeling “out of it.” it’s now about 3 pm and after being checked to see how dilated i was the nurse said i was a +2 (whatever that means!) and that it was go time! i was terrified but felt brave & ready at the same time. she told me that during each contraction (we could see when i was having one on the screen but i could also slightly feel them) i would push for 10 seconds and then rest and wait for the next one to push as hard as i can again. she touched me inside so i knew where to push to because it’s a certain kind of pushing you have to do, like in a certain spot you focus on to actually move the baby down. so the pushing process began and it was hard fucking work! an hour or so went by and she finally called for my doctor to come in for delivery, which made me feel like he was close to coming out. everyone was telling me they could see his head and his hair, which was so cool but really freaked me out! with every contraction i was pushing as hard as i could but towards the end i was getting frustrated, i felt like i was using up all my effort and i was afraid that when i stopped pushing he was getting sucked back up and that all the hard work i did in those 10 seconds was reverting, so i just wanted to keep pushing. i remember feeling my doctor stretching me out with her fingers, like going in circular motions inside me and that hurt like hell! my sister said the doctor even used dial soap to lube me up so he would come out easier! after pushing for what seemed like forever i even thought to myself “i just want to stop pushing and maybe he’ll just stay inside of me” – ha! i secretly wanted them to pull him out by his head because i was getting so discouraged that it was taking so long and i was getting so tired. what kept me going was my cheerleading squad. my husband, sister & mom who i am so thankful were all there with me. my sister was by my side fanning me and holding my hair up from my neck because i was getting so hot & bothered. dek was holding one of my legs and kept telling me i was doing great. and my mom was an emotional wreck on the other side of me just crying, which was so sweet. the nurses (i swear at this point there were like 10 people in the room!) even held my hands to pull me up to push harder because my arms were getting tired of lifting myself up. they kept telling me to pull my body up to try to see him coming out, but i didn’t really want to see that. i just wanted to feel the relief of him coming out. at 4:51 it happened. he slithered out. that’s the only way i can describe the relief feeling, it felt like a giant floppy thing just came out and i remember seeing the nurses cleaning him off a bit and my doctor holding him to get him to cry and after a few seconds they placed him on my chest and i just laid there with my eyes closed feeling him on me. i just held him tight and couldn’t believe i did it.
{baby atlas is born…with a suuuppper stretched out head}
{skin-to-skin right after birth}
{relaxing after birth}
i tore during delivery so my doctor needed to stitch me up. the baby on my chest was a good distraction but i could still feel tugging down there so i told the doctor and they released more epidural drugs so i would become number while she stitched me up. i also still needed to deliver the placenta, which in my case didn’t come out. my doctor had to go inside of me elbow-deep to pull it out…twice! that part was soooo painful and i was so relieved when she was done and everyone left the room for me to rest with baby and family. we spent 2 nights at the hospital in a private recovery room which passed in a groggy, but blissful daze of baby snuggles and sleepless nights. i started breastfeeding with the help & guidance of sweet lactation consultants. it was so painful at first, it literally felt like my nipples were being chopped up in a blender but it’s since gotten so much better and it’s not painful anymore. i was taken care of by the sweet staff who brought in lots of pain meds, helped me go to the bathroom, etc. dek would help me walk around the recovery wing and my mom & sister came to visit and hold him so we could nap during the day or so dek could go home to feed our dogs. i was nervous to go home but also ready to start our life with baby atlas and figure things out for ourselves.
{there was a sofa bed in our recovery room, but we chose to sleep together in my bed}
{skin-to-skin with dad}
{one of my favorite faces he makes. i like to call it “grump mcstump”}
{cuddles after breastfeeding for the first time}
thanks for reading!
let me know if you have any questions about my birth experience, i want to be an open, honest book so feel free to reach out!
