Cecily's Birth Story

Subtitle: That was not the birth plan.

Some people (mostly other Mothers) love to read other's birth stories, while other people (nearly all other people and certainly all men) hate it. So, I've added photos of Cecily's first few days to make it more interesting. Please feel free to look at the photos & ignore the text.  Or, if you want the Reader’s Digest version: She came crazy fast, and the epidural didn’t work.

 Okay, here we go…

At my 39-week appointment, I was getting closer (at about 1-2cm) so we made an appointment for Tuesday of the next week (August 7^th) to do a prostaglandin gel and try to get things moving.  We scheduled with Keith’s folks to have them come up and spend the night Monday night, so they could be here for Parker when we went in for our 7am induction appointment.

 So, Monday morning I went in for my 40-week appointment, and I was 4 cm.  Since I was already so far dilated, Dr Joki decided we should probably try & induce today, rather than waiting for our Tuesday morning appointment, since considering my history, he was a little concerned that I’d go into labor naturally and “have the baby in the parking lot”, which was not really part of my birth plan.  This seemed reasonable to me, so I headed home & waited anxiously by the phone for Dr. Joki to call back & let me know when we should head to the hospital.  Meanwhile, I called Keith’s folks to have them head up earlier than planned and called Keith at work to have him wrap things up & head home as soon as possible.

Eventually, Dr Joki called to say we had a room reserved at 6:30 that evening for the gel.  So, we ate dinner, kissed our boy good-night and headed over to the hospital.  Once we were there, they set me up on the monitor, where Cecily was doing well and I was having light, inconsistent contractions about every 10 minutes or so.  Around 7:30, Dr Joki arrived to put the gel in, at which point I had progressed to about 5cm. 

As he described it, the plan was to: “Put the gel in, then once the contractions start, we’ll get the liter of saline in.  Once you have your fluid levels up, we’ll get you the epidural, and once you’re comfortable, I’ll pop your bag and the baby should probably come out fairly quickly.  Repeat after me, ‘we don’t want to push for four hours.’”

Sounded like a good plan.  For reasons that I can’t really explain, I felt a little bad that with the epidural so early I’d end up with a fairly painless delivery.  But I was willing to deal with a little guilt in exchange for an enjoyable delivery.

Initially, everything followed the plan pretty well.  Shortly after applying the gel, I could feel my contractions getting harder & closer together.  By the time we’d given it the full hour to work, the contractions were coming about every 2 minutes and I was panting pretty hard to get through each.  They started my IV fluids and we waited for the bag to empty so I could get my epidural.  I couldn’t see the clock from the bed, so from here out, I’m estimating how long everything took, but it all went in something of a blur.

Around 8 or 8:30, the Anesthesiologist arrived to give me my epidural.  By this time the contractions were pretty strong & I was no longer feeling guilty about the “pain-free” delivery and was eagerly looking forward to a little relief.  Unfortunately, the pain-free part seemed to be taking longer to arrive than I remembered from Parker’s delivery.  But I know that these things take time, so I was trying to be patient.

About an hour after the epidural, Dr Joki came back to break my water.  Since I was still feeling everything, he decided to wait until I was more comfortable before he got things going.  However, instead of getting more comfortable, they seemed to be getting progressively worse.  So, while I laid on the bed whimpering, Keith & Dr Joki sat on the couch watching the Men’s Beach Volleyball team give away their last chance at a medal and discussing track cycling.  (Cecily's birth will always & forever be associated with the London Olympics for me).  Eventually things were painful enough that they called the Anesthesiologist back to see why it wasn’t working.  Dr Joki checked me about this point and I was at 7cm, and they started to discuss whether it would be better to increase the dosage or just take it out and start over again.

This is the point where I started screaming.  It should be said, I am NOT a screamer, I honestly don’t think Keith has ever heard me raise my voice in the entire time we’ve been married (if you don’t count yelling at the dog).  I am pretty even-keel in all things and am very, very seldom out of control.  But at this point, the pain kicked up and I lost all control and started screaming like an injured animal.  I’ve never heard a sound like that before come out of a human.  All I could do was scream and say “I need to push, I need to push”.  Somewhere in all this my water broke all over everyone & everything in the room and Dr Joki checked and I was actually ready to push.  I have a vague memory of everyone telling me to call down and not to push so fast, but at that point, everything was completely out of my control and I couldn’t do anything to stop it.  I think I was trashing about, so Keith held down one leg and Dr Joki took the other, while trying to hold Cecily’s head in to slow things down.  I gave one push and I could feel Cecily’s head come about 1/3 of the way out.  Everyone was trying to get me to go slower to avoid tearing, but at that point I was working purely on instinct and my instinct at that point was to get her out.  So, one small push later, out came her head, and then the rest of her body.  I’m not even exaggerating to say that from when I was measured at 7cm, to delivering Cecily was less than 5 minutes.  Once she was out, we all looked at each other as if to say, “Whoa, what just happened?!?!”

Once my perfect little baby girl was lying on my chest, I was a little embarrassed about the level of screaming, and complete disregard for what I was being told to do.  But I think you can be forgiven just about anything when you’re in labor. 

So, although this was NEVER the plan, turns out I ended up with a natural childbirth.  The best we can figure is that the labor was progressing so quickly that the epidural never had a chance to catch-up.  But my legs never did go numb, so it’s equally possible that it just didn’t work.  Either way, I now know what it feels like to give birth without any drugs…I don’t recommend it.  And neither does Keith; the poor guy is still a little traumatized by the whole experience, and if there was ever any thought of a baby #3 (there wasn’t) I can 100% guarantee that he will never agree to it now.

We started the induction at 7:30 and Cecily was born three hours later at 10:41pm.  Guess Dr. Joki wasn’t kidding with his comment about giving birth in the parking lot.

With all that said, as frantic as everything was, this delivery was about a million times easier than Parker's (even without the epidural).  I highly recommend the two-push method over the four-hour push method.

For her part, Cecily has been a fantastic baby.  She started nursing on her first try, and hasn't really stopped yet, except when she's asleep. So far, the second baby has been infinitely easier than the first baby, it's amazing what a little experience and perspective can do.  Of course, ask me again on Tuesday when Keith goes back to work & I might change my mind.

We're all pretty infatuated with this little girl and we can't wait to get to know her better.