A Labor of Love...and Songs

It all started a week before M was born. My body had been working hard the week beforehand with a minute long contraction every 5 to 7 minutes...but sadly my son did not want to come out of his mommy's safe womb (I don't blame him, I bet it is pretty comfy). So a week before the due date, my doctor and I sat down and had the dreaded conversation about when I should be induced. We determined it'd need to be soon since my body was in early labor and was constantly straining itself (without any effects like dilating enough, the pain but no gain type of thing).

After that conversation, I was DETERMINED to have an all naturally-hormones-induced labor. I WOULD have this baby! And so we went on walks, and walks, and walks, I had primrose oils, spicy foods, baths, exercises, more walks, and oh yes more walks (we walked 20 miles that week alone, I am not exaggerating!). But NO results! I was stuck in limbo as my body did not want to dilate enough for Malachi to come out.



So Wednesday, October 13th, afternoon, Super Hubby and I were instructed to go to the hospital to start the cervi-gel (sp?). When we arrived we went through all the customary procedures, the hook ups to the monitors, and answering the birth plan questions, and more monitoring. My nurse was great and friendly, and then the awful words of "Well, it looks like your body is ready and kickin' into gear! You're having a contraction every 4 minutes, did you know that?" The nurse: "Well you see, that's a problem; if you're contracting this much, we really can't put the cervi-gel in there. There's not much we can do with it. Unless you can get your body to stop contracting so much, I'm not sure we can do much today. I'll go call your doctor and find out his plan."



WHAT?!?! I had been telling my body to go into labor for weeks now and right NOW they tell me to tell it to stop contracting? I think not. I was fine with starting on Thursday morning, but I wanted out of that hospital bed. Well the nurse came back and told me I had the option to spend the night and be monitored all night OR go home and rest and come back bright and early the next morning. Home it was! I was more than happy to go home and "sleep" in my bed for one last night before my little guy came out.



The next morning, we went in, went through the hoops of procedure, and I got hooked in with some awesome Pitocin! Now to quickly outline the day...



7 a.m.: Pitocin started; 2 cm dilated-still early labor and early labor contractions (let's call them Intensity Status I.S. for short aka pain from 1 to 10)

9 a.m.: Start the walking around the halls, lunge-ing around - still 2 cm, I.S.: 3, every 20 minutes I have to get hooked into the monitor and checked on

1 p.m.: Warm baths, monitored, checked at 4 cm woohoo! progress! During this time, I have decided for this labor and delivery instead of screaming (like with B) OR attempting to say Hail Mary's (like with T), I will sing songs as loud as possible and make up the verses! Brilliant! Resident dr comes in and "tries her best" at breaking my water, epic failure! She does not succeed at all. I.S.: 4

3 p.m.: Warm bath, monitored, checked still at 4 cm and still hitting a I.S. of 4.5/5. Found the song I would change each verse to: Sweet Caroline would then become Sweet M! Perfect!

5 p.m.: Warm bath, monitored, check at 5 cm; need to progress so I went and did squats and lunges in the hallway between each contraction... I.S. 5/5.5

6 p.m.: Dr comes, breaks water; 6 cm, 100% effaced BUT he was at +2 (aka he's waaaaaay up there and NOT wanting to come down. I.S.: 6.5; I needed to get this going so I forced myself to walk around the halls, singing, lunge-ing, and squatting between hard contractions...

7 p.m.: No change! Nothing! Warm Bath.... nothing... stay in warm bath and SING like crazy to "Sweet M"- I will say these were some of the BEST verses because I would concentrate so hard on thinking of good words instead of thinking of the intense contractions. I.S.: 7

10:10ish p.m.: I call Super Hubby to come and listen to my fun song (haha believe me, he could hear it just fine by the time I called him in...) I.S.: 8.5ish

10:25ish p.m.: I tell Super Hubby to get the nurse; he'll have to use his super strength to pull me outta this tub because I'm gonna have this baby (please note I have no idea if my body has changed from a 7 cm or not...but I knew something was happening!

10:30ish p.m.: Dr. comes in; checks.... (waits with dramatic pause...) 9.5 cm! I tell him I need to push so he better get ready to play some catch! Dr tells me to wait to 10 cm so M can come out easily... I SING like no one's business! Oh and my new prayer I created in the tub: "Hail Mary, full of grace, Help me push him into space!" It's a winner and Mary totally helps during this part!

10:45ish p.m.: checked again; 10 cm! Time to gear up! I tell my body I have 5 pushes to go and then I'll see my baby... BUT

11:03 p.m.: it only took 3 pushes! There he was in all his glory! M was the cutest baby, perfect to everyone in the room... Best part of everything was: no problems. All natural labor/deliver, no drugs, no problems :)

After that Super Hubby and I were marveled at how beautiful this little guy is. I mean he is gorgeous and perfect! Here are some pics!

Baby M: 8 pounds 2 ounces

19 1/2 inches long

Wonderful!

Mommy with M right after birth

Grandma Patti came to help with the delivery;

she was the BEST Doula ever! She always made sure I would breathe

through contractions (I tend to hold my breath to push, yikes!)

Great-Grandma Ellie sent BEAUTIFUL flowers

(and a little Monkey too!)