I shared a miniature version of Ada’s birth story over on Instagram a couple weeks ago, but I’m here to get the full version down in writing! If you’re into birth stories, keep on reading. If not, pass on by. I know it’s not everyone’s cup of tea, but I’m a sucker for a good birth story!
I chose to schedule an elective induction for March 13 (39 weeks + 1 day). I previously had two medically necessary inductions (due to blood pressure issues) and one elective induction — all good experiences. I see a lot of negativity these days surrounding elective inductions, but I felt super confident about my choice going into this birth. Trying to plan for out-of-state family to come to town, being GBS+, having an issue with my umbilical cord attachment, and dealing with some anxiety about making it to the hospital on time (the end of two of my previous births went super fast) were all reasons I felt more comfortable in a controlled birth setting. My body does well with pitocin, likely because I always dilate quite a bit ahead of time.
But I honestly didn’t think I’d make it to induction day. I had really awful prodromal labor with this pregnancy. I also experienced it with both my boys, but this time was WAY harder and longer. Overall, the third trimester of this pregnancy was just really, really hard. My body felt very done and the mental battle at the end was trying.
But we made it to March 13! My mom flew in the day before, so the timing was perfect. I was dilated to 2cm and 70% effaced from weeks 36-38 and when I checked in for my induction I was dilated to 4cm before they began pitocin! I was so happy that allllll those contractions over the last couple of months actually did some work for me.
I needed antibiotics again during this birth to protect baby from GBS so the nurse started me on those at 8:30am. They got a tiny bit of pitocin going at 9am and I felt consistent contractions coming on over the next hour or so. I knew I wanted an epidural early on this time. I’ve had an epidural during each birth, but for two of them I was basically in transition and I ended up regretting waiting so long. I’ve had them not work at all, work too well, and work on only one side of my body. I had no idea how my body would respond this time!
The anesthesiologist administered my epidural at 10:15am and then I waited to see how it would take effect. About 20 minutes later, I started to feel woozy, light-headed, nauseous, and on the verge of fainting. My blood pressure read 90/50 — I felt horrible. I rang for the nurse and she immediately handed me a puke bag and called for the anesthesiologist to come back. Apparently, I wasn’t given enough fluids prior to the epidural and my body was having a hard time handling it. He immediately gave me a medication that bumped my blood pressure back up and I started to regain my stamina.
By 1pm, even with consistent contractions, I was still at 4cm and baby’s head wasn’t quite engaged properly. My nurse had been rotating me through a variety of positions every 30 minutes to get baby in the optimal position. We decided to have the on-call doctor break my water to get things moving faster and give the baby more room to drop down. It didn’t break as dramatically as it had (on its own) during my first three births. It was more of a slow trickle but I could tell having it broken helped my contractions come faster and harder.
After having my water broken at 1:15pm, I tried the side lying release position while my nurse pumped my hips each time I contracted. We did this eight times and I felt baby shift abruptly and drop/engage into place! I was so happy to have her in the best position possible! But because she dropped so fast, her heart rate also momentarily dropped. I heard it on the fetal monitor along with the nurse. She watched it for a few seconds and then calmly told me she would be pushing a button on the wall, calling a team of ten people in to help reposition me and make sure baby’s heart rate recovered. But before she could call them, the heart rate bounced back and we never had any other issues with it. The baby likely compressed her cord for a few seconds! The nurse was (of course) required to cut all pitocin use at that point.
I could finally feel myself dilating at this point — amazingly it’s still possible to feel this even with pain meds. The epidural worked to dull some of the abdominal pain but couldn’t touch the back labor (!!!). That was a new experience - yikes! I could still feel each contraction even with the epidural. I like knowing what’s going on though so I appreciated feeling some of it. But by 3pm I was measuring only 6cm. The process felt super slow at this point and I figured I still had a while to wait. My nurse kept telling me that the end will go very fast (which was true for my boys’ births). I felt a lot happening right after 3pm and by 3:20pm I was at 10cm! The end was SWIFT! They called for my doctor to come (she got stuck in traffic of course) and I began pushing once she arrived at 3:40pm. Waiting for her felt like an eternity!
After about 10 minutes of pushing (and my doctor having to slow me down to avoid tearing), baby Ada made her entrance at 3:50pm! She was screaming SO loudly, probably upset by how fast the process went was the end. It felt surreal experiencing birth for the last time and bringing another GIRL into the world after nine years!
Photo by TOMOKO UJI on Unsplash