Oliver's Birth Story

October 13 - EDD
I'd been wanting help to do some cleaning and finally convinced Mom to come over and do the floors. I did the dishes and directed my troops to empty garbages and sweep, mop and vacuum.

10:30 pm - I had laid down in bed, watching some TV on my laptop, when I felt the urge to pee. Not unusual since I'd been going every two hours or less. Upon going vertical, I felt a small gush. "Um, did I just pee my pants?" I thought. "Hmm..." I soaked through three pads, one right after the other. Not pee, not colored. Yeah, that was my water breaking.
I went upstairs to tell E that I thought my water broke, but hey, I'm new to this, I could be wrong. What do we do next? I really wanted to do my hair but I thought maybe that was a bit vain; no, my husband assured me, you just go shower and we'll see what happens. I shower. I gather things to go to the hospital. E's not sure we should just go in; maybe call the on-call doc just to be sure? I call. He tells me to yes, go to the hospital. My doctor is on vacation.

11 pm - We arrive at hospital and enter via the ER after-hours entrance. They hook me up to a monitor (not really very comfy). The nurse checks with a litmus type paper thing to be sure it was amniotic fluid, and yes it was. She leaves me to um... labor. But no contractions or any other symptoms yet.
I get really uncomfortable. I pace from the bathroom to the other side of the room, circling the bed and E. I try to go to the bathroom multiple times... nothing. Can't sit, can't walk, can't lay down. I get sick in the bathroom. Contractions start in earnest. The nurse checks on me a few more times. I think I'm okay for now.
They get worse. I can only stand between contractions, and then hang onto E and sway during them. E is timing them - one minute long, one minute apart.
I don't think I can stand much more and ask for drugs. The nurse asks if I want narcotics or the epidural. I hesitate for only a moment. Epidural it is - I want relief. If this is only the start of labor, I will NOT make it. She hooks up an IV and gives me narcotics in between contractions to tide me over until the the anesthesiologist arrives. Drugs are very nice. This helped take the edge off but I could still feel the contractions and they still hurt. But it allowed me to lay down and just moan a bit through them instead of not being able to hold my own body up and feel like screaming. That is if I had been able to suck air into my lungs.
The nurse checked my progress to make sure the epidural was still possible and I was three centimeters. Some progress from my appointment on Thursday when I was just one and a half.

Approximately 2 am - I was worried (vaguely, through the pain) about being able to stay laying down and in the right position for the doctor to put in the epidural. Thankfully he was very good - quick and easy. And immediate relief. They hook me back up to the monitors: one cord for epi, monitor for baby's heartbeat, one for contractions, the finger clip thing for my heartbeat, the IV to my wrist... anyway a lot of wires and cords. Between the IV and the epi, I dozed off.

Around 5 am we decide to call Mom. We'd held off calling anyone earlier as we weren't sure if they'd send me home after first checking me or how long the process would last.

Between 7 and 8 am the on-call doctor checks my progress. Everyone is very surprised that I am complete and ready to push - including me! I hadn't felt any contractions or pain since getting the epidural and I was still a bit woozy - lack of sleep and drugs will do that to a person. My contractions were never regular. The doctor and nurse discuss lowering my epidural dosage so that I can feel contractions and push during them. Apparently the rules had recently changed and the OB couldn't adjust or remove the epidural, and the nurse could only turn it off or on. So they had to call the anesthesiologist to get permission to turn it down. I remember them saying it was a 14 and they wanted to move it down to a 7.

About 8 am - A second nurse comes into the room with the warming cart, bassinet and other carts for delivery. It starts getting busy in there. My nurse starts me pushing during contractions but they haven't adjusted the bed or set up anything they're just getting me started. They remove the lower portion of the bed (adjustable!) and the doctor gets in his scrubs and all set up. It was hard. The nurse kept wanting to lower the head of my bed, but that made me more uncomfortable and I kept thinking that if I was higher, gravity could help. I finally just told her NO instead of her moving me down and then me moving the bed back up every few contractions.

8:47 am - Oliver is born!

This is what I can recall for now. I'm sure there will be more details to relate later. :)