Lilliah Hopes birth story

Isaiahsmom92707's Journal

Lilliah Hopes birth story
Aug 28, 2009 at 3:50 PM
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- Isaiahsmom92707
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Sorry it's taken me so long to write this,..to my defense,..I wrote it once and hit backspace and lost the whole friggin thing. Needless to say I was super pissed.

On Friday the 14th we went to my hubbys moms house to spend the night because my cousins baby shower was the next day fairly early in the morning and we live about an hour and a half away. We went swimming late that evening and went to bed around 12. About 1 I felt Lilliah moving around a lot and pressing down on my bladder so I decided to get up and go to the restroom. As I was walking down the stairs I noticed I was kind of wet and thought maybe I peed a little. I went to the bathroom and as I sat down a little liquid trickled out. I thought it was kind of odd but I didn't think it was my water breaking. I went and laid down and about 10 mins later the flood gates opened, my water had definitely broken. I told hubby that he needed to get up and we needed to go home,...you should have seen him running around like a chicken with his head cut off. Poor guy lol,..I guess he thought we were having a baby soon,..he was wrong. So we dropped Isaiah off at his grandparents house and we went back home. At this point I was having contractions about 10 to 15 mins apart. The next morning after having not slept at all I called my doula. The contractions were coming every 5 minutes but they weren't stronger than before. She decided to head over to my house. While I was waiting on her the contractions slowed back down. We decided to take a walk to get things going so we went to big lots and strolled around because it was too hot outside. Nothing changed. We got home and decided to use the breast pump for a while. I pumped for about an hour and a half and while I was doing it the contractions were coming closer and stronger but as soon as I stopped they went back. I did this twice that day. That evening we decided it was best for me to drink a glass of wine and try to rest. I laid down and rested, but I don't think I really slept at all. The contractions didn't slow down and while I was laying down they felt much more painful. Since my water had been broken for 24 hours I started taking vitamin C every hour and checking my temperature every hour to make sure there weren't any signs of infection. The next day I called my doula and she said I should try the pump again. so I did and the same thing happened. We walked several times that day and tried the pump twice. By that evening I was getting extremely frustrated. Everyone and their mother was calling or texting or leaving messages in my email or facebook telling me I should go to the hospital. It was getting to hubby and he was starting to second guess me so I told him to turn off his phone, and I didn't answer mine. Around 5 on the 16th I decided it was time to try caster oil. I didn't want to but I was becoming sort of desperate. After taking it within a couple hours my contractions were stronger. My doula told me to get on my hands and knees and by 9 I was FINALLY in active labor. We called my doula around 1 in the morning and headed over to the hospital. I was having contractions about 4 minutes apart that lasted at least a minute. I was nauseated and shaking. I THOUGHT I MUST be in transition. We get to the hospital and when they check me I was a 4. I acted like a huge baby when they started drawing blood and putting in the hep-lock. I was prettty pissed that I was only a 4. We walked and walked and I sat on the ball and the next morning around 8 or 9 the midwife checked me. I was an 8. Thank God! Transition! This part is short right!? No. At 11 The midwife checked me again. I was a 7. I wanted to cry. She told me that she thought my uterus was getting tired since I had been in labor so long. She was able to manually dilate me ALMOST to a 10 by pressing around and pushing back my cervix during each contraction.This was beyond painful. Now that I only had a lip of cervix left she told me to push with contractions to push away the lip. This was really painful as well. When you feel the urge to push the contraction isn't really painful but I didn't have the urge so I was feeling the contraction and it felt like someone was using a crowbar on my pelvis at the same time. I whined and cried at this point because it felt so unnatural to do this. The midwife came back and had me lay down and I'm not really sure what she did but she pressed on something and somehow that made pushing a lot easier. I began pushing for real but at this point my contractions were very spaced out and I almost couldn't even tell if I was getting one. I would push and then people would start their conversations and then finally I'd yell "I'm getting one!" And they would start cheering me on and when it was gone they'd go back to their conversations. It was kind of funny. During pushing my contractions finally picked up and they were very close. I really didn't push for THAT long considering how far apart my contractions were at first. Anyways, they put up a mirror so I could see her. I thought that I would want no part in watching all that, but actually, it helped me a lot. It was exciting to see her coming out,..I knew I was finally doing something. It's funny though because even at this point there was a part of me that said to myself,..well,..she's not out yet, don't get your hopes up. Terrible. And probably part of why I was in labor so long. Anyways When she crowned it wasn't as painful as I thought it would be,..although yes,..extremely painful. I screamed at her to get out lol. I think I said a naughty word when she came out. Oops. They told me to reach down and grab her. At 1:38 P.M on the 17th of August I pulled her out and put her right to my chest. I cried. Everyone kept saying You did it! You did it Hope! It was a pretty amazing moment. I had never been so happy to see someone in my whole life. She weighed 8 lbs and 2.6 ounces and was 20 &1/2 inches long. She was so alert when she came out. She conversated with us for a while and then I nursed her for a bit. After a little while we went to our postpartum room and I walked there. I was completely amazed at how great I felt. Sore, but really,...fine. Light years better than after the c-section. It was a really hard and long labor,..physically but emotionally as well. My husband was an amazing support person. I couldn't have done it without him. I feel like with the birth of each of our children we've become closer. I know it took a great deal of faith on his part this time because he hadn't done all the research that I had and everyone was telling him different things. I love him so much more for believing in me. Even though I was in labor for,..ever,..and it didn't go NEAR as smoothly as I thought and wanted it to go, I would go through it all again. I have no regrets about this labor and delivery. I had always said I'd much rather go through a couple days if labor than to have another c-section...and I did, and that's totally fine with me. I couldn't be happier and honestly haven't had any baby blues at all. It's such a totally different experience than last time. I don't feel as bitter about Isaiah's birth anymore, I'm not sure why. I guess I just realise that it was an experience that I went through, and I kind of feel fortunate that I have seen both ends of the spectrum. God is good, life is blessed.