The Journey to James Dylan - Journals

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The Journey to James Dylan
Nov 25, 2009 at 8:23 PM
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- MamaJen74
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Something I should have known as the mother of four (soon to be five) is that EVERY pregnancy, birth and child IS different. This pregnancy was by far the easiest of them all. No, I don't usually have particularly difficult pregnancies but I do have physical discomfort (that is to be expected) especially in the last trimester. However, even THAT was absent this time around. I found myself weeks from my due date thinking "where did this pregnancy go? I'm not ready for it to end."

As my due date approached, I started stressing out about whether my mom would be able to attend the birth or not. She is my #1 birth partner and has taken care of me during every labor. We communicate on a level that does not require words. I do not have to express my needs to her. She just meets them. (Just as she always has...she was AP before there WAS an AP LOL.) The problem was that she lives about three hours away and also runs her own business which gets VERY busy a few days before Thanksgiving and stays that way until the weekend following. I felt like I was on a time frame of when I had to have the baby in order for her to be here. On Friday (my due date), mom called to let me know that it didn't matter when I had the baby...she would be here regardless. I jokingly told her that I just wished my water would break so that I would KNOW it was time for her to come. Although, that has never happened before and quite honestly, the thought of laboring without the cushion of my amnio sac scared me.

I had some contractions that evening from 5-7 minutes apart for about 3 hours. I hoped they would turn into something but figured they would just be more of the prodromal labor I'd been experiencing. I went to bed knowing that either the contractions would fizzle out or intensify. I was right...they faded away. I woke periodically through the night with Maddalyn hollering or my bladder hollering...but at 5:37 a.m., something really strange awoke me. It felt like someone had just thumped me in the side of my belly. I thought "that was weird" and rolled over to my other side. As I rolled, I felt a warm glug, glug, glug. "There is no way my water just broke. My water doesn't break until LATE in labor." By the time I got to the bathroom, I was soaked down to my knees. I checked the color and called my mom to get her on the road. I called my midwife to let her know what was going on and she encouraged me to stay hydrated and be sure to eat.

My day was really pretty normal. I took care of the kids, did some laundry...and a lot of pacing. My contractions began around 6:00 a.m. and would come every 10-15 minutes. Around Maddalyn's nap time, they had faded to every 30 minutes. I decided to take a nap with her because I figured I'd probably be in for a long night. By the time nap was over, my contractions were back to about every 10 minutes. I was really getting irritated. I felt like I was going to be in labor forever because my contractions were so far apart. They weren't painful at all and not requiring any attention or focus from me so I just thought they probably weren't really doing anything either.

I checked in with my midwife at 5:00 p.m. The "big" birth room (with tub) was in use by another mama and would probably be available in the next few hours. I decided that without the tub being available, there was nothing I could do at the birth center that I couldn't do at home so we just hung out a little longer. My contractions started coming about every 7 minutes around 6:00 p.m. Around 7:00 p.m., they were about every 4-5 minutes. They were starting to require a little bit of attention from me. I would lean over against my desk or table and rock my hips side to side. They weren't lasting very long and were not at all what I would call intense. I decided I wanted to get Maddalyn to sleep before I went to the birth center. She had taken a late nap with me so I waited until about 8:30 to put her down. JJ offered to put her to bed. He said "Uh, you were just breathing through that contraction and I thought you said when you had to start breathing through them, it was time for you to go." I told him I was fine. I just wanted to get her to bed.

I laid with her and at first, there was a lull in my contractions. I thought it was pretty cool...that my body was letting me get her to bed without having contractions. Then...I had three contractions with in a few minutes of each other. These were different. They DID require my attention. With the first one, I got up on hands and knees and rocked with Maddalyn the copy cat on her hands and knees right beside me (silly monkey). The next two, I just laid on my side and rubbed my belly. After the third contraction, Maddalyn was asleep and I was telling myself that I had to get up though I didn't really want to. I walked out of the room, told mom it was time to go and that I was feeling shaky. We got in mom's van at 9:09 p.m. It took 8 minutes and 3 contractions to get to the birth center. Those contractions were very different....very intense and VERY hard for me to stay relaxed through.

When we got to the birth center, I walked in and smiled at my midwife. She asked if I was feeling pushy and I told her no. The contractions were coming very close together at this point. I went to the bathroom, changed into a night gown, had my blood pressure checked and listened to the baby's heart rate. My girlfriend Melody and her daughter Olivia arrived as I was climbing into the bed and began pushing. A total of 20 minutes after arriving at the birth center, James Dylan was born. He came so quietly into the world. He didn't even cry.

I kept saying how I didn't think he was as big as Joseph (my largest baby). The midwife weighed him and asked what weight my largest baby was. I told her 8 lb 2 oz. She said, well...not anymore. James was 8 lb 11 oz, 21 1/4" long....born with NO interventions. I guess it only makes sense that the easiest pregnancy ended with the easiest birth.

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