Laurel's Birth Story (Long Version)

As I mentioned in my last pregnant blog post, I had some contractions and lost my mucus plug on Wednesday night (1/6). I wondered if this meant things were happening or what! I assumed that they might progress, so I made sure to get all of my bags packed so that we could head to the hospital right away. The contractions stopped when I went to bed that night.

On Thursday, I subbed in the first grade classroom I'd been in all week, but I wasn't sure if I was having contractions or just dealing with wearing uncomfortable pants during the school day. Around 3pm I texted a friend (Becky) to see if she wanted to meet me for a walk in Woodinville- we met up around 4pm and walked for about a mile. After the walk, we had burgers at Teddy's and I had a delicious milkshake. :) Becky and her 9 month old daughter, Valerie, came back to our condo to see the nursery, we chatted for a bit more, and then they went home. Sam was over in Bremerton for a funeral all day, so I waited for him to come home. He got home around 10:00.

I was having contractions every 11 minutes, so I thought nothing of it. I woke up around 12:30 a.m. to go to the bathroom, had some contractions, but nothing special. I was half awake at 2:10 with stronger contractions and then around 2:15 I definitely woke up because I had either just lost control of my bladder or my water had broken! I went to the bathroom and checked out my underwear (yeah, that's right, I was smelling my underwear to see if they smelled like pee!). I didn't want to be that girl that went to the hospital because she peed herself. While I was googling what it might be like when your water breaks, I started having regular contractions. From 2:30 until 3 am I timed them. They were coming about 2-3 minutes apart for about a minute a piece. I also needed to have a BM, but was pretty constipated. I can tell you, trying to poop while having a contraction is no fun!

I finally called the Family Maternity Center at Evergreen and told them what was happening. They said, take a shower, get your stuff together, and come on in. So, I wake up Sam, I start to pack the last minute things, while I'm still contracting every 2-3 minutes. These contractions are getting more intense, though! I'm waiting for Sam to take a shower first and then I say to myself- he can wait! I hopped in the shower and the shower made my contractions a lot more bearable. I thought to myself "I'll definitely be doing this in the hospital!". Sam and I finally leave the house around 3:30ish. The contractions are getting stronger!

We get in to Evergreen, sign forms, etc. I change into my hospital gown, get settled in bed, get ready for our nurse to have everything ready. I had to be coping with my contractions on the bed, not in the shower or standing around, because the nurse was getting my monitors on, starting the IV (I was positive for strep so I needed to have 4 hours of penicillin through the IV), taking blood for the cord blood donation. The first internal exam, I was 4-5 cm, 90% effaced. The on call doctor, Dr. Russell, (who we've actually seen before when my doctor had a family emergency) comes in and says: "Well it's 4:15, so unless you have this baby before 7am, you'll get to have Dr. Keys (my doctor) deliver you! You're doing great, just wanted you to know that I'm here!"

While all of this is going on, I'm thinking.... Oh man, I wanted to try to go without pain medications, but this is way more intense than I thought it would be. After one major contraction I tell our nurse that I think I want to get the epidural. She goes to tell the doctor, I focus on my spot on the ceiling and do some short breaths, with Sam stroking my forehead. My veins were being uncooperative, so it's taking awhile for the nurse to get the IV started, get the blood drawn, etc. I'm getting a little impatient but trying not to be. When we first got to the hospital, I had a loose BM which was, like I said, not fun while contracting. So around 5 am I feel like I need to go to the bathroom again. My nurse says that we should do another internal exam, to make sure it's not time to push, you never know. She is checking me and kind of unbelievably says, "Ummm.... I don't think I'm feeling any cervix. I'm just feeling baby's head.... Let me go get Dr. Russel to check you." Dr. Russell comes in and confirms, I am indeed at 10 cm and we can start pushing when I'm ready! Ummm yeah, I went from 4/5 to 10 in half an hour.... Didn't think that would be happening! At this point, we are past the point of no return with the epi, but I'm feeling good when I push and am able to relax between pushes, so it ended up being fine.

Sam, our nurse Amber, and Dr. Russell were fabulous; they made me feel encouraged and gave me good directions. One thing Dr. Russell told me that helped me was to, even when it was uncomfortable, to try to keep pushing. It helped me to overcome any fear of the pain. I just thought about how each push was bringing me closer to my daughter! After 30 minutes of pushing, Laurel Elizabeth Smith was placed on my chest, and our whirlwind labor was over! I was so excited and Sam and I just kept looking at each other in disbelief! Because it was so quick, we didn't have to worry about any visitors during the first hour/hour and a half, so we got some time to just absorb it all. It was so great.

Everyone was amazed that I went so fast and that I was so calm during both stages of labor. My nurse kept saying, she's acting like she's had the epidural! We never got around to giving the nurse our birth plan, but our nurse was so great and really asked us before we did anything what our preferences were. It's funny because in my plan I didn't want an epidural, I didn't want pitocin, Sam wanted to cut the cord, etc... and even though I was ready to deviate from my plan (I so wanted that epidural), I actually ended up getting most everything that I wanted! I am bummed that I had not time to labor in the bath tub though! I was looking forward to that. :)

I cannot say enough about the staff at Evergreen. All of our nurses have been fabulous and our wishes were always respected. We had to stay at the hospital until Sunday morning because I was unable to get the penicillin for my strep, so they have to keep an eye on Laurel and make sure she doesn't show any symptoms of infection. That's the only real wrench in things, but on the plus side, I got more consultations with the lactation consultant, so that got us off to a good start. All of the muscles in my body felt sore for the first two days, like I ran a marathon, but over all I felt great!