My Birth Story

(You may want to read my pre-birth story first.)  We arrived at the hospital at 6 am.  One of my girlfriends who is a labor and delivery nurse checked me in before her shift ended and set me up with an amazing nurse for my labor.  My dilation was checked, and I was at 4 cm!  That meant I only had 6 cm to go!!!  At around 8 am I was given an IV, and they started me on pitocin.  I was very fortunate that I was already dilated to 4 cm.  This meant that I could get an epidural at any time.  I was not in any pain at this point, so I decided to wait and see how things went.

I had heard that pitocin was the devil and created terribly painful contractions, but this was not at all the case for me.  I spent the morning happily napping and hanging out with my parents, my sister, Doug's parents, and Doug's brothers.  I'm not going to lie, the delivery room was a bit of a zoo.  There were multiple conversations going on, fetal monitors beeping, and Doug's dad had brought his harp.

By noon, I was 6 cm and still not in any pain.  My doctor decided to come in and break my water.  I had read that contractions can become more painful after your water breaks, so I knew that I wanted an epidural  right away.  The anesthesiologist came in minutes after my water was broken and gave me my epidural.  I let him know that my dad was an anesthesiologist in hopes that he would try to show off for me and give me the best epidural ever.  He's my new boyfriend.  That thing was awesome. First off, it was painless.  Getting the IV seriously hurt more.  Secondly, I had this wonderful, euphoric feeling for the rest of my delivery.  Basically, I was high.  

I took another nap, and woke up feeling a lot of pressure "down there."  I told the nurse, and she said that she would check my progress in an hour.  I tried to ignore the feeling, but it was pretty intense.  Fifteen minutes later I told her that I needed to be checked now.  This was around 4:30 pm.  She went to check me and immediately told me to close my legs and lay on my side.  The head was right there!  She needed to page the doctor so that we could get this party started!  Doug and I had decided that we wanted just the two of us in the delivery room when I pushed.  That way we could have a few special moments together once we met our girl, so we kicked everyone out.  

I waited for ten minutes when the baby's heart rate began to drop.  She was ready to come out now.  The nurse told me to start pushing.  I gave one big push and the heart rate came back up.  The on-call doctor came in.  I pushed again.  My doctor arrived.

I pushed maybe three more times after that and Kennedy came out!  What sweet bliss it was.  She was placed on my chest, and Doug and I greeted our sweet baby at 5:20 pm.

I have to say, the worst part of my labor was delivering the placenta (it was stuck, gross), and the worst part of my overall pregnancy was recovering.  It was brutal.  All that being said, I'd do it again.  And plan on doing it again.  I mean, just look at that face.