I did it! (Like 13 months ago)

I should say, we did it, because it’s Mark’s baby too, and he was there. (But really, I did it.)

Now that I’ve had a good solid chunk of time to process the birth, I’ve decided to write down the story so I can remember the gruesome torturous horror of it all, next time I think I want another baby.

EXTREME WARNING: This post is going to be graphic. Like, if you’re a family member, or you know me in real life, you might not want to read it because you might never be able to hold a conversation with me ever again.

So. Let’s just get into it.

I went into early labor around 10pm on the night of the 22nd of June. My mom (who had flown in from the States to help with the post natal joyride) and Mark were both up, but I didn’t say anything because I wasn’t 100% sure that what was happening were real contractions vs. Braxton Hicks, which are like practice contractions that your body does to prepare for labor. Also, I didn’t want to jinx it. So I rolled around on my yoga ball and stretched while I had a contraction about once every 30 minutes. They weren’t bad. They were like little mini-cramps. Mind you - I had acute pancreatitis in my early 20s, whereby your body essentially start digesting your own pancreas, LIVE, so I had experience with excruciating pain. I understood the whole “let me die because this extreme pain I am feeling is too much live through.” I barely noticed the cramps. “Psh,” I thought “this whole birth thing is going to be soooooo easy.”

The contractions continued on throughout the night, waking me at intervals - they still weren’t terribly painful, and I didn’t wake up fully each time, but I definitely did not get a restful night of sleep. I got up pretty early, and the contractions were incrementally getting closer and stronger; enough to the point where I felt like I could casually mention that I thought I was having contractions to Mom and Mark. They were very excited, but I tried to tamp down their enthusiasm because I knew that early labor could go on and on for days for some women. Plus, it was literally my due date, and who has their baby on their due date? That’s not real life. At this point, my number one goal was to keep baby head down with her face pointed towards my spine. That was my holy grail of pre-birth prep. I had made Mark read numerous articles and learn how to massage my back and belly to help me keep the baby aligned. That position is ideal for having a drug free vaginal birth. Head down and facing the spine to avoid the horror that is back labor. Back labor is particularly painful and makes it much more difficult to have a “natural” birth because the back of the baby’s head, (which is the hardest part) pushes against the lower spine and tailbone, smashing the nerves. If you think I’m explaining all of this to you for a reason, you are correct. More on that later.

So on a drizzly winter Melbourne morning, as my contractions were placidly moving along, Mark and I decided to take a little walk around the neighborhood. I think back on that walk often. It was truly the last pleasant memory of that day before our baby was born. Mark and I were so excited; we had to stop occasionally when I had a stronger contraction, but we kept our pace relatively brisk, and the pearly cool air on my face was like heaven. The rain started coming down in earnest, so we headed back to the apartment. By now, my contractions were definitely in full swing. We were using an app to time the length and the interval of the contractions, waiting for the magical 5-1-1 — that is when they are 5 or less minutes apart, 1 minute long, and have been that way for at least an hour. We called the hospital, and they told us that we should absolutely wait to come in, but the contractions were coming at 3-4 minutes apart, and Mark and Mom were getting oh-so-nervous, and of course, I was in a decent amount of pain, so after about 20 minutes, we decided to blithely ignore the hospital’s suggestion and just head on in.

The car ride was not pleasant, but I was early enough in my labor (which I, of course, didn’t know at all) that it wasn’t torture. We finally arrived, and I insisted that Mark park the car in the free parking area on the street rather than in the lot (yet another sign that I wasn’t really in the full throes of labor) and we walked in, stopping, of course for me to moan and sway through my contractions. We arrived at the front desk, they got me settled into a room, and checked my dilation. I was ONLY AT 6 CENTIMETERS. I was in enough pain and having frequent enough contractions at this point, that I thought that I was at least 8 centimeters - 10 centimeters is when your cervix is stretched enough to let a baby head pass through. I think that’s the moment that I lost everything. Resolve, heart, excitement, confidence. I was already in considerable amounts of pain, and was trying so hard to breathe and moan through it, swaying on my yoga ball, leaning against Mark, and my mind just shriveled up when I realized that I had 4 more centimeters to go. The next 13 or so hours were a blur of exhaustive, screaming pain - literally, I was screaming for quite a lot of it - with moments of calm between contractions where the only sensation I could feel was relief at the absence of pain, and the utter despair that the pain was certainly going to start again soon. There was a bathtub at the hospital, and I was in there for a good solid amount of time, until the nurse thought that I was getting “pushy”, and so forced me to get out. Hours and hours into it, I was told that I was still only at 7 centimeters, and I sobbed and begged for drugs. I was met with a great deal of uneasy glance-exchanging from Mark and Mom, the doula who we had asked to be present, and the midwife nurse. You see, on my very detailed birth plan, I had specifically asked for absolutely no drugs. That I definitely didn’t want them. To definitely not give them to me. And typically, women who do not want drugs will often ask for them in a moment of extreme duress, even though they know they actually don’t really want them. But oh man, oh man, I wanted them. However, it was easy to see why my support team was so conflicted. I had been so certain that I wanted a drug free birth, yet here I was, begging for them. I think at one point, between contractions, I looked Mark dead in the eyes and said “I am suffering. If you love me, you will get me the drugs.” Bewildered and delirious himself, he looked to my mom and the doula. And they decided that I was just pain-crazy speaking. Which, to be fair, I was, but I was also so so serious. At any rate, we slogged along. At this point I was too exhausted from the pain and the labor to stand, and I laid, moaning on the bed convinced that I was going to die.

Eventually, a decision was made to let me use nitrous oxide, commonly known as laughing gas. It’s like “diet birth drugs” so I think Mark and Mom felt fine about me not compromising my ideals, while still giving me something to help with the pain. I honestly think the midwives pushed it as a wonderful solution because they couldn’t get me to stop screaming and it is much harder to scream with a gas mask over your face. Apparently, nitrous oxide is used to “take the edge off” the pains of childbirth and quell some of the anxiety associated with that pain. Let me tell you, it did not work. Not only did it not help, it actually made things worse. It slowed everything down and crystallized each gut-wrenching contraction into razor-edged shards of agony that flowed endlessly through my body and in my mind.

Let’s take a little break from all the trauma to talk about the people involved in my labor/delivery. We had a doula, and she was a lovely lady, however, she was not helpful as a doula at all. She did, however take some beautiful photos. Also, we had a midwife nurse. Two throughout the labor, and a whole SWAT team once I started pushing, actually. The first was pretty hands off during the labor, just popping in and out of the room to see how we were doing - which is what we wanted at that point in time. The second was also pretty hands off, though at that point, we really could have used some help other than her telling me not to scream. She just sat in the corner, doing paperwork for hours (those two forms were apparently extremely challenging), coming over to try to get me to shut up when I was getting too loud. Also, she tried to move me out of the tub WHILE I was in the middle of a contraction. Also, she told me I was dilated 7 cm then when she checked me again, told me I was at 6 cm, which is physically impossible. Also, when we got to the pushing portion, she kept telling me I was doing it wrong, and only tried helping me for like 5 minutes before she was like “well, you aren’t doing it right, so I’m not going to try to help you anymore.” (She didn’t actually say that, but it was implied.) She was perhaps the least helpful person ever. On the opposite end of the spectrum were Mark and Mom. Mark was a champion - he was truly such a dedicated partner…calm, loving, strong, and above all, awake. I had heard stories of husbands during long labors that nodded off in the chairs (13 hours is a long time to be in a hospital with no food) or begged to leave for 15 minutes to go grab a bite to eat. Mark was not one of those men. He stayed awake and alert (his entire career led up to this one point!) and held my screaming, enormous, probably slippery body up during the swaying portions. I knew I was going to be relying heavily on him - he was a constant, calm, loving support and I know that I would have been lost without him. I never expected less of him - he is my partner in life and he is my equal in love. But the biggest surprise player that was present, was the one person that we didn’t intend to have there at all - my mom.

She certainly didn’t intend to be there either - we had discussed it, and decided that it would be more comfortable for everyone if she just stayed in the waiting room like she did for both of my sister’s deliveries. I thank all of the stars in the sky and all of the atoms in all of the universes that she ended up staying in the room with us. I mean, I feel bad for her - it definitely wasn’t a pleasant experience, and I think that she truly suffered seeing me in so much pain. My mom is not in her mid-thirties like Mark, and she is also not accustomed to being awake and on her feet for 18+ hours. It had to have been an endless nightmarish episode for her to live through. But honestly, reflecting back on it, I’m not sure if I could have done it without her. During those moments of out-of-body torturous pain (NOT hyperbole!) I can’t even remember what she said or what she was doing, but what I can remember is her holding my hand tightly and feeling her strength and that deep, absolute, unyielding love that a mother has for her child, and it was enough. It was enough for me to continue pushing for an hour and forty-five minutes when I was completely dilated, and it was enough for my body to not shut down and have to have an emergency c-section when all I could say was “I can’t….I can’t…I can’t….” and my Mom would grip my hand, get close, and say confidently into my ear, “ You can. You will.”

I could. And I did. My OB (who I believe the nurses weren’t planning on calling - it’s pretty standard practice for midwives to deliver the babies without the doctors in AU) ended up scurrying in at the last possible minute because after pushing for nearly 2 hours, our sweet little Kiwiberry wasn’t budging. She had shifted and was sunny-side up (NOOOOOOOOOO! WHYYYYYY! WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY!), and apparently her shoulders had gotten stuck and she wasn’t abled to make that last turn herself. The doctor ended up using a vacuum extractor which is really only a little suction cup with a handle attached to it for a doctor to stick to the baby’s head and pull on. I had to have a catheter inserted as well because apparently my bladder was full (I couldn’t pee) and it was also making it difficult for the baby to come out. So the catheter went in (scream!) the suction cup went in (scream!) and after 2 big pushes and 2 foot-braced-on-the-bed tugs, my perfect, stubborn, broad-shouldered little girl came out. She had very long arms (I only know this because the nurses wouldn’t shut up about it). They put her on my chest and that one moment of the absence of pain and the weight of her warm little body against mine was bliss.

Unfortunately, she was also asleep. They slapped the bottoms of her feet and rubbed her body and tried to get her to wake up, but she would not. She was tired. So they whisked her away to the little vitals cart that they have in every delivery room and wanted to do some measurements and get her some oxygen but the OXYGEN MACHINE WAS EMPTY. I didn’t realize this was happening at the time, I just knew that the nurses were flustered and hurrying around, and Mark was trying to not lose his sh*t at the incompetent nurse who hadn’t checked the oxygen levels (though she did fill out those two forms really really well) and I just kept trying to lift my upper body to see what was happening and deliriously repeated “Is she ok? Is my baby ok?” Over and over and over. Meanwhile, my doctor was trying to deliver the placenta which felt bad coming out, but definitely squishier than a baby, and she had to turn away from stitching up my sad sad second degree torn vagina and whisper yell at the nurses “what is going on?!…go get another tank then!…” We were extremely lucky in that our girl was literally just sleepy, but she was breathing fine - oxygen was measured at 100% - but if we had been in a different situation where my baby would have actually needed the oxygen, that would have been a different, much more pissed off, much more fraught story.

Luckily, it wasn’t. She was fine, I was fine, though exhausted and broken. I got to hold my little girl, and slowly the room emptied. My mom still had to go back to our apartment, and my amazing, spectacular badass boyfriend drove her all the way home (30 mins away) to drop her off and drove all the way back again that same night. I had tried to nurse my baby but she was just so sleepy and I had zero natural nursing instincts at that point, so nothing was happening there. While Mark was away, another nurse came in and suggested I clean up a bit before I passed out. I needed to clean up because I had huge amounts of blood, and some literal crap (truth!!! honesty!!!) on my lower extremities. She walked me to the shower and as I shuffled towards the bathroom I thought, “hmmm that’s weird, I can’t close my legs all the way. The doctor must have put some sort of special puffy bandage or perhaps a balloon between my legs to cushion things.” I stripped and as I gingerly lathered up and washed between my legs I realized, with a considerable amount of horror, that the thing that I thought was a balloon was actually my vulva and it had swollen so much, it felt like it was halfway down my thighs. I then leaned against the wall and moan-cried, wondering if, in fact, my vagina would ever be normal, ever again. During this moment of sadness, torrents of blood were drifting down the drain, and faint from literally everything, I dried off and stumbled back to the hospital bed, where the nurse lovingly placed my defiant but exhausted girl back into my arms. I was simultaneously very grateful, and also extremely annoyed. It sounds callous, but at this point, I had gone through a marathon labor and I was done. Dead. My body wanted to shut down. But I was too scared to fall asleep with my baby in my arms, so I held her until Mark came back (also beyond exhaustion after driving for an hour after a marathon labor) and told him he had to hold her because I was going to drop and perhaps break her and we had just got her. And he did, because he is wonderful.

We eventually got to our room and embarked on the great post-natal healing journey. Mark and I have discussed at great lengths the way the birth experience unfolded. People often ask me if I’m glad/proud/relieved or mad/sad/crazy that I didn’t get an epidural, and I have conflicted feelings about it. I’m glad that I ended up having a full-term, vaginal birth to a healthy baby, which very well could have been a different story if I had decided to get an epidural. Or it could have not. I guess my answer at the end of it all is that if I could do it all over again, I would have gotten the epidural…but that I’m glad I didn’t.

At any rate, it happened as it happened.

And we are now fortunate enough to have an energetic, silly, mischievous, cheeky, loud, stubborn soon-to-be toddler who lights our lives up every single day.