Haley with lil P
Wednesday, November 30, 2005
Monday, November 28, 2005
Alexa's Birth Story, 9/6/05
Alexa's Birth Story
I thought labor started a week before Alexa was actually born because I had one night and a day of contractions. Then they stopped. Completely.
I continued to have cramps for the next seven nights. Every night I went to bed wondering if I would go into labor for real. It was enough to make me crazy, especially since I had three due dates - September 2, 4 and 16th! Sunday night, the 4th, I didn't fall asleep until 5am and was wrecked all day Monday. Monday night, the 5th, I had real contractions, which lasted through the night and into the next day. Since I hadn't slept at all the night before, and I didn't believe true labor would ever happen, I was able to ignore the contractions and get a good night's sleep. I woke up the next morning, Tuesday, and had a bloody show at 7:46am, but throughout the day my contractions were never closer than 10 min apart but never more than 20 minutes. My parents came over late afternoon, and my dad told my mom "you are watching paint dry upstairs. We should go home because we may get a call at 4am." Fortunately, they stuck around. At 6pm, I confirmed my acupuncture appointment for the next day. I was hoping that she would be able to get things going because this was getting very tiresome!
Suddenly, at 6:34pm, I felt a pop...was that my cervix? Did it just dilate like a centimeter or two all at once? Nope - I went to the bathroom and a flush of water came out before I peed. My water broke! Suddenly, the contractions came on top of one another, they were very painful and very intense. No more paint drying now!
Nothing felt comfortable, though on my hands and knees with the birth ball rolling around under my chest with huge deep breaths helped. I tried lots of other positions, including taking a bath, but nothing really worked, I just couldn't get comfortable. I stayed in the bath while the IV dripped into me (I tested pos for Group B Strep and antibiotics were required for the safety of the baby). The IV took about ten minutes. If she wasn't born within four hours, I would have to do it again. It took three pin pricks for the needle to enter my skin properly - at nine days I still have marks on my hands.
This intense labor went on for about two hours, when I suddenly had the urge to push. The midwife's assistant, Michelle, who lives a mile away, had arrived 15 minutes after my water broke. Finally, when it was time to push, the midwife, Beah, arrived from her home in Livermore. Pushing was really scary, and I couldn't do it for about 10 minutes. All the memories of the two intense hours I spent pushing out posterior (sunny side up) Haley came flooding back and I totally freaked. I said, "I don't want to be here anymore, can I just leave?" Michelle said, "The only way out is through." Okay, I thought, here goes.
Twenty minutes later, in my own bed, Alexa was born in the proper position (first female in two generations!) but with her left hand by her face. It was 9:03pm, two and a half hours after my water broke and labor began for real. It was way more painful and intense than my first, but it was short, thank god. And I was home! Haley saw the last two pushes, which were really scary for her but she was really happy to see her little sister being born (she had told my sister on the phone thirty minutes earlier "My mommy is upstairs having my baby"). She sat in Felix's lap while he cut the cord. She was quiet for the first time in her entire life, her eyes big round disks, total dear in the headlights! Finally, she came around and started telling us what to do - cover the baby, she's cold, she needs milk, and so on. At 11:30 that night, I had showered and changed, Haley was in bed, the midwives left, and we were alone in our bed with a sleeping newborn baby. We were able to get a good night's sleep and recovery has been very easy because of that.
Welcome Alexa Morgan Baum! 9/6/05 9:03pm 20 inches, 7 pounds 0 ounces
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