How Sweet It Is...: Birth Story

One year ago today Gates came into our lives. A wonderful, sweet, healthy baby boy. I am going to try and recall that day the best I can. I should have wrote this down a long time ago but better now then never. I apologize if this is too much information for some people out there.

Monday, September 20, 2009, I was walking up the stairs to go to bed when half-way up the stairs I had a very powerful sneeze that caused me to "pee my pants". If you have ever been pregnant you know that towards the end your bladder control gets a little weak, so I went to bed embarrassed and didn't think anything else of it. Tuesday, September 21, my due date, I woke up as usual and did some things around the house, felt fine, cooked some dinner. Around dinner time I started to get concerned that it seemed like I was leaking but I felt fine and just thought that is odd. Around 8pm Chris encouraged me to just call the doctor and see what he thought. I called the after hours line and left a message with the operator. The doctor took around 30 minutes to call me back and in that time frame I started to get an upset stomach, cramps, I thought maybe I ate something bad. When the doctor called and I told them what was going on he surprised me by saying I should come into the hospital. I didn't think I was in labor, I thought I would have this distinct feeling of
"the baby is coming" or something. So I started crying in fear that it was possibly time, started trying to get my stuff together to go to the hospital. I wasn't rushing because I always heard stories that with your first baby you should delay going to the hospital because you will just be sitting in the bed or walking around waiting for labor to progress. I also couldn't hurry because my stomach was really hurting to the point where I couldn't concentrate long enough to think "get a pillow, get your cell phone".

Chris and I finally where in the car around 9:45pm and on our way in the rain to Emory Midtown Hospital. I mention rain because a lot of people will remember September 21, 2009 because it was the day of record flooding in the metro Atlanta area, so it was a good thing we where close to the hospital. We got to the hospital around 10pm. Chris offered to drop me off at the ER but I was thinking about how walking helps progress labor and that this was just the beginning of many hours of labor so I wanted to stay with Chris and park the car and walk. It took me probably 15 minutes to walk a distance of 5 minutes because I had to stop and sit I was in so much pain. I remember multiple people passing us asking if we needed help, a doctor, or a wheelchair. "Oh, no I am fine!" through gritted teeth. When we got to the check-in they sat me in a wheel chair as they went through the check in process. The nurse gave me a clip board and asked me to sign, I couldn't sign it if my life depended on it, I couldn't even bring myself to scribble a line. I think this is when the nurse decided to skip the paper work and waiting for a labor and deliver nurse to come get me and take me back herself.

They put me in a triage room, which is where you go before the labor and delivery room so they can check to see if you are far enough a long to take up a labor and delivery room. By this point I am in serious pain. I couldn't undress myself or sit still I was in so much pain, I started immediately asking for pain killers. The nurses tried sticking me with needles to check my blood and get an iv to start the process of pain killers but again I was in soooooooo much pain that I was rolling around moaning in pain which made it impossible to get any lines into me. They poked me with a needle all over my arm with no luck while I screamed for an epidermal. The nurses didn't give up till my body started convulsing from me pushing uncontrollably. I remember this uncontrollable pushing, feeling like when you can't control your body from throwing up. This pushing put the nurses in a frenzy when I told them that I wasn't purposely doing it, probably because the doctor was still not there and the bed I was in was not set up for delivery. The most important thing I learned from going to the labor and delivery classes was that if your body starts pushing uncontrollably and the doctor says that it isn't time, you need to blow because it is impossible to blow and push at the same time. I tried this but unfortunately, the pushing urge was a lot stronger then my ability to blow. The doctor, not my doctor, or any doctor that I had ever met in the past, showed up just in time for me to deliver Gates at 11:15 PM. No pain killers at all! No delivery room.

So, looking back, that was not a weak bladder, that was my water breaking, but my stupidity lead to a very short labor. If we had gone in when my water broke they might have sent us home any way or eventually induced labor, which I would not have wanted. The worst part of the whole process was in the middle of Gates coming out, I felt a pop, and felt this terrible pain in my lower back that was worse then any of the other pain. It turns out that I did something to my tailbone. The doctors have no way of telling what happened but they think I tore the muscles or something from my tail bone in the process of giving birth. It feels like I broke my tail bone. I still have bad pain from this a year later.

This is me shortly before the big day.