I will begin the story of Norah Rose’s entry into the world on Wednesday November 13, 2013. This was the due date calculated by my doctor, but as often emphasized, is almost never when the baby truly comes. Norah Rose continued that trend, and stubbornly remained in utero, giving her momma no signs of coming out in the near future. I was feeling just like any other pregnant day - none of the signs of early labour were present. This can be a strange feeling, as you want the show to begin, to move on to the next step, but at the same time, the next step is by far the scariest of the entire pregnancy, and such a huge unknown to a first time mom. I was definitely ready to get a move on though, and meet my daughter. I made it through two more frustrating days to my next doctor apt on Friday. I was dilated 2 cm now, and my doctor said I was ready for a stretch and sweep of my membranes to help get things going. I eagerly agreed. My doctor felt quite confident this procedure would start my labour soon, and the need for an induction was very unlikely she said. This was exciting news, so off we went home afterwards, anticipating a weekend full of early labour signs...
One much anticipated physical sign did appear, indicating my cervix was preparing for birth.This was exciting, as it was a step in the right direction, but by Sunday night I still had yet to know what a contraction felt like. In the late hours of Sunday night my Braxton Hicks contractions felt a bit different...not quite painful, but not quite painless. They didn’t seem obvious enough to be real labour contractions though, and they disappeared after a few hours, so all day Monday it still seemed as though everything had stalled. Monday night around 9pm however, I began having what felt like they MUST be real labour pains...it wasn’t anything so outrageously painful, but certainly different than Braxton Hicks and most importantly, coming at regular intervals (a sign they are true contractions)! In this case, every 9 minutes! I was so excited and immediately downloaded an app to keep track of the intervals in between, excited to see them get down to 5 minutes apart and have the show begin! Hospitals say you should be having contractions at least every 5 minutes before they will admit you to hospital in active labour. Everything before that is considered “early labour”, which you can handle at home. Boy, did I have no idea what I was in for. I didn’t realize the night before would be my final night of full sleep, likely for the next 18 years...
So Monday night I continued to have contractions every 10 minutes or so. They began to come closer at times, even reaching every 6 or 7 minutes by around 4 am. Although the pain was not unbearable, and I was able to silently breath my way through each 40- 60 second contraction, they were definitely not something I could sleep through. So, I was up all night, lying in bed, clicking away on my contraction application. You know sometimes how you THINK you were awake all night, but really you likely dozed off for a few hours and didn’t realize it? Not the case here, being that I had concrete proof from my app that every 5-10 minutes I was pushing the timer button. Dave dozed in and out of sleep, and when he checked on me around that 4 am mark I was excited to relay to him that we would likely be checking into the hospital later that morning as the contractions were getting closer to 5 minutes apart. By morning I was exhausted however, and also quite frustrated as the number that had been closer and closer to 5 was now creeping back up to 10, giving me no progress! I spent the day continuing to count, attempting to nap (without success) and trying to relax through the contractions as much as possible. The longest break I got was a few times where I had 20 or so minutes in between contractions. It was a nice break, but also deeply upsetting as it indicated things were even further from progressing. It was similar to the dichotomy between wanting labour to start but being scared about it starting at the same time.
By Tuesday evening it was unbearable to think of another night being fully awake after a day without relief, taunted by contractions that would not become regular! I called the hospital to see if there was any reason to come in after having contractions for this long without a pattern, and they said no, you won’t be admitted until they are under 5 minutes and the only thing we could do is offer narcotics to take the edge off a bit. The idea of narcotics didn’t sit well with me, and I knew I still would not be able to sleep. So, we settled in to bed hoping something would change over night, but the pattern continued...things got close together in the very early morning hours of Wednesday morning, but then began to taper off again by around 7 am. I was beyond tired, having woken up 72 hours earlier (on Monday morning) and not sleeping a wink since. I dragged myself outta bed and got in the bath, something that had helped with the more painful contractions the day before. I spent two full hours in there, protectively holding my phone above the water in order to continue obsessively timing. And once again, the pattern began to become erratic again, much to my disappointment.
At this point, I was getting desperate and very nervous, considering I was now so sleep deprived that getting through active labour and pushing seemed near impossible. With still no progress by early afternoon, and having had no relief from constant but erratic contraction, I said FUCK THIS and we packed up our things and headed to the hospital, thinking “they will have to take us seriously and do SOMETHING to help me, if we come with our stuff and our reality of sleep deprivation”. I was prepared to be denied right away however, and told the same thing as on the phone, so was surprised to be welcomed into an exam room and told they would begin monitoring me and see if they could do anything to help me along. SCORE! We were so excited for a step in the right direction.
The hooked me up to monitor my contractions and baby’s heart rate. My contractions actually became much closer to 5 minutes apart while I was hooked up, which was a relief to be like “see look!! please let me stay and have my baby!!” We sat in the exam room a very long time waiting for a doc to exam me, watching the monitor. It was actually a very nice time waiting in there...we felt hopeful and in good hands and enjoyed watching baby react to my contractions. Finally a doctor came and was able to tell me I had actually progressed a good amount since my last apt, and she would do another stretch and sweep procedure to help things move along. This doctor was rather aggressive with the procedure, and it wasn’t entirely comfortable...but man did it ever work! Afterwards the doctor told us she thought we’d be back that night in active labour. Feeling positive we headed home.
Within about 5 minutes of arriving home, the contractions began coming 2 or 3 minutes apart every time. It was a ridiculously fast change...I tried to eat as fast as possible in order to get something in my tummy in preparation for the work to come...I managed an apple and a bowl of quinoa. That’s right, I made a pot of quinoa during this time and struggled to eat it while holding on to the counter for support. Dave thought I was nuts...but I needed some good quality food to get through this gosh darn it!! As soon as I was finished my seemingly bottomless bowl of quinoa, we went straight back to the hospital.
About an hour had passed, so the hospital staff were pretty surprised to see us back, and somewhat unconvinced enough could have happened in the last hour. Back to the monitoring room we went - and I had dilated a whole other cm and was ready to be admitted! Yay! We settled into our lovely labour and delivery room, and I got straight in the jacuzzi bath for an hour. We met our nurse who I instantly liked, and decided I would definitely be getting the epidural once the bath wasn’t doing enough to get through my contractions. It had just been too many days of exhaustion - I needed to have some relief in order to rest before pushing this baby out. The contractions actually were not near as bad as I thought they would be, and perhaps had I not been in early labour for so long I could have managed them for longer. I never even needed any of the tips learned in prenatal class, nor did Dave have to intervene or suffer through me yelling profanities at him - basically I just breathed deeply and silently through them. As it stood I ended up getting my epidural at 4 cm, about an hour after being admitted. It was a fantastic idea though! I was scared for sure, but so prepared for some relief. The anesthesiologist was really nice and explained everything and did a great job getting it done quick. I jumped when she put the freezing needle in, but after that it was smooth sailing and I actually don’t even remember much after the freezing needle - I don’t think I felt much. They tape it down so well on your back that you have no idea it’s there either. I also got a button I could push if I needed more pain relief, so it was all under my control. The contractions were already lessening within minutes, and by about 10 minutes they were gone. Ahhhhhh :)
It must have been around 8 pm now. So we settled in at this point. Just hung around, chatted, asked the nurse a million questions. We both napped/rested a bit - Dave had a nice pull out couch/chair thing. Dave even watched the game for a bit on his phone. The Civic hospital uses “walking epidurals” so I could still feel my legs so we went for a tour around the hospital floor, about 5 laps with the nurse on one side of me and Dave on the other, me pushing the IV stand for support. What a crazy feeling it was that I could walk! I was barely able to feel anything in order to pee however, so eventually a catheter was needed. I was frozen though, so there was nothing to feel.
The early times I was checked I wasn’t making much progress...was stuck at 4 or 5 cm for awhile. They broke my water which was very anti-climatic actually...felt like nothing and not all that much came out coz baby must have been blocking it a bit. And, it didn’t do too much to help things progress faster. Next step was to use the synthetic form of oxytocin, which is what makes the uterus contract. The idea was to make my contractions stronger and longer. So my IV got started with that, which helped a bit but my contractions were just not coming regularly enough. So all night the nurse fiddled with doses of it, people checked me, and I had to keep lying on different sides to make sure the epidural was reaching both sides and not affecting baby’s heart rate. We tried to rest a bit but it was hard. Around 3 am I needed to push my epidural button multiple times as the freezing seemed to be wearing off a bit and I was feeling some of the contractions. By 4 am I felt good and frozen again, the nurse checked me and I was ready - 10 cm and full effaced, finally! Then she told me we were going to wait another 2 hrs to push, as this way the baby would come further down and the pushing wouldn’t take as long. She said this was normal procedure for a first time mom with an epidural, in order to lessen the effort to get the baby out since I couldn’t feel as well. She said if I felt the urge to push earlier however, we would go with it. So, another 2 hours we waited...around 5:30 however, my epidural was really starting to wear off, and I was actually needing to breath through contractions again...my button was not fixing the problem and and I was becoming pretty scared, as it had always been the pushing that scared me as far as pain, not really the contractions. Now I was getting close to pushing and was starting to feel again. Dave had to advocate pretty hard for me to make sure they fixed this as he could tell I was getting very anxious and no one seemed to be taking it too seriously. Finally they injected more medicine directly into my IV, and that worked and by 6:15 I was pain free and ready to push! I had still never felt the urge to push, which all the staff said I would, but I just never did...so at 2 hrs, it was just time to try either way.
Now that I was once again pain free, I was very unconvinced I would have any idea how to push. The nurse said just to try, and so I did. As a contraction came, she held one leg, and Dave the other, and the nurse told me to push for 10 seconds as she counted, then a deep breath, another 10 second push, another breath and one more 10 second push. Dave and I were both a little worried that I was ready to push and there was only our nurse in the room - weren’t there supposed to be teams of people there ready to catch our baby? I guess we didn’t realize, as the nurse did, that this baby was not so close to just falling out.
So, the pushing began. It felt like...nothing. I didn’t know if I was doing anything at all. I had asked for a mirror so I could see what was happening. I highly recommend this to help with motivation - it was an amazing thing to watch! After about 4 pushes and me having no idea if I was doing anything right, the nurse used her fingers to check if I was pushing effectively. She said I absolutely was doing everything right, the baby was moving and to keep doing exactly as I was. Unfortunately at 7:15 am our nurse’s 12 hour shift was over, and we were really sad to see her go so close to baby’s arrival. She seemed quite disappointed too, as we all thought baby would have arrived by now, but I’m sure she is used to the awkwardness of leaving people at strange times after creating such a bond. So we got a new nurse right in the middle of the pushing, and this nurse was actually a fantastic pushing coach, quite a bit louder than our usual nurse. It actually made a huge difference to me, as she insisted each time “harder” or “longer” or “ you can do one more”.
After about an hour I heard the nurse updating another nurse and saying how “she has another hour”...so apparently the max you can push is about 2 hours before they intervene, with forceps or a vacuum or in extreme cases C-section. This is the first I knew I had a time limit. But the nurse also said she was sure baby would be coming without intervention as progress was being made each push and there was no reason she saw to intervene. Baby was so close and I could see her head with every push. At this point I honestly didn’t even realize I had already been pushing for an hour. With the epidural, and the adrenaline of finally pushing, I felt very energized and nothing was really hurting. So, pushing continued, and by around 8:00, it’s getting hard...I do feel tired, and it’s been 1.5 hours now and it seems like there is just nothing else I can do. The nurse continues to encourage me, and around 8:15 Dave is told to push the “special red button” which calls in that team of doctors we were expecting. The room was suddenly full of people, and now it was time to really mean business with the pushing.
Having the mirror at this point was the best motivation - I could see how close I was, and even got to touch her head. Finally at 8:32 out she came, and they immediately tipped me back so I didn’t see anything but her head come out - the rest happened out of my sight. This part kinda sucked, I’ll admit. Although not true pain, it was NOT a good feeling when her head came out, and then almost worse to feel the entire body come out. It doesn’t feel good, but it also feels like a sense of relief at the same time. She was placed right on my chest and Dave got to cut the cord. I was overwhelmed at this point, and although this was the most exciting moment, the one I had been working toward and finally achieved, it was also sort of the worst. It’s hard to explain. The bed had been angled back so I was almost feeling like my head was lower than my body, but I may have just been lying flat for the first time in hours. I couldn’t see anything happening below my chest but I could feel all sorts of terrible things going on as the team worked to deliver the placenta which seemed to involve people punching me in the stomach over and over again. I was crying my eyes out uncontrollably due to emotions, which was making it hard to see through my glasses. I also finally felt the exhaustion my adrenaline had been covering up. They started to stitch up the minor tear I had gotten and realized I was not frozen when I cried out. And the worst part - I could not see my daughter!! She was placed just under my neck on my chest, and I was angled at such a level that I just could not see her, especially with my fogged up glasses. I had to ask Dave to take a picture of her so I could see her, and needed to ask the docs to confirm she was a girl. Keeping my eyes open was getting harder and harder as pure exhaustion sunk in. This was of course the most exciting part of everything, but it definitely is also just about the only real part of the whole experience that was also kind of terrible in a way.
After some lovely skin on skin time, they took her to the warming station for all her tests and such, and Dave went with her. I continued to struggle to stay conscious, and soon I had a few nurses attacking my breasts with my daughter’s mouth. Its’ very important to get breast feeding established as soon as possible after birth, and I understood this, but man this was a grueling time to learn a new skill. Norah Rose was a true natural, and latched on correctly first try, but refused to actually suck. So for the good part of an hour the nurses helped getting her positioned and latched and encouraged her to suck. I mainly just tried to remain conscious, which was becoming harder and harder. Finally our educational session was over, and a nurse helped me out of bed to shower, which was amazing, and breakfast was delivered which I scarfed down despite it being a cold hard boiled egg and cold toast. After that we packed up the room, and were headed to our new room down in the mother-baby unit! We had entered this first room as 2, and now we were 3, headed down the hall to get to know our new bundle of joy!
My experience at the Civic Hospital was exceptional. The only negative aspect is the sheer amount of medical students, as we were told multiple times it is a “teaching hospital”. It can be awkward with having extra people around, but I mostly didn’t mind as I understand they need to learn somehow, and a number of the students we met were fantastic and gave us exceptional care, especially the young lady who took care of us in the mother-baby unit who was working as a student under another nurse. We loved the staff who took care of us, we loved the rooms we were in and the services provided to us during our entire stay. Everything was provided for baby (diapers, blankets, hats etc) and my request for vegetarian meals was met easily, and the meals actually weren’t that bad considering what I was made to expect from stories. Giving birth was not even near as scary as I had anticipated. It’s hard, and uncomfortable sometimes, and it’s frustrating at times, but it’s also an amazing experience that I loved sharing with Dave, and love my daughter that resulted from the experience.
