Pyper's Birth Story

Well I am now a Mommy! And I must say, it really is the best feeling in the world. This little girl has stolen my heart in ways I never thought possible. I want to remember every detail of her birth, so I am writing it down.

Sunday the 17th was my due date. I really didn't think I would make it to my du date, but I did. I was a little depressed because I wanted to meet my little girl. I wanted to know she was here safely. The day was very normal, nothing felt out of the ordinary. Jordan and I took Jasper on a fairly lengthy walk in the late afternoon and I did pretty well. I started having more discharge that night but didn't think much of it.

I went to bed and laid down to watch a show on my laptop to help me relax. At 11:30 exactly I felt my very first contraction. It didn't hurt but it caught my attention and I was wide awake when I felt another one 7 minutes later. They started to come pretty regularly, not very painful, but they were 7-10 minutes apart for an hour. At this point I took Jordan's phone to him so he could charge it and let him know what was going on. I wasn't sure it if meant anything, but I wanted him to be aware. I decided to lay back down and see if I could sleep  through the contractions or if they would go away.

They didn't go away nor did I sleep very much. I slept on and off so I stopped timing the contractions, but they continued to come. Around 3am I got out of bed and decided to get things organized. I still wasn't sure if it was the real deal, but I couldn't just lay down anymore. Since I was up, I stopped timing the contractions. Around 4am I laid back down and decided to see if I could still time them. I could, but they were a little irregular. At 5am I had a really strong contraction that made me want to get out of bed. As I did I felt a gush. It wasn't huge, and I wasn't sure if I had lost my bladder or if it was my water... especially because it wasn't very much. At that point I told Jordan I was pretty sure I was in labor, but that he could keep sleeping and I was going to shower to see if that stopped the contractions. Again, I stopped paying attention to them. I got back in bed after the shower and thought they had stopped. At 6:30 they picked back up and at 7 I had another one that made me get out of bed. As I did, I felt another gush. It was exactly the same as what I felt earlier, and that put me on high alert. Throughout the night I had increasing discharge and lost my mucus plug.

I called my mom around 8 and told her what was going on. She suggested I call my OB to see if they wanted to check me out or go to Labor and Delivery. Because of the gush and my uncertainty about it, I was told to go ot the hospital. So Jordan and I got ready for the hospital. I hoped at this point that I wasn't making something out of nothing. But having contractions 5 minutes apart, lasting about 40 seconds each, Jordan was pretty sure it wasn't 'nothing.'

We checked in at the hospital and had to wait 90 minutes to get a room. By this point it was 11:30am and I was doing a pretty good job at breathing through the contractions. I got into my room and had the monitors put on me. Eventually my nurse came and was ready to check me. As she started she said she was pretty sure my water was broken and did a test to make sure, she also said I was 5cm dilated! I was so happy to be that far along, I was afraid to be told I wasn't very far along. My water wasn't completely broken, part of it was still intact.

The doctor came in and broke my water and put in internal monitors for baby and the contractions. That hurt extremely bad and although I planeed on an unmedicated birth, the OB highly suggested I get the epidural based on my reaction to the exam. I'm not kidding when I say it almost killed me and couldn't imagine going through more exams like that. After talking to Jordan I ordered the epidural.

While I waited for the epidural things got really intense. The contractions came on stronger and were moving around to my back. I could find absolutely no relief no matter what I did. Jordan was amazing and reminded me to breathe but even that didn't help the pain. At this point I became every woman's nightmare- yelling through contractions, crying and saying "I can't do this. I'm gonna die. This is too hard. Where is my epidural!?!? This hurts too bad!" Things like that. Poor Jordan.

The doctor came in at 4pm to place my epidural. Th nurse checked me before he placed it to make sure I wasn't too far along. At this point I was a 6-7cm. I was so proud of myself for laboring for 15 hours and getting to 6/7cm without pain medication. Mercifully the doctor placed my epidural. It started working pretty quickly except for one spot on my left side. Other than one little spot, though, I started to feel amazing! I will never attempt a natural birth again. The epidural is a miracle drug. My parents came just as they were placing the epidural and I was so happy to have them there. Getting the epidural allowed me to really enjoy my time with them and Jordan. We talked, laughed, listened to music, and had a great time together. It's one of my favorite things about my labor experience, actually.

I got checked again around 6 and was now at 8/9cm!! I still didn't have any pitocin and my body was progressing great even with the epidural. The nurse was really happy with my progress and said we would hold off on the pitocin because my body was doing so great. Around 7:30 she left and I got a new nurse who checked me and said I was completely dilated and baby was in the birth canal! A little while later we did some practice pushes to see how well I did and how much baby moved. It wasn't a ton, so she decided to start me on pitocin and just wait so that my body could move Pyper into position without me having to push her all that way out.

I really started feeling lots of pressure, and just waited to say anything because I didn't want to push until she was really low. I don't know what time I started pushing, but Pyper was coming quick! The nurse called the doctor twice because this baby was coming!!

Pushing was like nothing I had ever experienced. I was nervous but my instincts just kind of took over and when they told me to push harder, I did. I couldn't feel a lot of pain because of the epidural, so I was afraid that I wasn't making much progress but the doctor, nurse and my mom told me otherwise. Jordan gets really queasy so he stayed up by my head and was amazing support. I loved looking into his eyes and seeing the excitement and wonder in them.

It was neat to hear them saying they could see the head, and that it was a cute little bald head. That was really great motivation to keep going. Not long after, at 9:58pm, the doctor told me to look and I got to see him pull my baby out. She had passed meconium so they didn't let her cry because they needed NICU to look her over and suction her lungs out before she could inhale or swallow meconium. It was amazing to see my mom and Jordan's excitement over her finally being here. I was in so much shock when they placed her on my chest. It was brief because they still needed to check her out, but she got the green light from NICU so I got to see her. I couldn't believe she was here. That I had just delivered my baby. There's no feeling anything like it.

Eventually she was all cleaned off and I got to do skin to skin and Jordan, Pyper and I had a chance to be together as a family. I will cherish this time forever, and I will never forget Pyper latching on so quickly. What an amazing experience.

Even though I originally planned an unmedicated birth, I am so extremely happy with how everything went. I couldn't have asked for a better support team, or a more wonderful experience. I would gladly go through it again to have my little girl who is currently napping on my lap. She is worth every little pain I felt and so much more. I love her beyond measure and love spending my waking moments looking at her. I love nursing her and feeling that bond. She is my most amazing accomplishment. My family is whole right now and life couldn't be more amazing. What an amazing blessing my little Pyper Quinn is!!