I reached 40 weeks on August 9th and it came and went with no signs of baby girl getting ready to make an appearance. We were gearing up for a potential induction which wasn’t thrilling to me, but I wanted to do what was best for our little girl. Just like most do, she came on her own time and I knew she was on her way to meet us Friday August 12th.
Colin was working from home, thankfully, and we were on standby for an induction later that evening. Miss Callie let me know that afternoon we wouldn’t be needing that induction when I realized I started having contractions around 2:00 PM. I began timing them and luckily Colin was able to finish his day at work before they got closer together.
We headed to the hospital around 6:00 that evening and by that time, I was struggling to talk through my contractions. They were just under five minutes apart and hadn’t stopped since they started that afternoon. Once we arrived, they checked us in and we waited for my doctor (who luckily was on call that weekend) to come in. Although I knew labor had started, it felt so surreal to sit in that hospital room just Colin and me for the last time.
When a nurse finally came in (we got checked in right at shift change) she told me I was a little just under 3cm dilated. I was a little bummed about this because I’ve heard all the “super long” labor stories and thought that I was in for a long ride. She got me up and moving to progress things and said she’d check me in an hour. Colin and I literally walked laps around the L&D floor and throughout this hour, contractions were getting very painful. I was sure that things were progressing nicely, but when the nurse checked again, I was still only at 3cm.
For the next hour, I bounced on the ball, and this was the most intense hour of my life. Contractions ramped up even more and I felt like there was no break in between them. After about 30 minutes I couldn’t handle the ball so I just paced my hosipital room. I eventually needed Colin to support me throughout every contraction, and I feel like I couldn’t even tell you what day it was because I was so overcome by the pain. The nurse came back and said I was almost to a 4 and that’s when I asked for the epidural. I wanted to wait as long as possible because I was afraid of labor slowing down, but there was no way I could keep going.
As we waited for the anesthesiologist, I went to the bathroom to empty my bladder and while inside began throwing up. (Prior to anesthesia) This was the first time in my life that I had thrown up strictly because of pain. Poor Colin’s face was just distraught. He felt so bad for me, but there was nothing he could do to help. Once the epidural was placed, I became a whole different person! I was laughing, smiling, and joking around. Best decision ever!
Around midnight, my doctor came to break my water, and I was at 5-6 cm. At that point, it was just a waiting game of letting my body do what it needed to do. Thankfully, the epidural didn’t really slow me down at all! Colin got a couple hours of sleep, and I tried, but I could still feel the pressure and it was too much for me to sleep.
At about 4:00 in the morning, the nurse checked me and I was at 9.5 cm so she decided to let me labor down for a little while. I *think* this is a newer practice and I swear it helped so much when it actually came time to push.
Around 4:45 I started doing some practice pushes after the nurse told me how to push. I waited for a contraction to start and did a round of pushing. I could tell physically and by the look on the nurse’s face that I essentially did not do it right. That was a little defeating. We waited a few minutes and I got ready for another round.
As I started, the nurse asked Colin if he wanted to look at her head. This 10 second moment is something neither of us will forget. Colin saw our sweet girl’s head for the first time as I was pushing and the look on his face gave me every bit of motivation I needed to bring her out to meet us. After that round of pushing, the nurse told me I needed to wait so she could go get the doctor because our baby girl was on her way.
After our doctor got all geared up and ready to go, I started pushing again and after two rounds, our sweet girl entered this world at 5:10 AM. I knew that this would be the best moment of my life, but I couldn’t prepare for the feeling of holding my child for the first time. Magical and heavenly are the best words to describe it.
Callie Marie weighed 8 pounds 11 ounces and was 20.5 inches long. She latched wonderfully for the first time, and we did skin to skin for about an hour before moving up to the postpartum unit. I couldn’t stop the tears of joy. We stayed in the hospital all day Saturday, and were discharged on Sunday afternoon.
Prior to getting the epidural, it quite literally was the worst pain I’ve experienced in my entire life (props to all the women who do it naturally). But within the first week of her life, I looked at Colin with tears in my eyes and told him I wanted to do it again – the pain, the blood, the pushing, all of it – because it was the BEST day of my life.
