Easy Birth Story

7/11/13. Today was a Thursday. It was one of the last days to be together with my soon to be big sisters before getting induced on Sunday. Here’s what we did Breakfast with a friend, pet store, pedicures, park, 7-11 for free slurpees, garage sales, another park, ice cream, and then home to swim. By dark I was exhausted but we still had to do our nightly catch lightening bug walk. That’s when I got one bad back cramp. I told my husband when we got home and he seemed panicked. He quickly got the hospital bag and the girls’ overnight bag down by the door and packed one for himself. I was nervous too because I knew it was the start to real contractions. It was way different than the Braxton hicks I’ve had for the last few months. I continued about my night experiencing a few minor back pains/contractions. I wanted to sleep but I knew real labor was near and I was scared. I didn’t want to go to the hospital. I wasn’t ready to have this baby, even though I wanted it out for so long. This really might be the day the world gets to meet the little one that caused me so much stress and anxiety the last few weeks. Was it going to be boy or girl? I remember feeling a sudden sadness in the mix of pain knowing that this will probably be my last time being pregnant. It was a bittersweet moment. I wondered if I enjoyed being pregnant as much as I should, maybe I should’ve embraced it a little more. By 11 pm I had major back cramping and pain but nothing regular. I walked around my house trying to time them, while watching TV, doing dishes, and quick cleaning. Nothing more than 30 seconds, so I figured it wasn’t real labor. I also looked up if I was in labor or not because even though it was the 3rd time I still felt clueless. I downloaded an app to time the contractions but I still wasn’t sure if it was real contractions. At around 2 or 3 am I called my mom because I didn't want to drag the girls out in a panic if it was real labor. My mom got here and I still wasn’t sure since I was able to talk and function. The only weird thing is that I felt like I had to go to the bathroom with every contraction. I tried to go to bed in hopes that my water would break and then I would know for sure to go to the hospital. Finally around 5 am I was still asking my mom and husband if I should go in and decided to call my Dr’s office. The answering service told me it was my call and that the L&D nurse would call the Dr if they needed him (my Dr was pissed about this and said she should’ve paged him right away.) I still contemplated going because I read about a 5-1-1 rule (contractions 5 mins apart lasting 1 minute for at least 1 hour) mine weren’t like that so I still waited. They never got like that. Finally I got my husband. Of course, he had a headache and was obviously in more pain than me so we had to stop at Walgreens, which was closed. I told him we still had time and I thought Kmart was open. He got out of the car and that’s when I felt the most pain. I told him we needed to hurry. Then of course contractions/cramping stopped again. We got to the hospital around 5:45am, waited for L&D to come, which seemed to take forever. I told the nurse on the way up that I wasn’t sure if it was real labor and they’ll probably send me home but I wanted to make sure I wasn’t too far along because I wanted the epidural (which I didn’t get with my last 2.) She put me in the small room and told me to get undressed so she could check me. She had a strange look on her face and to my surprise and hers she said “umm you’re at 8-9cm, looks like you’re not getting that epidural this time either. We need to move you to a different room and get everything ready right away.” Omg. My baby will be here soon, now if only my Dr would hurry up. We made jokes about Candy Crush, pig semen and Kim Kardashian all while in fullest and hardest part of labor. The nurses loved me and couldn’t belive I was smilig and laughing (especially without drugs). They commentred on how I was such an easy patient. 7 am comes and Dr arrives and the nurses that I’ve dealt with for the last hour were about to leave. Dr breaks my water, I tell him I really need to push. I scream and cry in pain and push. Everyone cheers me on and says “the baby’s right there, we see hair, one more push, you can do it.” I push. They say “stop, stop, stop. Don’t push. You need to stop pushing right now.” I cry that I can’t and it hurts but they seem concerned and I do my best to stop. The baby’s head is out and I have no idea what is going on. No one seems to say anything. My husband later tells me the look on the one tech’s face was pure panic to the point he didn’t even care if it was a boy or girl. One more push and at 7:18 am “it’s a girl!!!” Turns out the cord was wrapped so tightly around her neck they couldn’t even unravel it and the Dr had to cut it off. I think, wow 2 contractions to push her out. That was the easiest labor and delivery. The nurses from the last shift stayed after just to see what I had and to congratulate us. They hand me my screaming baby girl and she was beautiful. They finally clean her up and measure her about an hour or two later. She weighed 6 lbs. 15 oz. and was 21 in long. We couldn’t decide on a name for the longest time but eventually decided on Cierra Rose. That’s how I remember the birth story. I actually just realized I have no pictures of me in labor and none of me and the baby or none of our whole family.

Mental Breakdown 36 weeks

The last few weeks of my pregnancy were an emotional nightmare for me. I completely lost my mind. The anticipation of this baby was killing me and I wanted to kill everyone around me for no apparent reason. I was having panic attacks and feared that something would be extremely wrong with my baby. I spent way too much time online looking up everything. I was sure my baby had everything from cerebral palsy to trisomy. I thought of and researched every possible negative outcome of the baby’s health. I prayed that if there was anything wrong it was cataracts because I was familiar with that. I had a growth scan around 36 weeks, where the tech made me nervous as hell by saying the baby looks a little small. When I asked “how small, like a few weeks?” She said yes with a look of concern on her face. She even made a comment that if the baby does not grow the doctor sometimes induces early because they have a better chance of growing outside the womb. She continues to tell me the baby’s legs looked especially short. Surely, I went home and googled the crap out of everything again. I went to my dr’s office crying but he showed me the report and said everything looked perfectly fine (as it did all along) and that the tech had no business saying anything at all to me because it was not her job and she was not trained to read the report. I still worried about my tiny baby and bought some whey protein and started making protein shakes to bulk up. As if I need the bulking, considering I had gained a good 30 pounds. Physically, I felt great and according to people, I looked great and not that far along. I was still doing everything I did before I was pregnant and possibly more. I never had swelling, complained about the heat or anything really (but I’m sure my husband will tell you differently.) Overall, it was good pregnancy, beside my early bleeding, varicose veins and temporary mental insanity but I was ready to meet my baby. In fact, my Dr said he would induce me on Sunday 7/15 at 9pm. My due date was 7/18. Of course I went home and researched induction, as I had 2 uncomplicated natural births and suddenly felt really nervous. I read that cervidol was made from pig semen and that made me not want to get induced. I did just about all the natural remedies to self-induce starting around 38 weeks. I bounced on an exercise ball several times a day while playing candy crush, took red raspberry leaf tea, took evening prim rose oil (orally and vaginally) walked every day, did squats in the pool and a few on land (but that made me feel like my vagina and organs were falling out) pressed on acupressure points and had a pedicure. I also tried castor oil but only tried one half a teaspoon full because I was a little leery of that for some reason. I did go into to labor the night I got my pedicure. I told her to hit all the acupressure points. I’m not sure if this was it was a coincidence or not. It was Thursday 7/11/13…

2nd trimester

Hard to believe I'm in my 3rd trimester already. Who am I kidding, it seems like July won't be here for decades. I'm feeling fine and have felt fine the whole time (minus my small bleeding episode at the beginning). Baby is growing just fine and sex is still to be determined. Once again I did not want to find out. This baby is very active and my doctor has yet to get a heart rate because of the movement. The only issue I'm having is varicose veins. They are so gross. I look worse than an 87 year old woman's legs. I bought myself some super sexy thigh high compression socks but only got a chance to wear them once so I'm not sure if they help at all. My weight gain has been fine. I am finally getting out of that "is she pregnant or did she gain 10 pounds phase." I feel like nobody actually cares about this pregnancy and I hope that doesn't mean that no one will care about this baby. My dad and coworkers are the only ones who have asked how I'm feeling and how baby is doing. My sister talks about how much she hates babies (we actually used to talk about this together until about a month ago) and my mom hasn't asked me anything at all. My husband is a whole different story but I'll just say, he didn't even go to the ultrasound appointment with me. Anyway, I'm happy that I'm feeling good and that things seem to be going fine and pray they continue to go that way for the next 11-13 weeks.

I want to travel the world

I'm going to take a moment to reflect on my career (or lack of one) and try to focus on finding my calling again. Some may think I am unmotivated and they are absolutely right. I am still having a hard time finding a passion in life but once I find it I think I will have the drive and motivation to accomplish it. I am trying to find my true north but my internal compass takes me every which direction. This makes me think my true calling is to travel every which way of the world. I have no problem packing up and moving on and wouldn't feel bad about having my kids drop out of school to travel the world. The problem is- my husband. He seems to be pretty grounded. He thinks, what's the point of working at the same job for 15 years if your just gonna pack up and start over somewhere else. I disagree. I think living should include change on every level. Maybe I am biased because I never had a job for 15 years. My longest is at Ingalls which is almost 5 years. Technically 2 because I quit and came back so they started me from scratch but total is 5 years. Another problem is that traveling the world is not actually employment unless I can find someone else's dime to travel on.

my 1st trimester

I am finally admitting that yes I am pregnant! It was somewhat planned. We talked about it for a day. I took out my own IUD, which I would not recommend unless you desperately do not have the money to pay the copay. I regretted it because after thinking about another baby, I realized I didn't want another. See my post No Baby. My girls are so easy to manage now. I wanted the IUD put back in But it was too late I was already pregnant within 2 days. I took at least 8 pregnancy tests at home and work before I even missed a cycle. I still didn't believe and constantly checked to see if my period was starting. At 6 and 8 weeks I did start bleeding. The baby was fine but I had what they called a subchorioic hemotoma (fancy word for a blood clot) in my uterus. Which I believe is from the improper iud removal. I thought for sure I was going to miscarry so continued to be unexcited. I was on slight bed/pelvic rest for a month and the clot resolved on its own. I am now 14 weeks and starting to finally be happy! This is the 2nd trimester so I feel less "at risk".  I am feeling great! Baby is Due in July and we will find out the sex then!! I'll keep you updated :)