Ok, this is going to be long. If you want the cliff note version – we were in labor for a total of close to 70 hours, in the end we used pitocin and a spinal block to finish things up, and I pushed her out in less than an hour. It wasn’t the natural labor that we dreamed of, but we have no regrets on how it did go, and have a perfect baby girl to show for it. Isla Hope was 9lbs 1oz, 21 inches long with a thick head full of dark hair, and big beautiful eyes that may or may not change from her mommy’s blue to her daddy’s brown ones at some point. For those with time on their hands, here is the long version:
Friday, January 16th was Isla’s due date, and sure enough, that afternoon I started feeling contractions, a half hour or so apart. By 9 that night they were 10 minutes apart, and within an hour they had moved to 6-7 minutes apart. Throughout the night they got more intense and closer together until they were 4-5 minutes, and though I was quite excited anyway – sleep was out of the question. Around 5 Saturday morning we decided to head into the hospital. The forty-five minute drive wasn’t much fun, and contractions were steady at 3 minutes apart. We arrived at the hospital, got checked in and settled. Upon examination, after being in labor for 9 hours, I was still completely closed and 60% effaced. Discouraged was the word to describe our feelings at hearing that news!
We were sent home with orders to try and rest, which we did “try” but with contractions between 5-10 minutes apart all day, not much sleep took place. By that afternoon the midwife on call, Jacki, was suggesting that we consider coming back to the hospital and getting some morphine to help me sleep. We had our hearts set on a natural birth, so tried some natural remedies of relaxation first. I drank a glass of wine and took a hot bath, by the end of which, my contractions were stronger then they have been all day. I was up and moving around for several hours, trying to stand, walk, squat through contractions to make them more effective. These contractions were a minute or longer in length – the previous set had ranged from 45-60 seconds, so this increased length led us to think perhaps things were finally beginning to happen. At 11 we headed back down to the hospital, this car ride being much less enjoyable than the first. When we arrived, we thought for sure all that work I’d done would mean at least a few centimeters dilation, but no. I was just 1cm and maybe 70% effaced, after more than 24 hours of labor!
We consented to the morphine and I enjoyed a good 4 to 5 hours or sleep – interrupted briefly by contractions but I was able to return to sleep immediately when they were through, and the morphine slowed them down for 12-15 minutes apart. Hmmm now things are starting to get fuzzy with my memory. I guess after I woke up I labored a while longer, was informed that I was still only 1cm and we decided to do another dose of morphine. This was sometime Sunday morning. When I woke up from that round we were thrilled to hear that I had progressed to 3cm!! I said, “wow, after only 30 something hours of labor!” and the nurse kindly informed me that they don’t start “counting” until the patient reaches 3cm. Thanks a lot.
Now we thought we were really moving along, we called Jacki to share the good news and she said she’d go take a nap and get ready to come birth our baby that night!! We called our doula, Jessilyn, and she showed up to help things get moving. Unfortunately, many, many hours later I was still at only 3cm! Around 1am we sent Jessilyn home and Jacki ordered a dose of Stadol. Although the morphine had been working well for me, they were unsure about giving me a third dose, so the Stadol was the next option.
Turns out that Stadol is a horrible, horrible drug! I fell asleep immediately after getting the shot, which meant I did not hear any of the information about what it would do. I woke up an hour later in horrible pain to a dark room, everyone gone! I had no idea if I was supposed to be awake, supposed to be feeling contractions? The next few hours consisted of me waking up in a state of utter confusion, ringing for the nurse who would come in and tell me she had just been in the room moments ago. Apparently they gave me a second dose of Stadol at some point but I was so perplexed I had no clue what was going on.
Around 4 or 5 Monday morning I was fully awake, and fully done with this whole process. I begged the nurse to give me something else, morphine again please? But all she could do is fill up the birthing tub nice and hot and get me in there to try and relax. That morning the call for midwives was changing from Jacki to Marge, so while we waited for the change to happen, we were in limbo – no more drugs, no more anything until Marge got there and decided where to go. At this point Todd & I were about ready to leave the hospital and drive to Fletcher Allen in Burlington and ask for a C Section. Or an epidural, anything! I told the nurse that I wanted more morphine, then a spinal block ASAP! She couldn’t do anything about it until Marge showed up, so stalled me in the tub some more. The heat of the tub slowed down my contractions a bit so that I could actually think for a moment.
8:30 Monday morning Marge burst into our room and declared that we were having a baby today – no buts about it. She checked me and glory of glory I had reached a 4 ½ in Marge world, and a 5 by the nurses count!!! Marge had two plans, the first for me to get up & moving – squats, lunges, anything to try and get this baby out. Second plan was to start some pitocin until I made it to 6 or so centimeters, then we could do the spinal block. A little background on that, this hospital doesn’t do epidurals, just spinal blocks which works like an epidural, except that they inject the medicine into you and it runs out in 2 to 3 hours, and if you aren’t done yet you either have to deal with it, or get a second shot – in the spine, fun. So Marge doesn’t like to do spinals until the patient is at 6 or better so that when it wears off it is darn near time to push. Since I couldn’t fathom trying to be active with no guarantee that any progress would come without help, we decided on plan B and started the pitocin.
Apparently at many hospitals, they start the pit at a 12 then crank it up all the way to a 25 at the highest. Thankfully, since I had no options for pain medicine at this point, they started the pit at a 1, and moved it up to a 3 over time. This was enough to set my contractions into real motion, Jessilyn came back, and we went to it. After about 3 hours of the strongest contractions I’d experienced yet, I wasn’t quite to a 6, but Marge said I could go ahead and get the spinal. This was the best news yet!! At around noon the anesthesiologist arrived and I got my spinal and, wow, what sweet relief! I conked out for about 2 to 3 hours, during which time they took advantage of my being out of it and turned up the pitocin to an 8. I woke up and started to have some feelings again – I knew I had to pee! I still wasn’t feeling the contractions though and when they checked me I was – amazingly! – at 8 centimeters! Within another hour I was fully dilated! We found out later that if this plan had not worked, and after the spinal I had not progressed, our next option was a c-section, so it was a really good thing that things did what they did!
At this point I was fully alert and ready to have this baby! I started picturing all of the different positions I would use to push – I had been practicing squatting for 9 months and had visions of being in the birthing tub. These thoughts were squashed though, Marge reminded me that I had just had a spinal and my legs would not support me! This was a discouraging thought; I’d have to deliver basically laying on my back, just what I didn’t want to do. Then more bad news, I was told that since I had taken so many drugs that my baby might not be very alert when she came out, and may not breast feed well right away. I hadn’t thought of that when I agreed to take the medicine! Too late now though, time to push!
Pushing turned out to be my specialty! After less than an hour, my baby was crowning! Jessilyn held up a mirror for me to see her black hair, and Marge said, “Well, now that she’s seen that head, she’s not going to stop pushing til she’s out!” Her head came through without a tear, but then my darling child who had spent the last 9 months with her hands up in her face decided to throw her elbows up in the air – ouch!! Marge said, “One more good push! Now, easy, easy, don’t push, now one more big one – here reach down and grab this!” “Grab what?!” I thought, but obediently put down my hands and grabbed my baby girl and brought her up to my chest! My first words to her were, “She’s so squishy!! Where did you come from??” It had happened so fast! There she was, perfect and healthy and beautiful!
Right before starting to push, Marge made a guess that the baby weighed 7 1/2lbs, so my mental imagery while pushing was of that little baby I guess, but it turned out little Isla Hope wasn’t so little – 9lbs 1oz! And she went right to nursing, not ten minutes after she was born! So much for a sluggish baby!
As much as we wanted a natural birth, we are completely happy with the decisions we made and have zero regrets. They say it was prodromal labor – an extremely slow moving process. Maybe her head wasn’t placed perfectly against my cervix, who knows. But the funny thing is, from start to finish the labor lasted close to 70 hours, the whole thing is such a blur – I honestly don’t remember much about it except that in the end I had a perfect, gorgeous, baby in my arms!
I talk about me so much through this, but there was another person there who was suffering right along with me – my amazing husband, Todd. At times I honestly don’t know who the labor was harder on, him or me. But he was by my side the whole time and was my rock through it all.
Isla is four days old today and I am absolutely smitten with being her mother. She is an amazing baby, nursing so well, already has herself on a beautiful 2-3 hour feeding and sleeping schedule. She calms easily and has these amazing alert periods where she just stares at us with her huge blue eyes. I couldn’t be happier with her, she is a perfect angel. Her daddy is a mess about her too – can’t stop looking at her and cuddling her. We are truly blessed.
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0196.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0227.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0235.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...100_0256-1.jpg
this last one is us this morning, she didn't feel like sleeping in the bassinet for her nap, and I wanted to get this birth story typed up, so we gave our wrap a try! IT gets an A+, she's been sleeping soundly this whole time!
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0271.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0265.jpg
Friday, January 16th was Isla’s due date, and sure enough, that afternoon I started feeling contractions, a half hour or so apart. By 9 that night they were 10 minutes apart, and within an hour they had moved to 6-7 minutes apart. Throughout the night they got more intense and closer together until they were 4-5 minutes, and though I was quite excited anyway – sleep was out of the question. Around 5 Saturday morning we decided to head into the hospital. The forty-five minute drive wasn’t much fun, and contractions were steady at 3 minutes apart. We arrived at the hospital, got checked in and settled. Upon examination, after being in labor for 9 hours, I was still completely closed and 60% effaced. Discouraged was the word to describe our feelings at hearing that news!
We were sent home with orders to try and rest, which we did “try” but with contractions between 5-10 minutes apart all day, not much sleep took place. By that afternoon the midwife on call, Jacki, was suggesting that we consider coming back to the hospital and getting some morphine to help me sleep. We had our hearts set on a natural birth, so tried some natural remedies of relaxation first. I drank a glass of wine and took a hot bath, by the end of which, my contractions were stronger then they have been all day. I was up and moving around for several hours, trying to stand, walk, squat through contractions to make them more effective. These contractions were a minute or longer in length – the previous set had ranged from 45-60 seconds, so this increased length led us to think perhaps things were finally beginning to happen. At 11 we headed back down to the hospital, this car ride being much less enjoyable than the first. When we arrived, we thought for sure all that work I’d done would mean at least a few centimeters dilation, but no. I was just 1cm and maybe 70% effaced, after more than 24 hours of labor!
We consented to the morphine and I enjoyed a good 4 to 5 hours or sleep – interrupted briefly by contractions but I was able to return to sleep immediately when they were through, and the morphine slowed them down for 12-15 minutes apart. Hmmm now things are starting to get fuzzy with my memory. I guess after I woke up I labored a while longer, was informed that I was still only 1cm and we decided to do another dose of morphine. This was sometime Sunday morning. When I woke up from that round we were thrilled to hear that I had progressed to 3cm!! I said, “wow, after only 30 something hours of labor!” and the nurse kindly informed me that they don’t start “counting” until the patient reaches 3cm. Thanks a lot.
Now we thought we were really moving along, we called Jacki to share the good news and she said she’d go take a nap and get ready to come birth our baby that night!! We called our doula, Jessilyn, and she showed up to help things get moving. Unfortunately, many, many hours later I was still at only 3cm! Around 1am we sent Jessilyn home and Jacki ordered a dose of Stadol. Although the morphine had been working well for me, they were unsure about giving me a third dose, so the Stadol was the next option.
Turns out that Stadol is a horrible, horrible drug! I fell asleep immediately after getting the shot, which meant I did not hear any of the information about what it would do. I woke up an hour later in horrible pain to a dark room, everyone gone! I had no idea if I was supposed to be awake, supposed to be feeling contractions? The next few hours consisted of me waking up in a state of utter confusion, ringing for the nurse who would come in and tell me she had just been in the room moments ago. Apparently they gave me a second dose of Stadol at some point but I was so perplexed I had no clue what was going on.
Around 4 or 5 Monday morning I was fully awake, and fully done with this whole process. I begged the nurse to give me something else, morphine again please? But all she could do is fill up the birthing tub nice and hot and get me in there to try and relax. That morning the call for midwives was changing from Jacki to Marge, so while we waited for the change to happen, we were in limbo – no more drugs, no more anything until Marge got there and decided where to go. At this point Todd & I were about ready to leave the hospital and drive to Fletcher Allen in Burlington and ask for a C Section. Or an epidural, anything! I told the nurse that I wanted more morphine, then a spinal block ASAP! She couldn’t do anything about it until Marge showed up, so stalled me in the tub some more. The heat of the tub slowed down my contractions a bit so that I could actually think for a moment.
8:30 Monday morning Marge burst into our room and declared that we were having a baby today – no buts about it. She checked me and glory of glory I had reached a 4 ½ in Marge world, and a 5 by the nurses count!!! Marge had two plans, the first for me to get up & moving – squats, lunges, anything to try and get this baby out. Second plan was to start some pitocin until I made it to 6 or so centimeters, then we could do the spinal block. A little background on that, this hospital doesn’t do epidurals, just spinal blocks which works like an epidural, except that they inject the medicine into you and it runs out in 2 to 3 hours, and if you aren’t done yet you either have to deal with it, or get a second shot – in the spine, fun. So Marge doesn’t like to do spinals until the patient is at 6 or better so that when it wears off it is darn near time to push. Since I couldn’t fathom trying to be active with no guarantee that any progress would come without help, we decided on plan B and started the pitocin.
Apparently at many hospitals, they start the pit at a 12 then crank it up all the way to a 25 at the highest. Thankfully, since I had no options for pain medicine at this point, they started the pit at a 1, and moved it up to a 3 over time. This was enough to set my contractions into real motion, Jessilyn came back, and we went to it. After about 3 hours of the strongest contractions I’d experienced yet, I wasn’t quite to a 6, but Marge said I could go ahead and get the spinal. This was the best news yet!! At around noon the anesthesiologist arrived and I got my spinal and, wow, what sweet relief! I conked out for about 2 to 3 hours, during which time they took advantage of my being out of it and turned up the pitocin to an 8. I woke up and started to have some feelings again – I knew I had to pee! I still wasn’t feeling the contractions though and when they checked me I was – amazingly! – at 8 centimeters! Within another hour I was fully dilated! We found out later that if this plan had not worked, and after the spinal I had not progressed, our next option was a c-section, so it was a really good thing that things did what they did!
At this point I was fully alert and ready to have this baby! I started picturing all of the different positions I would use to push – I had been practicing squatting for 9 months and had visions of being in the birthing tub. These thoughts were squashed though, Marge reminded me that I had just had a spinal and my legs would not support me! This was a discouraging thought; I’d have to deliver basically laying on my back, just what I didn’t want to do. Then more bad news, I was told that since I had taken so many drugs that my baby might not be very alert when she came out, and may not breast feed well right away. I hadn’t thought of that when I agreed to take the medicine! Too late now though, time to push!
Pushing turned out to be my specialty! After less than an hour, my baby was crowning! Jessilyn held up a mirror for me to see her black hair, and Marge said, “Well, now that she’s seen that head, she’s not going to stop pushing til she’s out!” Her head came through without a tear, but then my darling child who had spent the last 9 months with her hands up in her face decided to throw her elbows up in the air – ouch!! Marge said, “One more good push! Now, easy, easy, don’t push, now one more big one – here reach down and grab this!” “Grab what?!” I thought, but obediently put down my hands and grabbed my baby girl and brought her up to my chest! My first words to her were, “She’s so squishy!! Where did you come from??” It had happened so fast! There she was, perfect and healthy and beautiful!
Right before starting to push, Marge made a guess that the baby weighed 7 1/2lbs, so my mental imagery while pushing was of that little baby I guess, but it turned out little Isla Hope wasn’t so little – 9lbs 1oz! And she went right to nursing, not ten minutes after she was born! So much for a sluggish baby!
As much as we wanted a natural birth, we are completely happy with the decisions we made and have zero regrets. They say it was prodromal labor – an extremely slow moving process. Maybe her head wasn’t placed perfectly against my cervix, who knows. But the funny thing is, from start to finish the labor lasted close to 70 hours, the whole thing is such a blur – I honestly don’t remember much about it except that in the end I had a perfect, gorgeous, baby in my arms!
I talk about me so much through this, but there was another person there who was suffering right along with me – my amazing husband, Todd. At times I honestly don’t know who the labor was harder on, him or me. But he was by my side the whole time and was my rock through it all.
Isla is four days old today and I am absolutely smitten with being her mother. She is an amazing baby, nursing so well, already has herself on a beautiful 2-3 hour feeding and sleeping schedule. She calms easily and has these amazing alert periods where she just stares at us with her huge blue eyes. I couldn’t be happier with her, she is a perfect angel. Her daddy is a mess about her too – can’t stop looking at her and cuddling her. We are truly blessed.
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0196.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0227.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0235.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...100_0256-1.jpg
this last one is us this morning, she didn't feel like sleeping in the bassinet for her nap, and I wanted to get this birth story typed up, so we gave our wrap a try! IT gets an A+, she's been sleeping soundly this whole time!
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0271.jpg
http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i2...e/100_0265.jpg
:
I can totally commiserate! My baby kept me in labor for 43 hours of slooow progressing labor after a month of prodormal labor. I can't imagine holding out for 70 hours!! Awesome job! 
