As of 07:07a.m. this morning (nov 3rd), our son Junis (Yoo-nis, middle name still under discussion;)) has entered this world.
After the second bleeding scare the night before (see my post in november chit chat), last night again around 2am I woke up from another gush of fluids leaving me - only this time it wasn'T blood but amniotic fluid. I got up to clean up and change and by 2:30am contractions were under way. Since both my last births were loooong labours (DS1 50hours ending in a c/s due to malpositioning and DD2's hwbac 17hrs until I was complete and another 3hrs of pushing without ever feeling the urge to push) I expected to labour for at least a few hours until it was time to call the mw. Boy, was I wrong.
the contractions started pretty much full on right away and after maybe 30minutes of build-up they were already regular 1min long and 2mins apart full on contractions with some serious back labour. Never had that before, but the bad part is, that while the contractions taper off and leave you a small break between them to come up for air, the back pain never really does. It is as though the muscles don't have enough time to relax inbetween. not nice. anyway, so I soon realized: this time is different! At this rate and this intensity something must be happening and I just *might* not be in for another long labour after all. So, some time around 5am I called my mw. She came right away and checked me and I was 3cm already. DH had gotten up with me but was now with DS who had woken and was a little scared, hearing my moaning and chanting. By then silently laboring was absolutely out of the question and my mw immediately asked me, where I wanted to be, bc if we were to leave for the clinic, we'd better leave right now! I felt exactly the same, and while the prospect of getting in a car and driving for 30minutes rather freaked me out, I immediately knew, I wanted to go. Our new home is lovely and great, but with the kids about to wake up and my labour fully under way it really felt like the best choice to be away from them. I was also quite overwhelmed by the force of my contractions and felt like if they kept going like this for hours and hours I might just not make it without any pain-meds (never took any with both my previous births, so go figure).
The car ride was hell, what can I say. ctrx were still regular and literally felt like back to back and I had already thrown up twice at home (that'S my least favorite part ever: throwing up while having a murder contraction!) and had to once again in the car. by the time we reached the clinic it must have been about 5:45-6am-ish. DH had stayed at home with the kids, waiting for our friend to arrive to look after them and I was with my mw. It all felt right, I have to say, he couldn't have done much anyway and I was much more comfortable knowing him with the kids.
At the clinic I somehow made it to the birthing rooms where we had the bad fortune to have the least easy going mw on duty. She was a very simple person who needed to go by the rules which meant 'getting a good reading of the baby first', 30minutes. I didn't have any wires but I still felt very constricted and of course then the thingies didn't really stay in place and there were big holes in the reading and then she saw that the apprentice had used the wrong part and the new standard was to get mom's reading as well and we had to do another ten minutes and then another and she actually asked me to lie on my side! hello?! I was in full-on labour and she asked me to stay in a side lying position for at least (do the math) three ctrx?
At some point I said sth like, 'now it really is enough! are we still not done with this crap?' and she babbled something about needing to make sure the baby was alright, blah-blah. My mw kept rolling her eyes at her behind her back and promised I would get a shot of meptid really soon (some 'soft' pain med she swears by to take off the edge and make dilation easier) and after about an hour of doing those stupid readings around 6:45ish (I guess) she got round to it and went to run the birthing tub.
Ha, should have done that a lot earlier (it might actually have helped a lot, I loved laboring in the birth pool with DD) but by the time I heard the water running, I was already pushing. I finally got to feel what it's all about - being overwhelmed by this unmistakable urge to push and giving birth to a baby the way it's supposed to be! I remember checking the clock on the wall at about 6:50 and thinking, maybe he'll be here at 07:07 - and he was.
DH arrived about 30minutes later and couldn'T believe it already was over! Junis has a surprisingly full head of darkish hair (DH and I are both blondes, so that was a new one) and is still a little shaken by the speed of his delivery but overall he is fine. He weighed 8.4lbs and is sleeping a lot. He latched on a few times but my milk hasn't come in yet and he seems to prefer sleeping for now.
We left the clinic around 11:30 and have been home since. I tore a little but altogether I feel best compared to my other births. And I can finally make peace with the whole giving-birth thing. It was fast (start to finish 4.5hrs) and overwhelmingly furious and intense and there was a lot of noise made by me ;) but he is here now - we did it. no c/s, no meds but neither a stalled labour and a non-descending baby. So I am pretty happy with the outcome:)
pictures to follow.
Congrats
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