gurumama
07-18-2003, 10:37 PM
Reilly Samadhi Zoltán: April 1, 2002, Leominster Hospital, Leominster, MA, 8 lbs. 10 oz., 21.5 in.
This time (second child) I was determined to have a drug-free birth. I'd chosen certified nurse midwives for my care and delivery. I’d enjoyed long office visits, with lots of education, one-on-one care, and emotional support from the three CNMs in the group, and looked forward to giving birth with any one of them. In addition, Erik and I had taken Hypnobirthing classes. Our instructor worked hard to help us with self-hypnosis, stress-reducing techniques, and educated us about the physiology of labor, uterine muscle structure and blood flow, etc. We also hired a labor and post-partum doula, Dionne, to help us through the laboring process. We wanted to stay at home for as long as possible and keep our three year old, Ben, with us until we left for the hospital, and a labor doula would also help with pain and stress-reduction techniques to reduce my need for drugs.
For eleven days I’d had on and off labor with episodes so intense I’d been sure it was time…Finally, at 1:45am on April 1, seven days past due date, I woke up with surges (the Hypnobirthing term for contraction), but fell back to sleep, convinced I was dreaming. An hour later the surges woke me up again. I timed them for an hour and got up. One of my biggest questions about this second birth was whether my body would go into labor on its own. I’d had Pitocin for Ben’s birth, so my body had never been given the chance to naturally progress through labor. By 6am I thought I was in real labor, so we called Dionne and asked her to come over.
During the next few hours Dionne and Erik (my DH) kept me well fed, hydrated, and comfortable as the surges increased in intensity. We even went for a 1.5 mile walk! I used music each time a surge hit. I listened to Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” on our MP3 player, pressing “start” each time a surge began. I’d close my eyes, pull into the surge, and go with the pain, imagine it stretching through me, rather than trying to fight or deny it. When I’d tense up, it hurt more, so I really focused on relaxing.
At one point I noticed that one surge had lasted through 96 seconds of music on my MP3 player. “Am I in transition?” I asked Dionne. “Because I certainly don’t feel that crazed yet.”
“Maybe you are. Let’s see how you feel after a few more contractions.”
My legs started shaking around 1pm, and although I still felt fine between surges, they were harder to deal with. I kept wondering, though, when they'd become impossible, when that horrible frantic jumping feeling and overwhelming pain would hit. (It never did.) Dionne told Erik call the midwives, and as we were searching for the cordless phone Estee called!
She urged us to meet her at the hospital immediately. We weren't as organized as we'd thought, so it took about 10-15 more minutes to load the car. I was shaking uncontrollably and started to cry.
"I don't know if I can do this," I cried. The surges really hurt, like my pelvis was separating (of course, that's exactly what it was doing!).
"You are doing it," Dionne reassured me. "Now let's go!" The ride was surreal--I sat without a seatbelt on, tilting sideways, because my butthole felt like it was coming out of me. I asked Dionne if she'd ever delivered a baby in her car and she said no. (She later told me she was thinking, "Not yet!")
We got to the maternity ward at Leominster Hospital at 1:45pm. I wanted the famed jacuzzi tub in the maternity ward. I asked the nurse to use the tub and she told me I’d need to have an exam before I could get in, because if I was at 10 cm I would be too close to delivery to use the tub. I wanted Estee to perform the exam, but Estee wasn’t there…so I was between a rock and a hard place. I started to panic. We'd stayed at home to avoid all the bureaucratic sh!t at the hospital, and now my CNM wasn't there, I was in transition or fully dilated, and I had to deal with a nurse who was incredulous that I wanted my own nightgown, who handed me the External Fetal Monitor the second I walked into my room, and now she told me I couldn't have the jacuzzi, and that she might even have to call the on-call OB!
I started to panic and the pain suddenly hit me HARD> I had been totally on top of the contractions, but once I panicked...Erik and Dionne helped me focus and Erik said loudly, "No matter what, you'll get the birth you want, Melanie. If Dionne and I have to take you out of this hospital and help you have this baby ion the parking lot, we'll do it!"
I wish I could have seen the nurse's face!
Just then, Estee walked in. She sized me up and I muttered, "I want the tub. She says you have to do an exam and if I'm at 10, I can't labor in it."
"I think it's too late for the tub, Melanie."
"But I want the tub--oh my God, I have to push!" I shouted.
"Then push!" she replied.
I was confused. The urge was SO INCREDIBLE. I used to tell people that with Ben I'd had a "light" epidural. Bullsh!t. I must have had decent dose with Ben, because what I felt having Reilly, unmedicated, was SO strong. It was 10 times stronger than the urge to vomit.
So I pushed. After that surge, I pushed once more and broke my water, all over the floor, Erik's shoes, and the little table that I clung to throughout the labor. That little table was four feet away from the nice, sterile field set up on the bed, but it might as well have been four miles. I kept moaning, "My butthole, my butthole," and they laughed at me! The reassured me, too, but it wasn't until Reilly was 3 days old that Dionne explained I looked like a pouty four year old AND that I used every word I could think of--butthole, asshole, rectum, anus--to elaborate what I was feeling.
Erik, Dionne, Estee, and the nurse gradually eased me to the bed. I pushed two or three more times and when Estee said "One more for the head," I believed her, and she was right.
Having had Ben, I knew the head was the hardest part. But Reilly's head was actually smaller than his chest, so the exact thought going through my head was "Oh thank God,"--push--"What the--?" as his shoulders and chest got caught, briefly.
One more push and out he came. At 2:25pm. 40 minutes after we'd walked into the hospital. I was done. No drugs, no epidural.
I was so amazed that I had actually done it that, frankly, it took about 5 minutes for me to realize oh, yes, I have a baby now too. That sounds weird to admit, but the rush of doing what so many people told me was impossible briefly superceded the baby's arrival!
They carefully guided Reilly to my breast, cord still attached. He nursed immediately, and after the cord stopped pulsating, I cut it myself. I asked to touch the placenta once it came out, and I held it in my hands while Estee explained everything about it. The stichwork was pretty extensive--Reilly's shoulders came out at the same time--ouch--and I had been in a tricky hands and knees position and delivered fast.
Dionne helped me to experience how normal childbirth is—why be filled with anxiety about something that millions of women experience each year? I have some medical issues that prevent a home birth, so for me the combination of CNMs, a doula, and staying at home as long as possible helped to reduce medical interventions (such as fetal monitors, Pitocin, etc.) or pressure for labor to advance along a textbook timetable. The difference between Reilly and Ben was clear as well: whereas Ben had been somewhat sleepy, Reilly was extremely alert after birth. When Erik followed Reilly into the nursery to be measured and bathed, the nursery nurse said, “The mother didn’t have an epidural, did she?” She told him she could always tell the difference in babies born with or without one.
The hospital staff kept pushing drugs on me after--Tylenol 3, etc. They told me I didn't have to "be a martyr" and I finally got them off my back by telling them I'd had a bad reaction to those drugs--all I wanted were 800 mg Motrin (the stitchwork HURT!).
We filled out all the admitting paperwork AFTER the birth, and I was quite the topic of conversation on the ward that day--as in "Can you believe she waited ON PURPOSE to come in so far along?"
So yes, you can have a drug-free birth in hospital!
This time (second child) I was determined to have a drug-free birth. I'd chosen certified nurse midwives for my care and delivery. I’d enjoyed long office visits, with lots of education, one-on-one care, and emotional support from the three CNMs in the group, and looked forward to giving birth with any one of them. In addition, Erik and I had taken Hypnobirthing classes. Our instructor worked hard to help us with self-hypnosis, stress-reducing techniques, and educated us about the physiology of labor, uterine muscle structure and blood flow, etc. We also hired a labor and post-partum doula, Dionne, to help us through the laboring process. We wanted to stay at home for as long as possible and keep our three year old, Ben, with us until we left for the hospital, and a labor doula would also help with pain and stress-reduction techniques to reduce my need for drugs.
For eleven days I’d had on and off labor with episodes so intense I’d been sure it was time…Finally, at 1:45am on April 1, seven days past due date, I woke up with surges (the Hypnobirthing term for contraction), but fell back to sleep, convinced I was dreaming. An hour later the surges woke me up again. I timed them for an hour and got up. One of my biggest questions about this second birth was whether my body would go into labor on its own. I’d had Pitocin for Ben’s birth, so my body had never been given the chance to naturally progress through labor. By 6am I thought I was in real labor, so we called Dionne and asked her to come over.
During the next few hours Dionne and Erik (my DH) kept me well fed, hydrated, and comfortable as the surges increased in intensity. We even went for a 1.5 mile walk! I used music each time a surge hit. I listened to Samuel Barber’s “Adagio for Strings” on our MP3 player, pressing “start” each time a surge began. I’d close my eyes, pull into the surge, and go with the pain, imagine it stretching through me, rather than trying to fight or deny it. When I’d tense up, it hurt more, so I really focused on relaxing.
At one point I noticed that one surge had lasted through 96 seconds of music on my MP3 player. “Am I in transition?” I asked Dionne. “Because I certainly don’t feel that crazed yet.”
“Maybe you are. Let’s see how you feel after a few more contractions.”
My legs started shaking around 1pm, and although I still felt fine between surges, they were harder to deal with. I kept wondering, though, when they'd become impossible, when that horrible frantic jumping feeling and overwhelming pain would hit. (It never did.) Dionne told Erik call the midwives, and as we were searching for the cordless phone Estee called!
She urged us to meet her at the hospital immediately. We weren't as organized as we'd thought, so it took about 10-15 more minutes to load the car. I was shaking uncontrollably and started to cry.
"I don't know if I can do this," I cried. The surges really hurt, like my pelvis was separating (of course, that's exactly what it was doing!).
"You are doing it," Dionne reassured me. "Now let's go!" The ride was surreal--I sat without a seatbelt on, tilting sideways, because my butthole felt like it was coming out of me. I asked Dionne if she'd ever delivered a baby in her car and she said no. (She later told me she was thinking, "Not yet!")
We got to the maternity ward at Leominster Hospital at 1:45pm. I wanted the famed jacuzzi tub in the maternity ward. I asked the nurse to use the tub and she told me I’d need to have an exam before I could get in, because if I was at 10 cm I would be too close to delivery to use the tub. I wanted Estee to perform the exam, but Estee wasn’t there…so I was between a rock and a hard place. I started to panic. We'd stayed at home to avoid all the bureaucratic sh!t at the hospital, and now my CNM wasn't there, I was in transition or fully dilated, and I had to deal with a nurse who was incredulous that I wanted my own nightgown, who handed me the External Fetal Monitor the second I walked into my room, and now she told me I couldn't have the jacuzzi, and that she might even have to call the on-call OB!
I started to panic and the pain suddenly hit me HARD> I had been totally on top of the contractions, but once I panicked...Erik and Dionne helped me focus and Erik said loudly, "No matter what, you'll get the birth you want, Melanie. If Dionne and I have to take you out of this hospital and help you have this baby ion the parking lot, we'll do it!"
I wish I could have seen the nurse's face!
Just then, Estee walked in. She sized me up and I muttered, "I want the tub. She says you have to do an exam and if I'm at 10, I can't labor in it."
"I think it's too late for the tub, Melanie."
"But I want the tub--oh my God, I have to push!" I shouted.
"Then push!" she replied.
I was confused. The urge was SO INCREDIBLE. I used to tell people that with Ben I'd had a "light" epidural. Bullsh!t. I must have had decent dose with Ben, because what I felt having Reilly, unmedicated, was SO strong. It was 10 times stronger than the urge to vomit.
So I pushed. After that surge, I pushed once more and broke my water, all over the floor, Erik's shoes, and the little table that I clung to throughout the labor. That little table was four feet away from the nice, sterile field set up on the bed, but it might as well have been four miles. I kept moaning, "My butthole, my butthole," and they laughed at me! The reassured me, too, but it wasn't until Reilly was 3 days old that Dionne explained I looked like a pouty four year old AND that I used every word I could think of--butthole, asshole, rectum, anus--to elaborate what I was feeling.
Erik, Dionne, Estee, and the nurse gradually eased me to the bed. I pushed two or three more times and when Estee said "One more for the head," I believed her, and she was right.
Having had Ben, I knew the head was the hardest part. But Reilly's head was actually smaller than his chest, so the exact thought going through my head was "Oh thank God,"--push--"What the--?" as his shoulders and chest got caught, briefly.
One more push and out he came. At 2:25pm. 40 minutes after we'd walked into the hospital. I was done. No drugs, no epidural.
I was so amazed that I had actually done it that, frankly, it took about 5 minutes for me to realize oh, yes, I have a baby now too. That sounds weird to admit, but the rush of doing what so many people told me was impossible briefly superceded the baby's arrival!
They carefully guided Reilly to my breast, cord still attached. He nursed immediately, and after the cord stopped pulsating, I cut it myself. I asked to touch the placenta once it came out, and I held it in my hands while Estee explained everything about it. The stichwork was pretty extensive--Reilly's shoulders came out at the same time--ouch--and I had been in a tricky hands and knees position and delivered fast.
Dionne helped me to experience how normal childbirth is—why be filled with anxiety about something that millions of women experience each year? I have some medical issues that prevent a home birth, so for me the combination of CNMs, a doula, and staying at home as long as possible helped to reduce medical interventions (such as fetal monitors, Pitocin, etc.) or pressure for labor to advance along a textbook timetable. The difference between Reilly and Ben was clear as well: whereas Ben had been somewhat sleepy, Reilly was extremely alert after birth. When Erik followed Reilly into the nursery to be measured and bathed, the nursery nurse said, “The mother didn’t have an epidural, did she?” She told him she could always tell the difference in babies born with or without one.
The hospital staff kept pushing drugs on me after--Tylenol 3, etc. They told me I didn't have to "be a martyr" and I finally got them off my back by telling them I'd had a bad reaction to those drugs--all I wanted were 800 mg Motrin (the stitchwork HURT!).
We filled out all the admitting paperwork AFTER the birth, and I was quite the topic of conversation on the ward that day--as in "Can you believe she waited ON PURPOSE to come in so far along?"
So yes, you can have a drug-free birth in hospital!