Remembering 2 months ago...Elise's (long) Birth Story

It is hard for me to believe that our precious Elise was born two months ago. Elise has grown and matured so much and we have enjoyed the joys and challenges of having a new baby in the house and watching John Harrison grow to love his new sister more and more each day. I realized the other day that I never blogged about Elise birth story so I thought I'd use her 2 month birthday to do so. I always enjoy reading my friends' birth stories especially now that I've had two children of my own. Well...here it goes. On the evening and night of March 15th, I went to bed just not feeling right. I had restless sleep with frequent, irregular contractions. I went to the doctor the morning of March 16th; I had been almost 100% effaced for several weeks, but had not dilated. I was shocked when my doctor said that I was 3 cm dilated. I was glad that my body had been doing something with all the contractions I had been having! My doctor told me that with the change in going from 0 cm to 3 cm dilated in one week, he didn't expect me to make it another week without delivering and that I should get ready as the baby could come any time now. For those of you who have been pregnant, you know that OB doctors are very wary of giving predictions of when babies will come! I was really surprised to hear that that Elise would likely come early....I just had no idea that she would come later that day and be 9 days early!!! I called David on the way home to share the excitement. Around 6 that evening, David and I were outside playing in the yard with John Harrison--David asked me if I thought I would deliver naturally or with an epidural and I said that I would like to think I would deliver naturally, but I hadn't prepared myself psychologically/emotionally for a natural delivery (I had induced labor and an epidural with John Harrison). Around 6:45, my water broke...however, I didn't realize that my water had broken. I had read that only about 15-20% of women have their water break spontaneously. Out of that group, only a very small percentage have a high tear in their amniotic sac that leads to a slow leak....the vast majority have a "gush" that makes it obvious that their water has broken. I had heard of women going to the hospital thinking their water had broken only to learn that they had peed on themselves. My pride was getting the best of me and I didn't want to be that pregnant woman who went to the hospital unnecessarily. I started having more frequent contractions that became more and more regular. David and I started to loosely time my contractions and they were about 5 mins apart. David kept asking me is I thought we should go to the hospital and I kept saying "no." As the contractions became more intense, I told him that I thought it was likely that Elise would come before morning. After much deliberation on my part and at David's encouragement, I called my mother-in-law to see if she and my father-in-law could keep John Harrison overnight in case I had to go to the hospital that night. My mother-in-law gladly agreed and David and I got John Harrison ready for bed and his things packed and in the car. My contractions were about 4 mins apart and quite painful and I agreed that we would go to the hospital after we dropped off John Harrison at my in-laws' house. We got to the hospital about 8:45....the 35 min drive seemed to take forever! There were no wheelchairs in sight when we got to the hospital and so we walked to to the labor and delivery floor to check in. I guess I had not preregistered early enough with the hospital so the admissions lady had to get all of my information. The admissions woman was also on the phone and said we would have to wait a few minutes. I was having strong, painful, frequent contractions and buried my head in my hands hoping that the admissions woman would quickly get off the phone and get my information so I could be triaged. David sent me to the front desk to ask to get back to the triage area and he stayed to answer the required admissions questions. After waiting for what seemed like an hour in the triage area, a nurse came in to assess me (in reality, I only waited about 15 minutes). The endless questions seemed to take an eternity (noticing a theme here:) and when the nurse finally checked me, I was 6 cm dilated. When I got to the labor and delivery room, my nurse told me that I had to get 1 liter of IV fluids before I could get an epidural. I looked at the bag of fluids and thought that it couldn't go in quickly enough. An anesthesia student came in to assess me for the epidural....before he could even finish the questions, my nurse checked me and I was 9 cm dilated---she told me that I wouldn't be able to have an epidural. I started crying and was so scared--I shouted to David and the nurse that they were going to have to help me. The pain was so intense...I am sure the nurse had known all along that I wouldn't be able to get an epidural, but thought it would be best not to tell me. David did his best to comfort me and help me cope, but I was not the most rational person at that point and was also not too consolable. The nurse had put a call into the doctor earlier to let her know that my labor was progressing and that I would be delivering later that night, but she quickly called the doctor again to get her to the hospital since I was progressing so quickly. I emphatically said that the doctor had to get there right then because I was about to have Elise. David later told that the nurse was getting ready to deliver the baby on her own if need be. In order to help me cope, David told me that he saw the doctor coming in...right after that, she walked in the door. I was so relieved....the doctor barely had time to put her sterile gown and gloves on....I delivered Elise's head with one push and her shoulders with one more push. Elise was born less than 4 hrs after my water broke! Although I cried when the doctor handed me John Harrison for the first time, I didn't cry when the doctor handed me Elise. I felt guilty for not crying, but at that moment, I was so relieved that everything was over. The next day, I felt so much better than I had the day after John Harrison was born....no sore back from where an epidural had been...in fact, I didn't really feel like I had delivered a baby the night before. So, would I deliver naturally again? Yes, mainly on the basis of how much better I felt afterwards. I am not some heroic woman who determined to go naturally and labored for 20 hours....my natural labor came out of necessity and circumstance. Instead of thinking about going through that process again, I am choosing to think about our sweet baby girl and enjoy the fleeting newborn days! Happy 2 month birthday, Elise.