WARNING:!   There are some details about child birth that you may not want to know!!!  I’m going to be completely honest about my labour and delivery~ details and all :)  Consider yourself warned.  

After we arrived home from the hospital I wrote an email to my friend who is also a new mom to tell her the details of our baby’s birth.  I thought I had better put that story somewhere so I would be able to find it again when I want to remember. So~ here it is! My birth plan seemed quite solid and natural going in.  I was going to try to do everything as natural as possible.  Weeks before the baby was born I started to drink Red Raspberry Leaf tea, took primrose oil, did every healthy thing possible to ensure a timely and healthy labour and delivery.  At 41 weeks, baby STILL hadn’t arrived, and I was getting worried. I had refused to have a “membrane sweep” every week, saying that the baby would arrive on time when she was ready.  On week 41, the doctor sent me for an ultrasound to check the levels of amniotic fluid, and found that they were getting low. She informed me that they would try to start an induction after lunch.  This was on Monday, May 30th.  So, we went home, got our bags, had some lunch, took a shower and went back to the hospital around 1:00.  Before they do a full on induction, they start by inserting a little gel-soaked thing to try to ripen the cervix.  At this point I was 3 cm dilated, but had had no contractions yet.

It was really painful and I had BAD cramping the rest of the day. We slept there that night and at 5:30am I woke up with really painful contractions. Lucky for me I paid attention in prenatal class and was able to breathe through most of them!!!! They were about 5 min apart, and after a couple of hours they brought me the laughing gas. I found that I didn’t make enough difference to use it, so I kept doing my breathing instead. I got in the bathtub a couple of times, but worried that that could be slowing down the process so didn’t go in much! We walked the halls of the hospital and I walked in circles around the room. At supper time, after the whole day of these awful painful contractions, they checked me and i was dilated~~~ 4 cm. AHHH i broke down and started sobbing!! All of that hard breathing pain and ONE CM!!! She decided that she would try to break my water to see if that sped things up, or if they would have to go ahead with the induction (oxytocin drip). NOPE, breaking the water did the trick! Contractions immediately changed to about 1.5 to 2 min apart, lasting for about 90 seconds. Mom was there writing down all of my contractions and times the whole day, and Charles took care of me so well. It was so painful so fast that I couldn’t keep myself under control anymore. I couldn’t get my breathing going, I tried not to cry and scream. There wasn’t much rest between each contraction. They said they wanted to give me Fentanol for the pain, so they gave me an injection of that. It was awful! I just felt out of my mind, like I was drunk or high or something, and I got really sick feeling and thew up a lot in a little bowl. Ew. After that I just tried to bear the pain, but I was going out of my mind. The doctor came in about 7:30 to check me and I was 7 cm dilated! She was really surprised. Yeesh! But the pain was so intense and I was getting out of control she said “I think we should consider an epidural”. And I said “YES PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!” Our hospital doesn’t do epidurals much, I was the first one the nurse had seen before. Usually the epidurals had lead to C-sections because the mommy’s couldn’t feel the urge to push, and it seemed to slow down labour. Anyhow, I got the epidural about 8:30 I think. The contraction pain went away but I got a different intense pain that literally felt like a “pain in the butt” I just kept saying “my butt hurts!!”.I felt so much pressure and pain in my bottom. I thought the epidural would take that away but not at all! So painful I was still wailing half the time! After the epidural was in, I was shaking uncontrollably for quite a while, I think it scared my husband.  I had a really bad feeling in my chest, and I could feel that my heart beat had slowed quite a bit. I kept saying “something isn’t right! please check my heartbeat!”.  My blood pressure had dropped a lot, quickly, but no one told me that was why I was feeling that way. About 10:30, I kept saying “I feel like I have to poop!” (sorry) and the nurse said Ok I’ll check you again. She checked me and said “OMG you’re 10 cm! You can start pushing now!” and i was like “ummmm…. how?” and she said “when you feel the urge to push, push like you have to poop”. I didn’t feel the urge though because of epidrual. BUt I was really determined and pushed everytime I felt a pain in the butt. I asked what would happen if she didn’t come out, and they said they would stop the epidural. NO THANK YOU! I was laying on my back and i was like, isn’t there any other way I could be to do this?! Laying on the back doesn’t make sense! They thought my legs would be too weak tho because of the epidural. I said I had to pee, which i kind of did but not too much, I just wanted to sit up. So they brought this chair with a hole in it and I sat in it and tried pushing sitting up when they went around the corner. When they came back, the agreed to let me sit up in bed to push. At this point I’d been pushing about an hour. Mom said the nurse went out in the hall and said to the other nurse “she’ll probably be pushing another 2-3 hours”. When she came back I was pushing with all my might and she checked and said “OMG IT”S A HEAD!! THE BABY IS COMING! GET THE DOCTOR!!!!”. The doctor ran in, and I was doing my pushing with all my might, and in 15 minutes or so she was born :) It was sooo painful, even with the epidural, but the pain ALL went away the second she came out!!! Charles and the other nurse held my legs back behind me ears almost while i pushed her out at the end. She kicked her way out and they could see her kicking through my stomach and pelvis and i felt it and it was so weird! When she came out, the cord was around her neck and I was terrified, they took her quickly over to the baby table and put oxygen on her and she was fine, and brought her back. Charles cut the cord and sprayed blood all over the doctors face haha. Bobae started nursing immediately and didn’t stop for almost 4 hours. WHICH led to very painful cracked bleeding nipples. Her latch was good but I guess it was just too much. The next day the pain was so bad that every time I nursed I would cry and do my labour breathing exercises. FINALLY they gave me some special cream yesterday and it seems to be getting better. She gained 2 oz already so I think we’re doing a good job despite that! Good girl! Everyone at the hspital loved her said how smart and pretty she is, the last nurse said to me when we were getting ready to go “your baby is so alert and content… i can tell she’s going to do big things”. It made me so happy!!!! Now we are home, and I was worried about how hard it would be without the people at the hopsital right around the corner, but it seems to be a bit easier and more relaxed being here. It REALLY hurts to pee, and walk or sit much, but other than that doing good. I never could have imagined how much I would fall in love with this precious baby. I could just stare at her for hours and hours and hours and hours! I think I’m still in the hormone induced emotional state because when I think abotu how much i love her i just start crying!! We are so lucky!!!!!!!!!!  Oh~ all evening we had been wondering if she would be born in May or June. She arrived the first minute of June. 12:01am. :):):)

Bobae Lavender Lee~  Born June 1st at 12:01am.  7lbs 5.5oz, 21 inches long and perfect.