A home birth, and even further a tub birth, is something I often thought about during my pregnancy. it was something I would have liked to have done. Unfortunately for us, we lacked the social network that could have allowed us a safe, stress free home delivery. The information on midwives in the area was limited not to mention midwifery in New Brunswick has become a fairly new practice adopted by the public health system. But the main reason why we relied on a hospital birth was because I tested positive for Group B Streptococcus and required antibiotics to be administered for at least 4 hours before giving birth.
So on Sunday, December 19th at 4:00 pm Duane and I were getting ready to head down to a cafe when I felt my water break. I calmly called Duane and told him that I thought I felt my water break and he wanted me to make sure I just didn’t pee myself! The hospital advised us to come straight up and be admitted, luckily I had our bags packed and ready to go. We called a cab and while we waited we called my mom, sister and Duane’s parents to let them know my water had broke. Duane and I were so nervous and excited that we would be meeting our little one soon that we were shaking and it seemed like forever for the taxi to get to our house.
One of the funniest moments was when we went to enter the delivery area at the DECH and pressed the button on the intercom, Duane stuttered to the voice that answered that “My wife’s labor broke!” After confirming that my water had in fact broke I was immediately put in a hospital gown and hooked up to an IV but for now I was only 3 centimeters dilated.
My contractions were about 10 minutes apart in the beginning and only lasting about 15-20 seconds, they felt like period cramps and were bearable. But around 7pm they were lasting 30-45 seconds and were about 5 minutes apart, these were much stronger but I stuck through them. Around 10pm I agreed to try to ease the pain by getting into the hospitals jacuzzi, it was in there that I first puked (in the garbage that is) and knew that I would possibly need something stronger for the pain. At 10:40 I started to get shots of fentanyl which took the edge off slightly, it simply made me feel a bit woozy in the head but I still felt the pain. By 12:42 am I was only 4cm dilated and feeling frustrated that it was taking so long! Finally at 1:30 am after puking about 5 times throughout the evening, I requested an epidural even though I tried to avoid having one. The few reasons why we didn’t want one was because of the possibility of him being born drugged, and I was told that I would be so numb and not able to feel anything when it came time to push. It took the anesthesiologist 8 tries to get the needle in my back because it was so swollen. However, this did not hurt compared to the 3 contractions I got during the process which made me puke while I was hunched over while he worked.
I felt relief within 10 minutes and was able to rest in between the half hour checks of my cervix dilation. I was glad that I decided to get the epidural so that I could rest and prepare for delivery. At 7:30 am on Monday morning I was getting ready to push and despite my worries I was actually able to feel everything and could even move my legs. My contractions came every minute and I had to take a deep breath and push as hard as I could 3 times during each contraction, this went on until 9:40 am. I was extremely tired and did not think I could go on, Duane told me later that I said I couldn’t do it anymore and with that I started my last set of pushes. I remember feeling frustrated that for the last hour I was told that they could see his head and that it was getting so close, but I felt like it was taking forever and I didn’t know how I could go on any longer. So at 9:43 am I did my 3 pushes during the one contraction and then with every last bit of my energy and with the most breath I could gather I pushed a fourth time, I could hear the doctor saying she saw his head, then his shoulders and I felt him fall out of me. I was so happy that he finally was out, and with his cord around his neck they quickly unwrapped it and cleaned him up to place him on my chest.
Soren was a bluish, gray color with vernix covering him (and a bit rubbed off on my chin when they put him on me) and he smelled a little funny, but when his eyes looked into mine the feeling that filled me made me forget about the last 19 agonizing hours. He was perfect to me and I knew this would be one of the most memorable moments in my and Duane’s lives.