I wrote Ezra’s birth story while I was in the hospital and, for no legitimate reason, haven’t been ready to re-read, edit, and post. His delivery felt semi-traumatic at the time, but I really don’t have any negative feelings {or any feelings at all, for that matter} that arise when I think about it.
On Thursday, 1/31, I woke up super nauseous. I went to work and powered through some meetings and left for a pre-scheduled acupuncture appointment during lunch. The acupuncturist helped with the nausea but I started having period-like cramps while on the table. I called work and told them I needed to go home. For the rest of the afternoon, I laid in bed. I went to sleep around 8:30pm, convinced that work would be easier tomorrow if I got a full night of sleep.
Around the time I went to sleep, the fire alarm went off in our apartment building. My husband and I spent a good amount of time going outside and back inside, only for the alarm to go off again. He ended up finding some ear plugs and I fell asleep to the sound of a muted fire alarm.
At 3:30am I woke up to use the restroom and noticed it was pink when I wiped. I hadn’t spotted since 7 weeks so felt a little funny about it. I got back in bed and heard and felt a POP. I leaned over to Google what the pop could be. I read about hearing a pop with no water leaking and rolled back over to go to sleep. As I rolled over, I felt a gush of water everywhere. I woke up my husband and walked to the bathroom and continued to leak water (pretty heavily). I was so bummed. I was exactly 36 weeks and this meant no birthing center. I called the after hours midwife line and they said to pack a bag and come to the hospital.
From there I took my time, I showered and blow dried my hair. I finished packing the hospital bag that I had just started packing a few days before. I ate a string cheese. And we headed to the hospital, in the dark of the night, listening to our delivery playlist for the first time. Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You” was playing as we parked the car.
I checked into the hospital around 5:30am and they confirmed it was my bag of water that broke. They checked me in and my midwife arrived shortly after. It was a huge relief to see our midwife. I initially thought that going into pre-term labor would require an OB delivery.
I was 2cm dilated, 50% effaced, and +2 station. The midwife was pleasantly surprised, but advised me that I was up against a timeline for infection (meaning c section). I also hadn’t been tested for GBS yet and found out I was positive when the hospital ran the test. While not ideal, I don’t recall feeling super derailed by the news. All I can remember is how much the penicillin burned as it pumped through the IV in my right hand.
By noon, I had only progressed to 4cm and the midwife said that pitocin was my only option to avoid a c-section. I felt defeated, but also knew it was my only choice. I labored for 12 hours with pitocin (starting at 2 MU and ending at 22 MU). I was in so much pain, I figured I had to be close. I was wrong. When the midwife performed the cervical check, I was only 6cm. I had only dilated 2cm in 12 hours! I felt like I had to be close to 8cm, which sent me into a little bit of a spiral. My birth plan was becoming more and more out of reach.
At this point I was given another choice: epidural or possible c-section. I knew I couldn’t labor another 2 hours to get to 10cm. After lots of crying and my husband not knowing how to support me (he had 8 months of training to talk me out of epidural), I opted for as low of a dose epidural as possible. The anesthesiologist gave me an epidural with no medicine and let me pump over time until I got the desired result. Looking back, it was the best decision I could have made with the water breakage situation at hand. Especially since I ended up laboring another 14 hours before we met our baby.
I slept for a few hours and woke up at 4am at 7cm, 90%, 0. I felt like a new woman and had a positive outlook on the entire situation. By 6am I was 9cm, 100%, 0, but had a piece of cervical lip in the way. They put me on the bed with the peanut and let me sit for a while. I could feel my legs completely but couldn’t feel any pain except for a back ache between my hips and ribs. When the lip was out of the way, around 9am, I still wasn’t feeling the urge to push, so they put me in an upright sitting position to let gravity labor for me. This position caused the monitors to alarm and the on-call OB to make an appearance.
By noon, it was time to push. At this point I could feel and move my legs, could feel contractions coming on and at their peak, and would soon feel pressure. I pushed for 4 hours straight doing what I can only describe as crunches with my legs spread wide, using handles to pull me up. I made progress with every push. While I was pushing, there was a constant battle between my midwife and the OB regarding interventions. The OB would mention the vacuum, the midwife would talk her out of it. The OB would turn on the surgical lights, the midwife would instruct her to turn them off. My midwife, nurse, husband, and I felt like the best team.
Ezra August Pruitt was born at 4:01pm on 2/2/19 weighing 6lb 3oz, measuring 20″, and with an Apgar score of 8.9. I didn’t experience any tearing. And I did #2 while pushing and was totally aware of it (awkward).
All of his tests came back great until 36 hours where we faced issues with glucose and jaundice, which are apparently very common for 36 week-ers. We spent 5 days in the hospital. We were able to keep glucose under control thanks to supplemental donor milk from my lifesaver of a friend. And jaundice also improved thanks to donor milk and the bilirubin machine.
Nothing about my birth plan worked out except for vaginal birth and healthy baby and I couldn’t be more at peace with those things. I wholeheartedly believe my birth team guided me in the best and only direction for a vaginal birth. I’m so thankful because, when I wrote this, our baby was just over 3 days old and I noted feeling totally fine. I felt sore and puffy, but not sore enough to take Motrin.
I can’t say enough good things about the Mama Natural birthing course {online}. Because of this course, my husband and I both felt super prepared to make informed decisions through every step. At points we felt like we were annoying, but we came out of the process feeling confident we made the best decisions for our family during our 5 day hospital stay.
Almost 5 months later, we’re still doing wonderfully. Ezra is almost 17lbs., making him an above-average sized baby on a full term baby scale. He’s hitting all of his development milestones and there’s nothing about him that feels pre-term. I still wonder how our experience would have been different had he baked for another few weeks and I was able to deliver at the birthing center. But ultimately, he’s here and oh so happy so there’s no point in letting my mind go there.
Did your delivery go according to your birthing plan? What would you do the same or differently next time around?