The Pope Kiddos: Abigail's Birth Story

Saturday - May 29th
It was a pretty regular day. Melody & Bella had already been here for a few days. We decided to take a picnic lunch to the New Haven green and then go on a walking tour of the Yale campus. At this point walking brought on contractions so I had to stop several times throughout the day with contractions but nothing really noteworthy. That night I went to bed as usual.

Sunday - May 30th
I woke up at around 4 AM with contractions. I'd had middle of the night contractions previously so I wasn't convinced it was anything yet. After having several in a row I decided to start keeping track of them. Thankfully I had just downloaded an app for my iPhone to track them. After an hour of contractions coming every 5-10 minutes I decided it was probably the real thing and I woke Scott up. The contractions continued and continued to get more and more painful. At 7 AM we decided to call the midwife on call. She thought I was still in early labor on encouraged me to try to walk and to wait it out another hour or so. We both took showers and woke my sister up and told her we were going to walk outside. That plan never materialized and I decided I was just ready to go to the hospital. Lily wasn't up yet. I thought it might be easier for her if she didn't have to see us leave and if she didn't have to see me have a contraction. She's generally very sensitive to me experiencing any kind of pain. So we left around 8:30 without saying goodbye to her.

We got to the hospital in only 3 contractions and ran into Abby's and Lily's pediatrician leaving the hospital. I told her she might be back tomorrow to check out the new baby. We got checked into the hospital and up to Labor and Delivery by 9 AM. I got changed and hooked up to the monitors and the midwife, Pam, came in to check me. I was only 3 cm. I was a little deflated(OK, a lot) by that since I was in a lot of pain by that point, especially in my back. I told her I hadn't had any drugs with my previous delivery. She said I should stay on the monitors for 30 minutes and then I could walk around the hospital for an hour and get re-checked and go from there. If I was at least 4 cm she could break my water at that point and get things going. As Pam was leaving she mentioned that back labor generally took a long time. Since I was only at 3 cm, I pretty much decided then I wanted to get an epidural. I didn't think I could handle the contractions "for a long time". As soon as Pam and the triage nurse were done with me I turned back onto my left-hand side--a slightly more comfortable position than on my back. I think this caused the monitor to move off the baby's heart and start monitoring my heart (baby's heart rate was in the 130s and mine was in the 70s) but they couldn't be sure of that so they told me I couldn't leave to walk around the hospital. (If the baby's heart rate was dipping that low it could indicate a problem, like the cord being wrapped around her neck.)

So I had to stay on the monitors. I told the nurse I wanted an epidural too. She told me they'd get me moved into a labor and delivery room and order an epidural. Only one problem. They were out of labor and delivery nurses (at Yale one nurse is assigned to you and pretty much stays with you the whole time). So I had to wait for a nurse to come on. In the meantime the triage nurse said that she'd get my IV started so they could get the epidural started faster once I got into my room.

At around 11 AM I was getting moved into my labor and delivery room down the hall. I had to stop once on the short walk to brace myself for a contraction. I kept telling myself that maybe that was the last contraction I would have before I got the epidural. I felt like an elephant was standing on my back. I barely even noticed the contractions in my stomach (uterus) because they were so strong in my back. Finally the anesthesiologists came in to place the epidural. There were three of them and they asked me a lot of questions about my medical history, height, weight, etc and hooked me up to a lot of monitors. I had a few concerns about getting an epidural--that it would stall my labor and lead to more interventions (pitocin, vacuum/forceps, and an eventual c-section), that I would get an epidural headache after it was removed, or that I'd have some other poor reaction since I didn't have a good experience under general anesthesia for a previous surgery. The first is not uncommon, the other two are rarer. My nurse helped me get into the correct position and Scott left to go move the car out of the loading zone in front of the hospital since he couldn't do much while they were placing the catheter in my spine anyway. The nurse warned me that the first part when they gave me the numbing agent would be the worst. It did hurt, it felt like I was getting poked with a lot of little needles all at once. The doctors wanted constant updates about the sensations I was feeling. When the catheter went into my spine I felt a very strange sensation down the right side of my back--like a cramp or a Charley horse. It definitely hurt, but not like a contraction. I felt other strange sensations and I wasn't sure what was a contraction and what was a result of the medicine they were starting to put in me. My right side felt almost immediate relief after the medicine was started.

After they were done I laid back on my back and felt better almost immediately. I could still feel some tightening on my left side so my nurse rolled me onto my left side so the medicine could "settle" and hopefully take better effect. I was able to call my mom at this point and felt fantastic compared to how I had previously felt. I still hadn't been checked again since some time around 9 AM when I was 3 cm and it was now around noon. The anesthesiologists had remarked that there was no way I was still that low based on the contractions I was having. Finally Pam came in to check me again. I was at 9 cm and the baby was very low. She asked me if I felt like I needed to push but I didn't. She thought I was so near 10 cm that my cervix would just move out of the way of the baby if I started pushing. She said that since I was complaining of pain (!?!) that I probably wouldn't be able to push for a while since they were going to give me more medicine and I probably wouldn't be able to feel anything well enough to push. I told her I wasn't complaining, I was just telling the nurse I could still feel the contractions since she asked. I told her I would rather not get any more medicine and push this baby out sooner rather than later. She broke my water and the fluid was clear. Both the nurse and the midwife left at that point. Within the next couple of minutes I felt the baby descend a lot and felt like she might just come out on her own. Scott paged the nurses station and said I felt like I needed to push. Very shortly after that our nurse and midwife returned with all sorts of trays with equipment on them. It's amazing how quick they are when you tell them you're going to push. Pam checked me again and I was completely dilated and ready to go. Pam asked me to try a test push and when I did I shot urine across the bed and hit her a good 3-4 ft away. She said I was using the right muscles if I did that. We laughed. There wasn't any laughing during Lily's delivery.

So I continued pushing. I pushed for a long time. I remember looking at the clock and seeing that it was 12:53 and thinking I was going to push her out by 1 PM. They kept telling me she was so close and that she just needed to turn and get under my pelvic bone and she would be out. Pam asked me if I wanted to watch my progress in a mirror. I wasn't sure I did but I said I did. My nurse got a mirror. The mirror was a little discouraging because it didn't look like I was making any progress with my pushes at all. I missed the 1 PM deadline I set for myself and I updated my goal to 1:10 PM. Since I couldn't see any progress I was encouraged to push even harder and to push until I saw something happen. It was frustrating when I was pushing as hard as I could and it didn't look like anything was happening. Pam left at this point (which was also discouraging because clearly she didn't think the baby was coming any time soon). But she had also been texting on her Blackberry while she was standing there between my legs, so I didn't mind too much that she left.

I was in quite a bit of pain again at this point. I could almost feel the contractions at regular strength on my left side and I could feel a lot of pressure, especially where the baby was pushing against my pubic bone. I kept pushing as hard as I could. Scott later told me my face was turning purple (and people compare this to a bowel movement?). Finally I saw the baby turn. It was a strange thing but her head turned almost 360 degrees in just a few seconds. The nurse even commented that she didn't see babies turn like that very often. She called Pam back in since the baby was coming. Her head came out almost immediately after that. The nurse confirmed that the cord wasn't around her neck as Pam walked in the door to catch the rest of her body. And I pulled her up onto my chest.

This was the part I was most looking forward to and didn't get to experience with Lily (since she had meconium in her amniotic fluid and had to be taken by pediatricians immediately after delivery). I got to pull her up onto my chest and hold her as soon as she came out. Her face was purple but she was crying as soon as she came out (even before her whole body was out). The nurse immediately started me on pitocin (which Yale uses post-delivery on everyone to minimize the chances of hemorrhaging) and Pam was working on delivering the placenta. It was just Scott and I there to bond with our new baby. She looked perfect. They put a blanket over her and we just looked at her. It took a while to deliver the placenta so I got to spend quite a bit of time with her. We breastfed and she took to it right away. Eventually they took her across the room to get washed off a little bit and wrapped in a blanket. And then Scott got to hold her.

After a little while we were ready to get moved to a recovery room. I moved into a wheelchair and they took us to our room.