Ryleigh's Labor and Birth Story

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            On Thursday night after returning home from finishing my last lab practical exam at Red Rocks Jeremy and I went to bed.  We were chatting and Jeremy was feeling my belly.  He was noticing it harden up and then get soft again.  It did it several times as we lay there and so we started timing them.  There was a pattern.  About 6 minutes apart, lasting for a minute.  We got excited and continued to time them and my belly continued to contract.  We were told to call the on call midwife when they were 6 minutes apart lasting about a minute, so we did.  Melissa was on call and she said for us to come in in about an hour or two if they kept up.  They did, and so we gave Kelsey a call so she could meet us there and watch after Keegan. 

            We got the birth center at about 2 am and Melissa checked me.  I was at 4 cm and -1 station so she told us to walk around for a bit to see if they picked up.  Jeremy and I walked the breezeway and I continued to have contractions that made me stop walking and breath through them.  We walked and walked and walked.  The sun began to rise and it was looking like a beautiful day to have a baby.  Keegan and Kelsey napped and played.  Things were really relaxed.  I got rechecked at about 7 am and was still at 4 cm so Molly, the midwife that was on call for the day, sent us home to get some rest.  Usually contractions will slow down during the day because of hormonal changes so the plan was to rest up because I’d probably be in more serious labor later that day or that night.

            Kelsey kept Keegan and they spent the day together and Jeremy and I returned home and tried to get some rest.   I took catnaps in between contractions, which were still coming every 8-12 minutes or so.  I was eating toast and drinking lots of water and juice because I knew I needed my energy and didn’t want to get dehydrated like I did with Keegan.  At about 2 in the afternoon I threw up my toast and bread.  This freaked me out a little bit so we called Molly and she said to come back to the birth center to get checked.  We got back down there and she checked me and I had progressed to 5 cm, still -1 station, and contractions about every 7 minutes.  I was super excited to have made it to 5 cm because that is one of the criteria for being admitted.  Since the contractions weren’t that close together yet Molly suggested we go walk around the neighborhood for an hour and then she’d check again.  After an hour of walking around she checked again and I was still at 5 cm despite all the contractions I was having.  Molly suggested we walk down to this little Thai restaurant and have some dinner, so we did.  I had chicken and rice soup.  All the while having contractions and burying my face in my hands every so often.  I’m sure people thought Jeremy and I were having some issues or something. 

            After eating we walked back.  This is the point where I was starting to loose hope and had a good cry on the way back.  Keegan’s early labor was so long and it was happening all over again.  Why wasn’t I progressing?  Why isn’t my body getting the message and switching into active labor?  After wiping my tears, we went back in and found out I still hadn’t progressed.  Molly felt around and she said that Ryleigh didn’t seem to be in the correct position and that could be causing me to have prodromal labor.  She was transverse earlier and now seemed to be posterior.  Crap!  I needed to get her to flip around and be anterior so she could properly engage and move things along.  Molly told us to have me lay on my side in bed with a bunch of pillows under my leg and have my knee pulled up as far as I could get it to my chest and alternate this position from side to side every 30 minutes.  She told us to go home, which made me really nervous so we decided to get a hotel room close to the birth center instead.

            We walked back to the car and I had another good cry.  We looked up hotels and found a La Quinta not too far away.  Jeremy got us all checked in and we went to the room and I did the position as I was told.  Contractions were really strong and I would have to jump up out of bed or get on all fours and breathe through them but they were still about 7 minutes apart.   At some point we called Molly to update her and she suggested getting in the bath, so I took a shower followed by a bath to try to get some rest.  Jeremy was such a trooper and sat with me, timing contractions on the phone and telling me I was doing a good job.  I felt a little self-conscious at the hotel because I was moaning through the contractions so I bet our hotel neighbors were wondering what the heck was going on in our room.  Oh, well.  Molly’s daughter’s birthday celebrations were the next day and she was having another midwife, Laura, cover the last part of her shift starting at midnight.  Contractions were down to about 6 minutes apart again around midnight so Jeremy called to talk to Laura.  Funny story: the answering service wasn’t picking up!  It took about 40 minutes to finally get through.  So frustrating.  We finally got through to Laura and she said to come in and get checked in about an hour.

            At about 2 am we got back to the birth center and Laura checked me and I was at 6 cm and +1 station.  Laura thought Ryleigh was now anterior but maybe a little asynclitic, meaning her head might be tilted toward her shoulder, but Laura didn’t think that was a major issue.  Laura was certain I was going to have my baby!  Those were great words to hear!  We talked it over and decided that she was going to break my water and start cottonroot bark.  We called Kelsey so she and Keegan could be there and Laura called in the nurse, Shawn.  Both took about half an hour to get to the birth center, so I had more contractions while we waited and continued to drink electrolyte water.  They gave me a Chobani strawberry yogurt and it tasted so gross I couldn’t take more than two bites.  Ick. 

            Finally, Kelsey, Keegan, and Shawn were there.  Laura had a student midwife working with her named Karen.  Laura had Karen checked me and broke my water, then did a thorough check to make sure the cord hadn’t prolapsed.  All was good so they had me hop in the tub because sometimes things happen really, really fast after the water is broken.  The water felt so good!  Jeremy also put his swim trunks on and got in with me, which was different than Keegan’s birth because he stayed on the outside that time.  Contractions didn’t pick up so Laura kept giving cottonroot bark.  After about an hour, she had me get out and walk a little bit and go to the bathroom to see if I could empty my bladder.  I did.  Contractions continued and were picking up so I got back in the tub. 

            Around 5:15 I felt my stomach muscles rhythmically contract. One, two, three… It happened with the next contraction too.  I told Laura I thought I was ready to push and she said “That makes sense.  You can try pushing a little with the next contraction and see how it feels.”  Okay.  So I did.  It felt right.  Jeremy yelled for Kelsey and Keegan to come in.  Everyone moved closer to the tub.  I was sort of on all fours but hanging onto the edge of the tub.  The next contraction or so I really pushed and felt Ryleigh moving down, and moving down quickly!  Jeremy says he saw just a bit of her head, then after the next big push, a whole lot of her head.  It was going so much faster than it had with Keegan.  Finally!! A bonus for being in labor the second time!  With the next one I really pushed hard and grunted loudly and she moved even more.  I could tell she was almost out.  Laura said to “let this one go, breathe it out” but I couldn’t.  I was so close.  I just bore down and out she went.  It felt so good!  Laura caught her underwater and quickly passed her between my legs as I sat back into Jeremy’s lap.  Then Ryleigh was in my arms!  I finally had my perfect little baby in my arms!  5:18 am.  She didn’t cry right away, but after a few seconds we heard a few good ones.  After just a few minutes they noticed a little blood and said it was time to get on the bed and deliver the placenta.  I held my little baby and they helped me stand up, step out, and take a few steps over to the bed. 

            I laid down with Ryleigh on my chest, pushed a little and out went the placenta.  5:24 am. They started to massage my uterus and out went more “stuff”.  The whole while I just got to hold and stroke my baby.  The placenta looked good and so it went into a big Ziploc bag next to me so that Ryleigh could get all her cord blood.  I guess I was bleeding a bit more than I should have because they gave me a shot of Pitocin to get my uterus to contract.  They said I had “a tired uterus”.  No kidding!  30 hours of contractions. I wasn’t surprised.  No biggie.  That’s what Pitocin is there for.  I got looked at and didn’t even tear.  Yay for no stitches!  At some point Shawn’s shift was over and Julianne took over.  Julianne was fantastic and did all of our postpartum care.

            Ryleigh started rooting and so we had our first breastfeeding session.  She was a champ already!  Keegan was in and out of the room, on and off of the bed.  He was interested and didn’t seem scared.  It came time to cut the cord.  Ryleigh got her “clip” (Keegan was obsessed with the clip in the baby book we had).  Jeremy cut the cord.  Jeremy didn’t actually get to really do this with Keegan because Keegan’s cord had snapped during delivery, so that was nice this time.  I was ready to go take my herbal bath so Julianne got that ready.  I walked to the toilet first to try to pee.  (Apparently if you add peppermint essential oil to the toilet water it helps you pee!  Julianne said she wasn’t sure why it worked but it was an old nurses trick.  Interesting!)  I had some blood on my legs and Keegan seemed a little concerned.  “Mommy has red!”  Kelsey and I assured him I was fine, it was just part of having a baby.  They left and I got in the tub. Julianne had put candles all around the tub too, which was nice.  It felt good to soak in the tub and get cleaned off.  While I soaked, Jeremy held Ryleigh and they did some newborn checks.  She was 21.25 inches long, weighed 8 pounds 4 ounces, her head was 37 cm and her belly was 36 cm.  The tests for gestational age put her right at 40 weeks and all of her APGAR scores were 8’s and 9’s. 

            We spent a few more hours relaxing in bed.  Keegan and Kelsey went and had some breakfast then fell asleep in the car in the parking lot.  Julianne went over all of our discharge instructions.  At about 9:00 we started to gather up our things.  I got dressed.  We dressed Ryleigh.  Jeremy put her in her car seat.  At about 9:30 Jeremy pulled our car around and we left for home. Kelsey followed us with Keegan still fast asleep.  When we got home we all enjoyed a piece of BIRTHday cake.  Keegan blew out the “0” candle.  Then we all laid down for a well-deserved nap.