the story of jack thomas

This is going to be a long post with probably some intense and personal information...you've been warned! :)

If I've learned anything in my three weeks of parenting, it is that flexibility is key. In preparation for Jack's birth I literally read every natural child birth book available, watched movies like The Business of Being Born and had Trevor do much of the same. I downloaded mp3s of hypnobirthing and listened to them daily while practicing yoga breathing and holding ice cubes in my hands to simulate pain. I typed up positive affirmations to read daily and a birth plan with well thought out and researched choices. at our child birth class I ignored most of our last class as we discussed interventions and pain meds. I wanted natural childbirth so badly. So much so that I was absolutely devastated when at 36 weeks my blood pressure sky rocketed, had to be monitored at the hospital and was on modified bed rest. If I had to be induced, the chances of natural childbirth would be really slim. Thankfully I was able to keep my blood pressure at a safe high level and had no other symptoms of pre-eclampsia, so no talks of induction.

My whole pregnancy I had wanted to go late so that I wouldn't have to go back to work until January after Christmas break. However, once my blood pressure issues came up, I started mentally planning for him to come early. Needless to say, I was shocked when it seemed as though I might go past my due date (especially since I had one night ten days prior to my due date of timeable contractions). Work was really challenging. The beginning of the school year is always exhausting but being at the end of pregnancy, carrying around 55 extra pounds and having high blood pressure was really intense.

Well, the day before my due date (Monday 9.10.12), I was determined to get this baby out. I had been drinking red raspberry leaf tea, eating pineapple and spicy food and doing about any old wive's tale besides walking (blood pressure issues) to try to start labor. At lunch that day I started feeling sharp, random cramps so I decided to walk. Once I got home and Trevor went off to work, I decided to see if I could get these cramps to turn into something. I leashed Sofía up and we walked. The cramps were there but nothing painful or timeable. Something in me told me it was going to happen, though. I decided I should eat a healthy and filling dinner (spicy pasta fagioli with spinach) and relax. I even texted Trevor and told him to take it easy at work because I though it would be that night.

At 7:40pm while laying on the couch and playing on the computer, I heard the loudest pop inside of me. I immediately stood up, knowing that if it was my water, I'd have a gush...sure enough there was one! I freaked out for a second and then called Trevor. He answered and immediately said he would call me back and I said, "No, my water broke!". He has never been home faster.

My contractions started immediately and were tolerable but required focus, about 4 minutes apart and 1 minute long. I was prepared to labor at home for a long time so I started cleaning up the house a bit and getting ready by taking a shower. The look on Trevor's face when he walked in the door was priceless. Scared, excited and nervous. He went and got dinner for himself and then we laid in bed watching Monday Night Football where I kept timing contractions. I called my doctor and let her know what happened and she said as long as I could feel Jack move between contractions, we were fine to labor at home.

While laying in bed my contractions really picked up; usually you need to walk and get them going in early labor so I was shocked. Trev and I looked over my birth plan and my relaxation reminders and then suddenly my contractions were intense, 1 minute long and 2 minutes apart. I texted my natural mama friend Jianna who recommended I call my doctor and my doctor thought it would be good for me to come in. We got our bag, fed the animals and walked out to the car. I could not sit straight up at all in my labor so I sat in the back seat with a pillow and moaned the whole way to the hospital. I was shivering like crazy (which they later told me was from all the hormones racing through my body) and feeling like I was going to be sick. Trev had one hand on the wheel and one hand reached back to touch my leg.

We finally arrived at the hospital around 11 and had to go in through the emergency entrance and then wheeled to labor and delivery. We checked in and went to triage. They had me gown up and hooked me up to the monitors and a hep lock. They did an ultrasound to confirm he was head down and then checked to see how far I was. 3 cm and 90% effaced. I looked at Trevor and said "I feel so defeated". My contractions were coming hard and fast. How could my contractions be so intense and have only gotten me so far? They monitored Jack for 20 minutes and did bloodwork to check my pre-eclampsia status. They then asked if I wanted anything for pain and I said no. If I could moan into a pillow tilted to the left on my back, I was OK. I was just focused on not clenching my jaw. They then told me my water did not break and I must have just peed. To this day I know they are wrong. How do I hear a pop, stand up and feel a gush and then contractions start immediately and intensely and that just be from my bladder? I will forever disagree with them.

They then had me walk to my room, which ended up being the same room my girlfriend, Jianna, had and that was painful. I was 4cm and 100% at that point and in serious pain. I wasn't getting any rest between contractions as they were staying in my back, were 2 minutes long and 2 minutes apart. The nurse anesthetist came in and discussed pain options but I thought I should try the tub first. The tub helped for a couple of hours (the jets on my back felt great) and to get me to 7cm but at that point my contractions were on top of each other, I had back labor, I had taught all day and went walking after work and I was exhausted. My body never eased into labor and at 3am and 7cm I decided I needed to get out of the tub and get some relief. I just kept begging for rest. I always thought I would be upset with myself if I got pain meds but I wasn't. I'm still not but I am bummed now that labor didn't go as expected. I anticipated rest between contractions and I never got that. Flexibility is key. I decided to get IV pain meds because it was suppose to be low intervention and just take the edge off. That's all I needed because I knew I still had transition and pushing to get through. I was starting to get terrified of transition because I knew it was the hardest part and my labor had been already what I expected of transition. Well all it did was make me high as a kite and no relief. I thought my nurse, who was amazing by the way, was hiding under my bedside table. I am mad I got the Stadol. It was "wasted" meds-didn't help at all.

So the decision to get an epidural was made and waiting for the fluid bag to get through me was excruciatingly long. They broke my water and I got the epidural. I know I was fine with the decision when I couldn't have cared less on the size of the needle (I'm absolutely terrified of them). The hardest part was sitting for it and sitting still while I was having contractions. This was around 4:30am and I was 8cm.

I'm glad I waited so long to get my epidural because he was barely, if at all, affected by it and neither was the speed of my labor. By 5:45 I was 10cm and 100% effaced and feeling ready to push. My epidural had ran out and I was ready to push without it. I had my break, I didn't need a refill. However, before they would let me push I had to wait for my doctor to get there and change and had to have a temporary catheter because I couldn't pee because of the epidural. They had me wait to push until 6:30 while my contractions pushed him down further. That was so uncomfortable...feeling the need to push and not being able to.

At 6:30am I finally began pushing and boy did I underestimate it. It was such a slow process. Finally around 7:45/8am things really got moving. Lights were being turned on, nurses were coming in, the bed was getting broken down and I was getting amazing motivation from Trevor and the doctor. I really needed it because I was exhausted. I was sleeping between pushing contractions and having Trevor spoon feed me ice chips. I started begging my doctor to do anything she could, just get him out. She gave me a small episiotomy (which I didn't want originally but didn't care at this point-I would have taken a c-section-and I ended up not tearing because of it) and I just had a few pushes left. They kept saying he had dark hair which Trevor was shocked by-he was convinced it would be blond like he was. I was thankful for the amount of hair; it made all the heartburn worth it. Every time I pushed my doctor kept saying "He's almost here" and Trevor kept saying "Oh boy". I looked at him and said "He's going to be born on his due date, grandpa Jack's birthday". I thought Trevor was going to lose it then. His grandpa Jack meant so much to him.

At 8:14am I felt him squirm out and they put him on my chest. Trevor cried and I surprisingly did not. My mom said she heard my last push and his first cry in the hall. I was so relieved he was finally here and I was so amazed by him. He was so alert (8 and 9 on his apgars) and we just hung out skin to skin. He cried to clear out his lungs and I told him how much I loved him, happy birthday and sorry how rough his day had been. After some skin to skin and an attempt at breastfeeding they weighed him and measured him. 8lb 8oz and 20 3/4 in long. They kept saying it was a quick labor for such a big baby. I disagree. It was so intense, I feel like it should have been shorter.

Recovery was rougher than I thought it would be but we stayed until Thursday morning and that helped. Our hospital was amazing. The staff, nurses, housekeeping and room service, was all amazing. The healthy food was phenomenal and I made sure to order lots of it at each meal.

I won't bore you all (although I may have already) with the details of our hospital stay and first days home with visitors and I'm not going to talk too much about how awesome Jack is because I plan to do a 1 month old post next week (how can he be a month so soon?!) but I will say a few words. Being a mom is amazing and I have such a happy baby. He laughs and smiles a ton already, really doesn't cry or fuss and is absolutely adorable. The only meltdowns we have had (both Jack and I) are from difficulties breastfeeding. After five trips to a lactation consultant, endless hours researching on sites like kellymom.com and a few crying sessions, Jack and I are happily breastfeeding. I actually did this whole post while feeding him and on my phone. Our sessions had been so upsetting and hard before that I would have never thought this would be possible.

I want to leave with this, though. Before the last three weeks, labor and attempting breastfeeding I definitely had some judgements of those that got epidurals and formula fed. But having gone through everything I have recently I now know that there can be no guarantees with parenting. We can plan and hope for certain outcomes but flexibility and letting go the need to have everything go perfectly as planned won't make anyone happy. (Although cloth diapering is going so well and I'm thankful for that!). I hope I can remember this lesson as I raise Jack as I'm sure there will be times when life doesn't go as planned. I think in the end it was good for me to have struggled with labor and breastfeeding because I now have dropped unnecessary judgements that aren't fair. Mommy wars are so ridiculous. I hope I can refrain from judging in the future because we all are just doing the best we can with what we have at the moment. Now he just looked at me and smiled so I'm going to go and read a book to him and hope tonight has a lot of sleep for everyone but I won't be upset if it doesn't work out quite that way.