I Have a Son
Gerhardt "Hardy" Max Welden
July 2016
I have a son.
Thursday, July 28th. It was a normal day. I caught the bus to go to work and took a selfie of my huge belly. I had prided myself on standing to wait for the bus, running for it even when I was running late. Well, that day I sat down at the bus stop. Work was a normal day, but not too much happening since I had cleared my workload weeks earlier. A couple coworkers stopped by to ask when I would be induced (?? why!), which I shrugged off. Home birth is weird for people, apparently, so maybe people want you to have to go to the hospital? My sister and nephew picked me up to get lunch at Shahrazad (favorite!), and I burned my mouth on all the spicy foods.
Ben picked me up for our midwife appointment at the birth center in the late afternoon. The appointment was good. The baby hadn't fully dropped yet (or, engaged in my pelvis), though, so birth wasn't quite in a view. We had plans to go to Hello Falafel with Amy. We picked her up and drove there, but I wasn't feeling well. I slowly hobbled my way there since Ben parked really far away (really far away at nearly 41 weeks pregnant is about two blocks). I was still full from lunch so I ordered a juice. There was another woman there with her family and I remember her mother smiling at me in a knowing way when we came in. I wasn't sure why, until I saw that her daughter was pregnant as well. Turns out she was also a week late and I hugged her when they left. We went to Amy's to eat. I was grouchy and napped on her couch. I remember telling Ben several times that I wanted to leave, but he was enjoying the evening and wasn't used to me complaining so he ignored me. Finally I grouched enough that we left, it was a little after 8. On the car ride home the contractions began. Finally home, I slipped into comfy clothes and started bickering with Ben while boiling water to sterilize the parts to my breast pump. I was feeling like a crazy person. I went upstairs to get something by the bed, I crouched down and my water broke. Me and my insane kegels kept it in, crazy enough, so I could get to the toilet. Seriously. I texted my midwife to ask what water breaking looks like just to confirm. It was this delicate gold color and the flakes looked like they were shimmering; it was the #1 most beautiful thing I've ever seen in a toilet. I called for Ben; he came to the foot of the stairs and I said, "my water broke!"
Labor beginning with the water breaking happens to 25% of women, and the water that comes out is probably about a cup. Images in movies where it looks like a river of water is gushing out a woman is just not realistic for most women. The water that comes out is the amniotic fluid trapped between the cervix and the baby's head, which generally isn't that much. In the state of Wisconsin, labor must begin within 18 hours of the water breaking before you are legally required to go to the hospital for delivery. Fortunately for me, my contractions were definitely happening so labor had begun. My midwife said, well, looks like we're having a baby tomorrow! I called my parents, my friends, and emailed my boss: the baby is coming! It was 9:30. Start the clock!
The average length of a labor is 12-18 hours. My labor at home lasted for 31 hours before we had to go to the hospital, and then it was another 20 hours before the baby was born.
What I remember of those 31 hours are really bits and pieces. For a while Erin was saying that the labor was textbook; we were progressing perfectly. I labored in the tub, I paced a lot, I walked up and down the stairs, I listed to Pet Sounds by the Beach Boys (at least, I remember selecting it and turning it on). I remember Erin calling her partner, Brandi, who took pictures. I remember trying to sleep. I remember Ben trying to sleep while I was in the tub. I remember thinking all the foods I picked out to munch on were disgusting: grapes made me poop, carrots made me gag, peanut butter made me too thirsty. And these Annie's granola bars that I thought would be my lifeline? They had something MALT in them, which I hate!, and I literally threw it up. Oh gosh! I remember throwing up! (Which is actually really good during labor because it's like huge contractions.) I remember trying to sleep in bed but still tracking my contractions. I had no idea what time it was ever. I remember covering my eyes during contractions. I remember moaning through the contractions.
Midwifes do a physical check of you when you want them to, otherwise they pretty much leave you to labor in peace, like an animal in the wild. I loved it. I was happy. Erin and Brandi made themselves at home, I think, but I wasn't paying attention. I have no idea what time anything was happening because I had very little concept of anything happening outside my body. I vaguely remember Erin checking me a few times, when everything was going normally. I remember being surprised that I was only as dilated as xx (I don't remember), but it was okay. Eventually, Erin checked me and had Brandi double check. I was contracted to 9 cm and a lip, so my cervix was dilated unevenly, but I was really close to being fully dilated. From what I understand, what they could feel of the baby's head was squishy instead of firm; the baby's head wasn't straight, so it wasn't applying even pressure to the cervix (thus the uneven dilation), and his head was swelling where it was pushing on the cervix because that's not what is supposed to be pushing. It was so sad to me, because all the supplies to help birth the baby were out by my bed. Now our focus was, can we get the baby's head to straighten to apply even pressure? Erin's advice was to try and sleep, relax, maybe the baby will right itself. They used essential oils on my belly and feet to help; they wrapped my hips tightly in a sheet and lifted my hips vertically to help the baby move UP so it could straighten its head; they tried other things I can't remember. The answer is no, we can't get the baby's head to straighten.
At 2:00am, we checked again and it was all the same. We had to go to the hospital. Ben and I sat together while I continued contractions, and Erin and Brandi hustled around the house to erase all evidence of their being at our house. We were sad. We were so sad. We had our hospital bag packed for weeks, so it wasn't anything for us to get up and go, but it was so sad to part with our birth plan. We followed Erin to the hospital, my contractions went from being every 2-3 minutes to 20 minutes. We arrived at the hospital and checked in.
Going to the hospital is something you try and mentally prepare for with a home birth, but actually knowing we had to go, it was like all that mental preparation was a mental facade, there was nothing left when it happened. In any case, we knew that once we were at the hospital we had to self advocate for what we wanted (and thankfully we had Erin to help {midwife at home becomes doula at hospital}), but we needed to be open to what came our way, since we had to go to the hospital.
The first group of doctors who came to see us were not so nice. We were friendly and upbeat, they were at the end of their shift and we were quite aware of that. My water had been started leaking more, and it was more comfortable for me to labor while standing up than sitting down; I was wearing a bra and that's it, and I remember one of the student doctors asking me if I wanted a robe to wear. "Uh, no, I don't think that would be very comfortable what with the leaking water and all..." Poor girl, better get used to it... Fortunately I had a friendly nurse. I had to have two sensors wrapped around my belly, which kept falling off since I was moving around so much, and I was repeatedly unhooking them because the cords wouldn't let me walk as far as I wanted to. The doctors recommended starting on pitocin and getting an epidural, which I didn't want. I wanted to continue birthing naturally. "Then what are you doing here?" the doctors asked. Erin responded, "we are legally required to be here since her birth hasn't progressed in five hours." They left, but came back a little while later repeating their plea to medically intervene and made sure I knew I was going against doctor recommendation by not doing so. Because of all my moving around, they were concerned about not having accurate reads on the condition of the baby, and we decided to put an internal monitor on, which meant another physical check (making this like, my third physical check in as many hours, and matching the number of physical checks Erin had done during the previous 30 hours). This also meant that I could continue laboring in a little more comfortable way, although there were still cords coming out of me.
Finally at 7:00AM the staff switched over. I got an AMAZING nurse, Kat, who was my saving grace, and a doctor who fully supported my hopes, Doctor Amuzu. I did decide to start pitocin, but at my own pace. And I decided to take some iv pain reliever; it had been a very long 36 hours. I also started using a breast pump for nipple stimulation, which can help. I don't know, hours were still going by and it seemed like nothing was changing. The hospital was endlessly distracting to me, and there were so many people coming in and out that a people person like me was just too stimulated. The first doctors wouldn't let me eat anything since they were hoping for a c-section (okay, okay, I know they weren't hoping for it, but I do think that's where they saw my birth heading), I remember asking if I could eat anything and the doctor that I didn't like in particular replied, "ice chips." Great... I was starving, birth uses a lot of calories! But the second set of doctors allowed me a tray of liquids: broth, water, sorbet, jello, juice. It hit the spot, the broth was incredibly good. Anyway, the pitocin. I remember increasing, increasing, increasing, increasing, and then I remember when the pain killer wore off. Whew! Pitocin! That stuff is strong! But my pain killer had been stronger, apparently, and when it wore off those contractions sure were surprising! They weren't stronger or closer together than I had already experienced, but they were kind of out of the blue after the pain relief was gone.
At noon, 39 hours, I decided to concede: I would have an epidural. I had labored by myself long enough and even Erin agreed that it was time. I just wasn't progressing. Getting the epidural was not as scary as I thought it would be. It brought relief, and almost most importantly, it brought NAPS. Erin napped. Ben napped. I napped. Sleep was amazing.
And then I woke up shivering. You know how the doctors were constantly checking me once I got to the hospital? Yeah, I got a uterine infection. Could it have also been caused by my being in labor for nearly two days? Yes. Anyway, it happened. I called my mom and I remember my teeth chattering. The nurses were piling warm blankets over me. I took some medicine, went back to sleep, woke up hot from all the blankets and the fever had passed. Yay! And I was FULLY DILATED! However, at this point, the doctors knew that the baby had pooped, so all the amniotic fluid surrounding him was filled with this black tar like poo called meconium. There was a possibility that the baby would need to be rushed to the NICU. Erin was awake with me for this part, and we had to wake up Ben to tell him what had happened. Another hurtle to jump. I remember him being ultra serious and really sad...and then Erin told him that I was FINALLY full dilated, so yes there was some happy news.
We requested that the doctor at the NICU come see us so we could get a feel for what this might look like. The NICU doctor was awful. We were being really friendly and trying to be flexible and ... well, she was just terrible. Kat (my favorite nurse) came and I told her that, in short, I hated that doctor. I have no idea what time it was at this point, but Erin reminded us that we were fully dilated and could start pushing at any time. I think Ben and I lost all excitement about baby coming. We forgot that this happy happy thing was supposed to be happening, and we were focusing on this terrible doctor and the possibility of the NICU and our beautiful home birth gone wrong (not really wrong, I know, but astonishingly different than we had hoped for). We had had some down times during this whole birth, but we were completely lost at this point.
So Erin suggested that we just try doing some pushing. So we started pushing. My epidural was starting to wear off, I was feeling my contractions. I had this terrible pain in my right side that I'm not even going to bother talking about. Kat had to leave since her shift was up, but another nurse, Ashley, came that was wonderful. Pushing pushing pushing. I got the hang of it. It was good, it was HARD WORK. But every time I got through pushing through a contraction, I got amazing affirmations from the nurse, Erin and Ben. It was good, honest, hard work. I got to feel the baby's head which was really motivating. It was approaching midnight, and I was really hoping that Hardy would be born at the same time as me. I remember it being 11pm and thinking, okay, 47 minutes to go! It got intense. The doctor came and told me that the NICU doctor wasn't going to be coming :) mostly because I hated her, I'd like to think, but probably because we just didn't need her. 11:47 went by, Ben got into place to deliver the baby and finally, after 51 hours, my baby was born.
He was covered in meconium so we had to cut the cord and clean him off right away. (Our hope was for delayed clamping and skin to skin as long as possible, but oh well.) I asked, "Ben! Who is it!" He didn't know what I was asking. "Hardy or Kay?!" He smiled and said HARDY! My son. I laughed and looked over towards the baby and saw him turn his head to me, he knew his mama's laugh. The NICU nurses cleaned him off and we started our 24 hours of mom/dad skin to skin. (Yes, that's right, we didn't let anyone else touch him for 24 hours!)
I'm going to leave the story here, because our next couple days in the hospital were terrible, and that's not what this is about. This is about my darling boy, my son, Hardy Max, and how he entered the world. VERY SLOWLY! :)
