Navigating the Unexpected: My Birth Journey
Today I'm doing something a little bit different. I am doing a solo episode. I had plans for this week's episode, but realized that the release date for the podcast was the same day as my son's second birthday. So I have yet to share my birth story in full.
And I don't know that I ever will, to be honest. But last year, I kind of chronicled my birth on my Instagram page. So I figured I would pick up from what I shared there. As this episode gets released, I will post those in my stories from last year. But yeah, I hope you enjoy it.
I guess I'll give a bit of a trigger warning. It was kind of a rough birth, so if you think that that would be challenging for you to listen to, please just skip this week. I'll leave it up to your discretion.
From Prodromal Labor to Active Labor
So on October 12th of 2022, I started laboring to bring my baby Bode into the world.
At this point last year, it had taken me a year of a lot of EMDR and talk therapy to even consider talking about my labor and delivery experience, but finally felt ready to share a little piece of what it all looked like. Well, the podcast wasn't active at the time. The Instagram feed felt like the safest place to share.
After four days of prodromal labor, I finally slipped into active labor. I would wake up every day around 9 a.m., start laboring until about noon, and then it would just stop. For four days, I would start labor early in the morning and stop around noon every single day.
This specific day was no different. Our doula came on night three around two or three a.m. because my contractions were about five minutes apart and lasted a while, but completely stopped early into the morning. I had my final midwife appointment that afternoon on this day. I was late to my appointment because we had to stop the car twice because of the pain I would have just sitting in the car during contractions.
The second stop was at a random neighborhood where we pulled over and I was throwing up in the street from the intensity and the regularity of the contractions, but probably mostly panic. My contractions completely stopped when I arrived at the midwife's office, just like they had days prior. I had my first of many cervical checks. I was three centimeters dilated.
I spent the day on the couch with the dogs trying to rest and did more mile circuits than I could count. I tried to stay hydrated and eat while I geared up for labor. I specifically remember my midwife saying, we might see you this evening with a baby. We were prepared for a home water birth and decided it was time to blow up the birth pool and get all the supplies organized again and get all the last minute to be checked off.
That evening, my sister FaceTimed me and my parents to tell us she was pregnant with baby number four, which was an exciting distraction. We shared with my family that I was definitely in labor and hoping to have a baby that night. We had chosen very specifically not to share with our families and only a select few friends that we would be having a home birth. We were educated on the risks and benefits and only wanted positive thoughts and energy in our field division.
It served us well.
Contractions started again at 1 a.m. and the ball was quickly rolling. Contractions were regular and shorter in length. Between each one, the app said to go to the hospital, so we called our doula instead. Pictured, me at 1.45 a.m. starting labor and our last snuggle with our dogs. Laura, our doula, arrived around 2 a.m. on Thursday night.
At this point, finding a comfortable position to rest in was challenging. Standing up or sitting completely upright were the only comfortable positions, hence the pillow pictured. Time was irrelevant at this point as I had fully entered the birth zone. Shortly after Laura arrived, a birth assistant and training midwife had arrived. My vitals were taken and I was let to labor for a while.
The baby's heart rate was checked fairly often. Again, things were really a blur. I remember moving from room to room and position to position to continue to encourage the baby to drop down. According to the notes, the midwife arrived from another birth around 4 a.m. and I had another cervical check, check number two. I was at six centimeters and definitely feeling like my laboring down way productive.
About 5 a.m. I finally got into the birth pool. When I got into the pool, I was already pretty tired. I used the warm water to relax a bit, open up, and allow things to start moving a bit quicker. Despite being six centimeters, I wasn't really feeling the urge to push at all. I'd felt the baby sitting in my pelvis for hours, days honestly, but no forward movement. My contractions were strong and regular, but it didn't feel like much progression.
For whatever reason, I got out of the birth pool and believe we tried to do the mile circuit once again. Just as it was before, most positions were a no for me. Unless standing, sitting upright, or kneeling, the contractions were significantly more intense in any other position. Exhaustion started to take over after four days of on and off prodromal labor and a full day of early labor.
This is where things start to get a little off course.
The Decision to Transfer
At 5.30 AM, I began vomiting. I knew vomiting is typical in birth, and it's my body's reaction to pretty much anything that's uncomfortable. So I was not surprised or shaken by it. It was just part of the process. After trying to keep down fluids and honey sticks for an hour, to no avail, at about 7.30, I wound up taking some Zofran to stop the vomiting long enough to take down some liquids and get going again. I got back into the pool to get back into the zone and spent an hour of refocusing on my birth mantras flowing through my contractions. And then at 8 a.m. labor stalled. Four days, five and a half hours, labor stalled. I spent another hour sitting in the tub trying to relax my body.
With consistently intense and regular contractions with no movement to come of it. The original midwife and assistant team rotated out and another team came in. I agreed to getting out of the tub to have my water broken in hopes to get things moving. Around 9 a.m., my water was broken and I was checked. All looked good. This was check number three. Contractions almost immediately got more intense.
I got back in the birth tub because it was simply the only place I could cope with the contractions. I was able to get back into birth mode and refocus on the ebb and flow of contractions. This was easily the hardest part of my labor. It was exhausting, emotional, and uncomfortable. At about 1130 AM, I was exhausted and started vomiting again. But this time it was uncontrollable.
I was unable to get breaks between contractions because of the vomiting. Unfortunately, I'm extremely familiar with what my body feels like when it's dehydrated. I feel like my energy is completely zapped. My mind is fuzzy and so is my vision. My muscles feel like they're working overtime just to function. I felt all of this times a thousand. In addition to all of this, the midwife and assistants swapped out again.
An all new care team. A new midwife.
They got filled in on where things were at and offered the option of an IV for fluids. This was such a saving grace of an option that I didn't even know was an option. My immediate birth team, my husband and doula were as hopeful as I was in forcing some fluids to get me through to the home stretch. In my head, I knew this was going to be a pivotal point. Either this would work, I'd get rehydrated and get this baby out, or I simply wouldn't.
We tried to place the needle in my left arm with no avail. My veins were pretty collapsed and after many years of having IVs and blood draws, I knew how hard it was going to be to place it successfully. We tried my left hand and after a few tries, we finally got it. Around noon, everyone left the room to go downstairs to eat, drink and rest, leaving me and my husband to be alone in labor for the first time since the night prior.
I distinctly remember saying that if this doesn't work, I don't know if I'm going to be able to keep going. At this point, I was still in the birth tub. I laid my head down on my arms on the edge of the pool and noticed that the lines on my tattoo on my left arm looked distorted. Thinking this was a symptom of exhaustion and dehydration, I lifted my head to get a better look. The IV had blown and fluid was filling up under my skin.
I told my husband that I didn't think I could do it anymore. At this point, I had been laboring on for five days, hadn't eaten much, vomited all the liquids I had been taking in. In my head, the IV was my last shot. I knew it was over for me, but I couldn't bring myself to say it. It's a blur to me how we even got to the point of needing to decide what to do from there. I just remember it was me and my husband in the room again.
While the midwifery team and my doula discussed what was going on, I remember whispering to him, “I think I have to be done” and just falling apart. I was completely out of the birth zone. I was defeated and tired. To me, it felt like I was giving up on my dream of having a beautiful home birth. And in a way I was. It was a disaster telling our doula and midwife team that I had to call it. Everyone suggested doing another check to see where I was before making the decision to transfer.
At 3 p.m., I did another check, check number four. I didn't know it was possible, but I had gone from six centimeters back to four centimeters. I was advised by the midwifery team to transfer to a hospital to deliver. I was both devastated that my home birth experience was over, but relieved to get confirmation that for whatever reason, my body wasn't making the progress I needed and I was working upstream.
The next 45 minutes was blurry chaos.
Hospital Birth and the Arrival of Bode
We had to decide which hospital we would be transferred to; the nearest hospital 10 minutes away, the women and children's hospital within the hospital system I worked for that was 20 minutes away, or to the home birth friendly hospital where my midwives could get me into a room which was an hour and a half away in afternoon traffic.
Ultimately, we chose the Home Birth Friendly Hospital because my main goal out of my birth experience was not to have to fight for the care that I wanted. After five days of laboring, I simply couldn't deal with other people's opinions about my choice. The hospital was notified, our already packed bag was repacked, clothes to travel in were put on - and my sweet, sweet husband had never actually packed his transfer bag.
At 3:30pm on Friday the 14th, we got in the car for a 120 minute drive while in active labor.
We got to the hospital safely, but the ride was a blur. I went fully back into the zone and was able to just focus on myself and get to the front entrance of the hospital. I was wheeled up to triage, sat there for a minute, and then was wheeled right into a room. I was given every medication option I could think of. I wasn't thrilled to be in the position of choosing medications, but with the guidance and empowerment from my doula, Lara, I decided to do pain meds that would allow me to rest and recover enough to get back to it.
I was able to rest - like deep, meaningful hours long rest. Something I hadn't done in several days. I got checked after the meds kicked in, check number five and was back to eight centimeters. After much back and forth and consultation with my team, I decided to get an epidural. The way the baby was sitting in my pelvis with his arm right up by his face.I felt that it was the only way I was going to get him out on my own and I needed the support of an epidural.
After I got the epidural, I slept and slept some more.
About 7.30 a.m., I decided I was ready to start pushing. My doula asked if I wanted to listen to music while I pushed. I spent my entire pregnancy curating two playlists for my birth. A chill birth and a party birth. Pretty self-explanatory. But to those who know me, I was surprised I wasn't remotely interested in hearing either of those. I thought I'd choose one of these two playlists, but I wound up going with my punk pop preteens playlist instead. It took me a bit of time to figure out how to actually push. Once I got it figured out, I tried every position humanly possible to get him out. Pushing on my back had never been a preference for me until I was in the room and no position was comfortable for me or my baby. Anything on my side would put him into immediate deceleration.
Shift changes were beginning and my new midwife was taking over, nother bummer in the saga since I had really loved the midwife who had been with me since my arrival. She literally just left me alone. She would come to see how I was doing pretty regularly, see if me and the baby were doing well, let me know how much time had passed since my water had broken, and that was it. It was my best case scenario for a hospital birth.
For me, the pushing phase felt like 30 minutes. In real time, it was four hours.
We reached a point where my midwife asked what my thoughts were on using a vacuum or forceps since I wasn't progressing and getting the baby through my pelvis with my pushing. She said she thought I could do it, but wanted me to start thinking about my next options. That was immediate alarm bells for me. I had been in labor for way too long, my water had been broken for way too long, and I was against using assistive devices for my labor. I was determined to get him out on my own and was losing my chance to do it.
After six days of laboring and four hours of pushing, I was able to see his head and knew I was right there. I took every ounce of me to get him out. But at 11:26 a.m. Bode quietly entered the world.
It was the beginning of everything.
The next part of our lives we had just begun right in front of us. But I would have never expected what the next few hours and days had in store for my new family.
The baby came out quickly once his shoulders were out and brought him right to my chest. He didn't cry right away, which I know happens and doesn't mean there's an emergency. I rubbed his back and talked to him to help him be present in his new world and get him breathing.
I distinctly remember looking at my husband for reassurance and he told me to just keep talking to him because he'd know I was his mom. After a short bit of time, which felt like an eternity, he cried and was breathing.
A nurse mentioned seeing meconium when he was suctioned, which would wind up being a topic of debate. The baby immediately did the breast crawl and latched. The relief was immediate. Holding on for so many hours and days finally dropped away. He was here, he was breathing, and I could finally rest. I was so hyper-focused on labor and on the baby. Once he was here, I completely forgot about the pediatrics team that had been on call. They'd entered the room when he started crowning due to the length of time that I had been in labor. We laid together in the bed with him on my chest, wrapped in blankets. The baby wasn't keeping his temperature up, so we kept him skin to skin to help him regulate it.
After what felt like 30 seconds, someone from the pediatric team said that they were going to take the baby to warm him up under some lights and do his measurements while I pushed the placenta out and got stitched up. I didn't think anything of it, but I asked for him to stay by my bedside and for my husband to stand there next to him. I pushed the placenta out with a few pushes, which was challenging after being so exhausting, but my midwife reminded me that this was going to be much easier. The midwife and student midwife determined a second degree tear and started stitching. He measured seven pounds, three ounces, and was 21 inches long.
My husband mentioned to me that a nurse from pediatrics was going to come and check on the baby's vitals. She came every 15 minutes to check on him, which in hindsight should have been a red flag knee that not all was well.
The charge nurse who had cared for me since I got there came back in and said she was staying after her shift till the baby came out and let me know that there was a room ready for me.
As my husband and our nurse packed all of our stuff up to leave, the pediatric nurse came back to check on the baby. I was put into a wheelchair and my nurse and PCT wheeled me down to our room while my husband stayed with the baby to get checked and would wheel him to our room when he was done. I was brought into my postpartum room, helped into the bed and had our room set up with all of our stuff. Our new postpartum nurse came in and introduced himself and got me settled in bed. I asked him if my husband knew where I was and wondered if he had maybe gotten lost. He said he would make sure he found the room.
As I was being wheeled out, Peds nurse asked my husband if our baby was born with any fatal bruising. My husband said no. She observed that his face was turning blue and took him along with my husband to the nursery. He got put under heat lamps strapped up to monitors and continuous oxygen. My husband texted me to tell me that they took him to the nursery to warm him up and give him some oxygen. For whatever reason, I wasn't super worried about it. My husband was there and the hospital staff was giving the baby a little extra support and they'd be back soon.
My husband came back to the room without our baby.
An Unexpected NICU Journey
He said the baby was having a hard time breathing, his butcher up, so they were going to keep him in the nursery until he was good enough to come to our room. Honestly, the rest was kind of a blur. All I remember was being wheeled down to the nursery, calm collected, and then opening the nursery door, absolutely losing it. The helplessness of the situation, the guilt of feeling like it was my fault he was there, the fear of not knowing what would happen next all hit me like a ton of bricks.
This wasn't how it was supposed to happen. I was supposed to be at home, in my bed with my new family, resting, being nourished and cared for by our midwives and doula, but was meeting my baby for the second time, hooked up to wires, unable to hold him or do much of anything but watch his chest work hard to breathe. I couldn't stop crying. I couldn't stop thinking and probably saying this isn't how it was supposed to happen.
The doctor who was overseeing the nursery said in short that he was being sustained on the oxygen, but it wasn't enough for what he needed, but had one last thing they would try to jumpstart him, what that was, I don't remember. She gave way more detailed information about what they were doing for him and his care and his prognosis, which is all over to me now.
While we visited him, we decided we would name him Bode. We joked about naming him Danger throughout my pregnancy and decided it would be a fitting middle name.
My husband and I went back to our old Jersey Mike’s sandwiches in a room and just waited for more news. The doctor came back and said Bode was not improving and told us that we had the option to transfer him to a level 3 NICU or we could wait it out and see what happens. We asked her for her opinion given that we had zero basis to be making this decision. She said if it were her child or grandchild that she would have him transferred now before it was truly emergent. We told her that's what we would do. She left to make arrangements for Bode to be transferred to the Women and Children's Hospital NICU in the city.
Then there was me.
I'd only just given birth a few hours ago and never actually had the chance to rest. But I had no plan to stay behind while my baby and husband were miles away in a new hospital. We were in communication with our midwife who delivered the baby and she was going to try to get me transferred to the new hospital so I could recover and be with Bode.
We were unable to successfully transfer me to the new hospital. So I made the decision to be discharged against medical advice. It was a no-brainer. I barely even thought about it. My husband went to the nursery as I waited for my nurse to come so she could sign the AMA paperwork. I had to wait for the charge nurse and I'm assuming nurse administrator to send the AMA. I had to explain why I was leaving for them to document. As they left, the charge nurse said she would have done the same exact thing. It was so reassuring that it was the right decision despite not having a plan or knowing what was next.
I was wheeled down to the nursery and the NICU transport team was already there getting set up to transport. Once I saw the transport incubator, reality set in. In this moment, I couldn't be everything my baby needed, and I had to trust that the transport team would get him there safely. We couldn't ride with him or even drive behind. We kissed him goodbye and watched the medical team detach each wire and sensor one by one as the alarm sounded, and hand him over to the transport team who put him in a secured but closed clear plastic box and reset his wires.
Watching him close the incubator, wheel him away, not knowing exactly when we would see him again, was probably the hardest thing I've ever done in my life.
We got our things from the room, got in the car, and drove 30 minutes to the new hospital. This ride was equally as terrible for me as it was the last time I was in the car on my way in labor. We parked our car and started our third part of the journey.
Our son spent some time in the NICU, a very short time, but still very traumatic. I don't know that I'll ever be sharing more about that, but thank you very much for listening and thanks for tuning in.
TL;DR
To celebrate my son's 2nd birthday, I'm finally sharing my birth story on the podcast!
After much hesitation, I'm finally sharing. It's hard, it's vulnerable, it's emotional, it's all the feelings.
Thank you for listening
How to connect with the guest:
IG: @themamamakingpodcast
Website: www.themamamakingpodcast.com
birth story, motherhood, home birth, NICU, labor experience, parenting, Jessica Lamb, Mama Making Podcast, maternal health, emotional journey
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