On Tuesday night (19th) I had a significant amount of bright red discharge and had a small heart attack. Marched over to labor an delivery and they told me it was not a big deal - and that I was 3cm dilated but not in labor.

I went home and got a backache. Went to sleep around 3am, and by 5am I was waking up every 10 minutes with back pain. By 4:30 that afternoon (20th) I started timing them in case they were contractions. The doctor said they weren’t. I had no belly tightening, no pelvis pain, and the app was timing them irregularly, between 15 minutes and 2 minutes apart.

I went to take a shower and couldn’t stand up from the pain. I told my husband we were going back to labor and delivery, because this may not be labor, but SOMETHING is wrong.

They checked me again and found I was still 3cm, but I was 90% effaced and my back pain.. was contractions! Turns out I had ONLY back labor - which basically felt like someone stabbing your back and hip bones with a searing hot knife. I told the nurse I felt like a big baby for complaining - but she said back labor is the most painful labor and most women come in near tears when it happens. I felt better, especially because they agreed to admit me since I turned 39 weeks that day.

I had progressed to a 4cm naturally, but the pain was so intense that I was throwing up with contractions. I did not hesitate to call the anesthesiologist. Ladies - GET THE EPIDURAL! Lol that thing saved my life. I got the epi. around 7:30pm.

My epidural was so great. It numbed enough that I felt no pain, but I could still “feel” the contractions. I could feel my muscles tightening but it didn’t hurt. My husband and I watched tv and joked like we were just hanging out on a Friday night 😂

** Side note, I had surgery on my cervix a few years back with significant scar tissue, so we were afraid I wouldn’t dilated at all. Much to our surprise.. by midnight I was 10cm dilated. We couldn’t believe it! In 6 hours I had dilated and baby was at 1 station and I was just watching tv 😳

Second hurdle we anticipated, my baby had a big, big head. 97th percentile. So we were again concerned that a vaginal birth may not be possible. But it’s true ladies.. most of the time your body CAN do anything! We could see the hair on his head, crowning, when he got stuck.

I pushed for almost 2 hours! At this point it was 2:30am and my doctor was just arriving to assist the nurse. He watched his head as I pushed one time, and said he wanted to use the vacuum. I just looked up at him and said “do you have to cut me to use it?” And he said “actually, I don’t think I do. Is it okay if we try?” I was so tired at this point I just said hell yeah let’s vacuum this baby out!

He put the vacuum on his head and twisted a little bit to the side and he basically fell out. Apparently his brow was stuck behind my pubic bone. And his cord was in the way as well. So with two pushes and the vacuum, my beautiful baby boy was born. He was pretty blue and wouldn’t cry right away, so they took him for a second and I was so relieved to hear him scream. I don’t know if this had to do with his cord, they didn’t tell me. I was just yelling at my husband to go follow the baby 😂 I did have an internal, first degree tear and a LOT of swelling from pushing for so long. But two days later and I already feel 50% normal. My doctor said he gave me stitches because of the location of the tear.

They estimated me to have a 9.5 pound baby, my son was born at 8lb 6oz, but 22.5 inches long! He’s a big, skinny baby! We love him to pieces and already feel like he’s been with us a lifetime. It hasn’t even been 48 hours 💙

Everyone, meet Arlo!

Hack: They came to take those expensive hospital photos in our room. So I let the girl take the photos, told her I wasn’t buying any after, and then had her leave the baby since he was posed sleeping and I didn’t want to disturb him. Then I snapped my own photo with my iPhone for free! 😝😝