TW ⚠️: semi traumatic birth

I really want to share my birth story. This is my second birth and I feel like no ones very interested in hearing it ☹️😂 my birth was very fast and can be traumatic to some so please don’t keep reading if you’re very stressed about giving birth, especially if it’s your first time! This is your final warning 😂

So I’ll start off by saying that I’m taking this second pregnancy as a warning from my body that it does not like carrying babies. I had confirmed preeclampsia with my first and was induced at 37 weeks and he was born 2 days later. This pregnancy I didn’t have preeclampsia but my blood pressure started to skyrocket, so since I was starting to show signs of following the same trend, they decided to induce me again at 37w 2d. He was born the next day. No more babies! 😅

So, blood pressure started to go up and I was scheduled for an induction on Sunday July 4th at 7:30pm. I wanted to go with the balloon because with my first I had a bad reaction to the cervidil. I had contractions back to back with my first and wanted to avoid it. Once I was checked I was told it was not possible as I wasn’t dilated evenly through my cervix (it was 1cm dilated at the bottom but nearly closed towards the end) so cervidil was the only option given to me. He inserted it and off I went to antepartum.

Around 2am I started to feel contractions and surprisingly they were normal! Which made me so relieved. They were however pretty intense so they offered morphine mixed with gravol to help me get some sleep. While waiting for the morphine and gravol to kick in I started to do little laps in my room (due to covid we weren’t allowed to walk around out in the antepartum/labour department) to take my mind off of the pain I started talking to my little guy, if anyone came by the door they probably thought I was a lunatic 😂 I kept telling him how much more room he would have out here in the world and to not take as long as his brother did to come into the world, told him all about our little family waiting to greet him, his grandparents, aunts and uncles, our pets at home, etc. Eventually I started to feel really groggy and decided it was best to go to bed.

It was THE BEST sleep I ever had in a long time 😂 between being so pregnant, hip and pelvic pain, only being able to sleep on my side and dealing with a toddler, it was heaven on earth.

Then the contractions started to come back 😩 the nurse I had that morning was great, she brought me in a ball and I went to town bouncing on that thing. I was determined for this baby to be out that day! Used this app to track my contractions and oh boy were they close. So I’m bouncing, my fiancé is sleeping on the bed cause the poor thing has got himself stressed and so much anxiety he’s made himself nauseous (men go through a lot too!) so I wanted him to get as much rest as possible as well.

Then I felt what seemed to be a little flick, I stopped and sat there for a minute and questioned if my water had just broke. I slowly go to stand up and a gush of water comes out. Me sitting on the ball kept my water from coming out 😂 so I’m standing there shocked and so excited! I calmly say my fiancé’s name like 4 times and he comes out of a dead sleep and starts rushing when I told him my water broke. “Should i call the nurse?” Uhm, yes love, call the nurse.

My water broke around 10:50am. I get back into bed and I’m lying there waiting for my nurse and doctor to come back in, they come back in and the doctor removed the cervidil. As I’m lying there I’m noticing that my contractions are starting to get really intense, I start taking more deep breaths, blowing out hard. They’re there doing their thing, I’m told I’m about 3cm. So I’m like okay cool, I’ll probably have a evening baby or early tomorrow morning, it’s looking like the same timeline as my first. At this point I’m focused on getting through the pain and getting that epidural. Keep in mind, this is my second baby.

Another nurse comes in and says they’re going to move me over to labour and delivery and when my current contraction is over to start and walk over. I’m lying there like tf you mean I gotta walk over 😂 my contraction stops and I quickly get up and start trekking over to my labour and delivery room, I had to stop twice due to really, REALLY strong contractions.

I get to my bed and I literally never opened my eyes again. The pain was UNREAL and again, I had a bad reaction to the cervidil, I was met with yet again, contractions after contractions with damn near no breaks in between. They gave me laughing gas which helped a little at first and the one nurse started asking me questions about how I wanted my I.v. Inserted and at that point I was like “I don’t care, just put it in”. Didn’t even feel or was aware she put it in. By now I’m making what I believe to be animalistic sounds cause my god, THE PAIN 😂

From the beginning I told my nurses and doctors I wanted the epidural, not only for the pain but to also help my blood pressure. During all this pain it felt like the anesthesiologist took FOREVER. He finally gets in there, starts giving me the run down on the epidural and the risks, getting my permission and I’m just quickly giving out yes and no’s every breath I can get. Like idgaf just give me the drugs! 😂 so he starts and I feel a pinch and after that nothing, by this point I’m now FIGHTING my body to not push, the nurses sound like they’re getting mad at me because I keep tensing up, I stop breathing and they’re getting stern and telling me to breathe and to relax, but what they didn’t realize was my contractions were non stop. I managed to build up enough breath to tell them “I’m fighting my body to push!” I hear chatter and then they tell me to roll onto my back, I refuse, at the point I’m done being touched, they check me and next thing I know I’m being told to push, which is hilarious cause I don’t recall pushing once, my body did it all for me.

I go into some weird trance, all the while saying no over and over because I now just realized I’m pushing out a baby with NO DRUGS. ( the anesthesiologist stabbed me 5 times and each time he said to his student he wasn’t confident in the placement) I don’t remember a whole lot after, I do remember my fiancé grabbing my hand and telling me I need to put my hands behind my legs, which I physically could NOT do. Which at that point they put my feet on the stirrups and I have my fiancé and nurses helping me.

I’m feeling the contractions, I’m feeling my body forcing my son out of my body, I’m feeling the ring of fire and I feel and open my eyes for a split second to see a doctor who is NOT my original delivery doctor literally reefing down on my nether regions. All that pain built up and then that glorious release when our son was finally born into this world. It’s absolutely insane how one second you’re in so much pain from labour to damn near nothing the moment they’re out.

I notice my fiancé is now being told to sit down and I’m blissfully unaware. It turns out our sons heart rate was dropping below 70 and a chief doctor took over and got him out quickly by having both her hands inside me to push my cervix back over our sons head. When he came out, he had the umbilical cord wrapped around his neck 3 times and once around his body (which isn’t a shock for how much he moved inside of me!) Once my fiancé saw this, it caused his heart to drop and blood drain from his head because he thought we had lost our son, they got him to cut the umbilical cord, nurses noticed quickly my fiancé didn’t look too good and got him to sit. But our son was completely fine and healthy.

When I got into the labour and delivery room it was past 11am and I was only 4cm dilated, in amongst all that time being in pain and them checking me again I went full 10cm dilated in 45 minutes and had given birth. I guess I stressed out my original doctor that much she came in to see us after and told me that I took 5 years off her life 😂 I came out with one stitch and a first degree tear. Which I’m absolutely blown away that’s all it was. I guess they really do say birth without drugs is best.

Currently my son is now 2 weeks old today and it’s been a little struggle navigating with a newborn and a toddler but I’m slowly finding each day easier and more and more of a routine. I also want to put it out there that your health after birth is equally important. I was back in the hospital the next day due to my blood pressure going up to 142/108. Preeclampsia is still a very real thing after birth and can happen up to 3 weeks after. So currently I’m on blood pressure pills, which sucks, but gotta be healthy for my boys.

So remember to take care of yourselves even after birth! So, that’s my birth story in a nut shell, at least from my experience and memory, my fiancé has a whole other side to it from what I’ve been told. Birth is a crazy, wonderful thing eh? 😅