Finally my turn! (Had to say it since everyone does 😂🤗)

I had my 40 week appointment on my due date 5/2. I was hoping my doctor would be willing to induce me that day since I had been to L&D; twice within the last 2 weeks because I felt like my baby’s movement had decreased. Unfortunately she had no plans on doing that 🙄 (at my hospital you have to wait until you are at least 1 week past your due date). When I first got there the MA told me my induction was scheduled for 5/10. I’m sure it was the hormones because I got so sad lol. I asked her and the doctor at two different times if it could be changed to 5/9 since that was exactly 1 week. Of course they both looked at me crazy because it was only a 1 day difference 😂🤷🏽‍♀️ but 5/9 was booked so I had no choice but to keep the 5/10 date. At my appt my doctor didn’t go all the way to my cervix so couldn’t tell me how dilated I was 🙄 but told me I was at station -1. The Sunday before 4/29 I was checked at L&D; and was only 1cm 50% effaced and at station -2. So the only thing I knew was the baby moved down a little. I left the appointment so deflated and felt I would be pregnant forever (lol again the hormones).

The next day I had a pregnancy photo shoot which definitely brought my spirits up. I definitely waited until the last minute to do one so it was kind of a good thing my baby was late lol.

Now idk if this made a difference but the next night I ate a kiwi and did nipple stimulation on one nipple for 1 minute maybe less because I didn’t like it lol.

Ok so the next day Saturday 5/5 I was 40 + 3. I woke up that morning and said “I’m having this baby today!” I actually read someone’s birth story on here before and she said the same thing the day she had her baby so I figured I’d give it a try 😂.

From the time I got up I was having contractions about 15/20 minutes apart. I’ve been having inconsistent contractions for a while now so I didn’t think too much of it. Around 11am my contractions got to about 9/10 minutes apart so I decided to do the pregnancy baby dance. I only did that for about 15 minutes because those squats and lunges had me TIRED 😂.

A little after that I took my dog on a little walk. At 1:11pm I started using a contraction timer to officially time them because they were getting more intense and closer together. They were coming around 6 to 8 minutes apart for the next hour. My mom got to my house around 2 to walk some more but I didn’t think I could cause the contractions were getting more intense. So instead we went and got food and came back to my house. I ate as best as I could but the pain was making it hard to eat. So around 3:40pm I decided I’ll lay down for a while before calling L&D; and mom went home to get some rest. At this point my contractions were about 3 to 5 minutes apart. I laid down for maybe 10 minutes before I couldn’t really take it anymore. So I hopped in the shower. After I got out the shower I called L&D; at 4:13pm and they told me to come in. I told my boyfriend it was time to go but it was 2 minutes left of a basketball game so I told him we can wait until it was over lol. I was so worried I wouldn’t be dilated enough I didn’t mind waiting a little before going in.

We got to L&D; a little after 5pm. They put me on the monitors and said my contractions were about 3 minutes apart lasting 90 seconds. They checked me around 545 and said I was 6cm dilated! My boyfriend called my mom and told her she needed to come now. I was doing so good handling the pain but once my mom came in I started crying 😩😂 only for a second though!

The nurse came to ask me what type of pain control I wanted so I told her I want the epidural and anything in between that I could get while I was waiting lol.

Now a quick backstory...I have a legion in my spinal cord. So my doctor had been messaging the anesthesiology department for the past month so they can look at my chart to confirm if I could get the epidural or not so I can know in advance and be prepared. Of course they never got back to us. So the 2 anesthesiologists there at the time looked over my chart and reached out to their manager because they didn’t feel comfortable giving me the epidural. The manager said if I really wanted one I could get an epidural but absolutely could not have a spinal tap (so if I had to get a c-section they would have to put me to sleep). The problem was that I would have had to accept the fact that it was a chance they could go too far with the epidural (which would be like a spinal tap if they went too far) and that would most likely had paralyzed me. So I decided to not to get it and asked for a morphine PCA.

In the meantime they gave me a dose of fentanyl which took the edge off for about 30 minutes. I had to wait another 30 minutes to get another dose but that second dose didn’t help at all. My contractions were so intense I was dang near climbing up the bed lol. Everyone was saying how I was doing so good but I didn’t feel like it lol. I wasn’t screaming or going too crazy but I did cuss a little with each contraction 😬.

They finally moved us to the delivery room and checked me and I was at 9cm! By the time I should have been able to have the 3rd dose of fentanyl they told me no because I would be pushing soon 😒. They then broke my water (after my mom convinced me to let them). I was so worried that the pain would be worse after they broke my water and it would take me forever to get from 9cm to 10cm lol. They checked me a little bit later and I was at 9.5 cm and probably 5 minutes later I was at 10cm. Of course they came with the PCA when it was time to start pushing so I couldn’t get it and had to accept I would be pushing her out naturally.

I went from 6cm to 10cm within 3 hours. After about an hour of pushing, an episiotomy, and 2nd degree tear 😣 my beautiful baby girl was born at 9:17pm weighing 7 pounds 7 ounces and 20 inches long 😊.

Now the “ring of fire” and that STRONG urge to push are REAL! But in all honesty the whole labor wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be and the contractions didn’t hurt as bad when I was pushing. I think because I was so scared of labor to begin with and the fact that it went by so fast definitely helped. Now what I feel no one ever talks about is the after birth healing. It completely sucks.

I honestly felt like I was pushing my baby out of my butt (which I yelled out a few times during labor 🤗) and I ended up with hemorrhoids (TMI sorry). I swear the hemorrhoids are more painful than the stitches and trust me those are terrible too. It hurts to sit. I’m super swollen down there. And the pads are absolutely terrible. I even went to the doctors a few days after I got released to check on everything down there because I felt so raw. I keep getting told I will feel much better after 2 weeks so I’m definitely counting down the days. I will say it is getting better as the days go by but it just feels like it’s taking forever. After birth (for me at least) is dang near worse than labor because the pain/irritation lasts for weeks 😩. Maybe if I didn’t have the episiotomy, tear, and hemorrhoids the healing wouldn’t be so bad 🤷🏽‍♀️. But anywho what I will say is my baby girl is worth it and I am so blessed to have her 💞.

If you made it this far enjoy some pics of my baby girl. My mom literally has all the pictures from the hospital but here’s a couple from after we got home.