Sent home AFTER my water broke !! 🤷🏻‍♀️🤬

Almost 4 months later and I am finally ready to tell my birth story.

So it’s not that my labor or sons birth was the worst of stories out there or even particularly scary compared to some that I’ve read, but for me, my labor, his birth and the two weeks leading up all put together was beautiful beyond words, but also traumatizing.

I felt my baby drop at about 36 weeks and began having contractions all the time. At my 37 week check I was dilated to a 2 and 50% effaced. At my 38 week check I was dilated to a 3 and 80% effaced. My doctor stripped my membranes, and although I continued to have contractions every day like I had been all week it didn’t seem to be really going anywhere. My doctor explained to me this was called slow labor and is common for a first baby, and that once it picks up I will know because it won’t slow down at all.

A few days go by and I wake up one morning and I just feel awful. I go about my day like normal just relaxing and trying not to focus on it. My mom and I go to Walmart to do some grocery shopping. And while we’re shopping I start to get really strong contractions. I don’t think much of. It just think it was ligaments stretching and aching from walking around so much. But I keep stopping what I’m doing or saying to hunch over and have them and so my mom is like hmmm 🧐, I think you’re in labor. Well, there is also a HUGE thunderstorm happening, and they say the barometric pressure changes can increase labor but I didn’t think it was true until I walked outside and my contractions became much stronger.

I still didn’t believe it was real labor so I told my mom I just wanted to go home and watch a movie until my husband gets off work (it was about 9 pm at this point and he would get off work at midnight)

I tried to sleep but couldn’t. He got if work about 2 hours late, gets home and wanted to take me in; but I told him and my mom I just need to sleep. My husband lays in bed with me playing a game on his phone while I rest. Little did I know he began timing my contractions based on how much pain I seemed to be in. He did this for about and hour and decided they were between 4 and 6 minutes apart and we need to go in.

We get to the hospital, the nurse checks me, says I’m still at 3 cm and 80% effaced. She wants me to walk for an hour and says either things will stop or pick up a lot. I walk for the hour and with every step my contractions seem to be getting more and more intense and painful. And by this point I know that it’s real, I know my baby is ready to come. So after the hour she checks me again and says there is no change and my contractions are still 4-6 minutes apart so she is going to send me home. I start crying because some instinct I had knew I just needed more time. I ask her if we can walk around for another hour and she tells me I just need to go home and relax and that I can come back if I need to. While she’s off to grab the discharge paperwork I have the worst contractions of the night. So big that my husband watching it on the monitor got wide eyed and asked I was okay. He said the monitor was showing the contraction upside down and so big it went right off the screen. As I go to answer him, I feel this huge POP from inside, I felt it so strong I could almost hear it. It literally felt like a balloon popped from inside me!

All of a sudden I have this huge urge to stand or squat, and my body began trembling and shaking uncontrollably. The nurse comes in and I tell her what I felt and that I think maybe it was my water breaking; but she said “it’s not your water, I don’t see any gushing” I requested she check me again and ask her, “but I thought your water can slowly leak?” She told that I just need to relax. To go home and take a warm bath, and that I can always come back later if things change.

I was bawling. My pain jumped to being so intense after the pop, and it seemed like I was suddenly having contractions every 2-3 minutes now. I was so nauseous and my instincts told me NOT to go home. But she handed me my discharge paperwork and walked me out of labor and delivery. In the parking lot people were trying to get me a wheelchair to be rushed inside and we had to explain we were going HOME.

5 minutes down the free way, I have a HUGE contraction that is so strong it makes me lightheaded and my water just GUSHES everywhere. We turn around and go straight back to the hospital. The same nurse seems annoyed to see me back already and after testing my water to make sure it is really amniotic fluid she gets me to a labor and delivery room and another nurse takes over, THANKGOD. After 15 minutes in this room I get the urge to push, the nurses check me and I’m already at a 7 almost 8.

I originally planned to have a natural labor. But the urge to push was so overwhelming that I was doing it involuntarily. They warned me pushing early could tear my cervix and create a long list of issues. So I opted to get an epidural to try and relax some.

I also was having back labor throughout all of this, and sitting still for the epidural was sooo hard. Through out my labor I did not have typical contractions either, I had “hyperactive contractions”. So usually you have a contraction then a rest then a contraction. I would have a huge contraction, then a big contraction then a huge contraction, back to back with no rest period.

An hour after getting the epidural and it was time to push. I was doing great at this point and thought it wouldn’t be long before having my little prince. They wanted to give me pitocin to even my contractions out and make them into a pattern with rest times. But the baby’s heart rate and oxygen level kept dropping so they weren’t able to do that and put me on oxygen instead. They also directed me to push for every other contraction to give myself rest times even if my body wasn’t. I would push and see his head and by the next ‘pushing contraction’ he would have retracted. Again and again for 3 hours.

Finally the doctor tells me that if the baby isn’t out in the next ten minutes we have to look at other options. So during those next 3 contractions I just push with everything in me and his head is all the way out 🤗

I had this dream of reaching down and pulling him out once his shoulders were free and placing him on my own chest. My doctor was supportive. But once his shoulders were free and I reached down and grabbed him something just didn’t feel right. As I grabbed him and pulled I already hear him crying but the cord hasn’t been cut so I was confused. Then suddenly my placenta plummets out along with him, falls to the floor and snaps his cord. Blood EVERYWHERE. The doctor and nurses all yelling and swarming around urgently. They clamped his cord and let me put him on my chest and it was such a wonderful feeling. But I still didn’t understand why there was so much blood and chaos. I was crying and just kept asking if he was okay. Turns out he had a short umbilical cord. So every time he tried to descend down he wouldn’t have the length to continue; this was the cause for my slow labor, the cause of his low heart rate/oxygen, the cause for it taking so many hours of pushing.

Luckily he is healthy, and had no issues as a result and I luckily didn’t have any excessive bleeding etc.

The doctor said me getting the epidural probably saved both of our lives, because had things continued to progress at the rate they were the baby would have likely been in great distress and I would have likely had hemorrhaging.

He was born 3:05 pm on May 28, 6 lbs 9.5 oz 20.25 in long at 38 weeks 6 days

Sorry this is so long. Thankyou for reading if you made it this far ❤️

I just want to say ladies always trust your instincts, even if that means speaking up when you disagree with medical staff, even if it means ditching your birth plan, or any other scenarios that occur, TRUST your body and your baby to KNOW what no one else can.

Also shoutout to my husband! I literally would not have made it through without my husband and his encouragement support and love! He stills tells me almost daily how amazing, strong and beautiful I am for having made it through birth and how proud he is of me for bringing our little guy into this world ❤️❤️

Here is my son at birth

Here is a picture of him now at almost 4 months ( over 15 lbs and 25.25 inches)

**Sterling wanted me to tell you how appreciative we are of all your support ! ☺️