Luca Ian made his way into the world 9/12/18 at 1:32pm, weighing 7lbs 9oz and 19 3/4inches long. His due date was 9/9/18. My plan was to have an unmedicated, natural, vaginal birth. I took prenatal yoga, water aerobics, hospital birth classes, Hypnobirthing classes and ultimately switched providers and hospitals (went from an OB to Midwife) at 35 weeks to ensure I had the best odds of achieving my goal.

I went to the hospital on Tuesday the 11th to get checked in triage because I thought I could have a slow leak in my amniotic fluid. The nurses and midwives didn’t think so but still checked me. I was 5/6cm 80%-90% effaced and my results came back that I was ruptured so they admitted me and wouldn’t let me go home. All I wanted to do was go home and bounce on my yoga ball!

My husband had to pack everything up and meet me at the hospital, we weren’t expecting to be admitted. Everything was smooth from like 3pm to 1030pm; they checked me again and I was 6/7cm still 80-90% effaced. My contractions weren’t regular and they wanted to break my water more. I kept walking around the unit/hospital, bouncing on my yoga ball, I took a bath, I squatted, did pelvic tilts, I ate snacks and kept hydrated-anything I thought could help, I tried. I listened to my positive affirmations and relaxation recordings on repeat. I held off for another couple of hours and when they checked again with no additional change, I allowed them to break my water more at 12:30am. 1am the contractions started becoming more intense but were still irregular. They were telling me he was sunny side up because I was having back labor that was consistently intense. I didn’t want to believe it because I was always told he was head down and in a good position and I was nervous this could mean my plan wasn’t going to happen because of all the stories I have heard of people having back labor/babies not being in optimal position.

At 630am, I was (I felt) threatened with Pitocin by the night nurses; they admittedly came from big hospitals out of state that are more medically managed and have high volume of births. Since I had been ruptured since 9am that Tuesday morning, they wanted to get baby out before the 24 hour mark. I lost it. I started crying, I felt defeated and I felt like giving up. Then my morning nurse came in around 715/730am and was seriously amazing. She didn’t leave our side all day. She started putting me in different positions to try and move baby to a more favorable position and she got him to move somewhat and allow contractions to definitely pick up with regularity and intensity. There came a time where I felt like I couldn’t continue on-I was shaking and I was really uncomfortable. I remembered in that moment the article on the Transition phase that my Hypnobirthing teacher had sent me (and that I sent to my husband!). My husband gently encouraged me to keep going and talked about how close I was to meeting our son and how much I had already gone through. About 30 min after that, around 1030am, I was checked again and I was 9.5cm and almost 100% effaced, just a little lip of cervix left. I needed to hear that.

I re-centered myself and utilized my breathing techniques/low moaning until it was time. I had every intention of breathing baby down, but I switched to pushing because that’s what my body wanted to do. The intense feelings of needing to push before it was even time to push was such an indescribable experience. It really is your body taking over and I realized how I just had to let go. I started pushing around 12pm and my contractions really slowed down to happening every 5-6 minutes. I felt so tired or like I was out of body, in a trance; I was dozing off in between contractions.

I’m grateful for my nurse, who was experienced in natural births and Hypnobirthing, the OB tech who kept being the bedside cheerleader and my husband, who was the best coach, support/motivator of them all. I pushed for about 1.5 hours and had the mirror the whole time, which was such an amazing experience. I really was able to visualize my progress and that was a huge motivator. My midwife encouraged me to reach down and feel his head when he was crowning. I remember the highly emotional moment of him crowning and his shoulders being out and everyone excitedly telling me to reach down and pull him out. I didn’t register he was right there and out because I was so focused on the mirror! Being able to bring my baby to my chest is an indescribable feeling; such an emotionally intense moment.

I’m so grateful for my pregnancy and birth experience and I hope others can realize they too can have a positive experience or know that not all birth stories are “bad.”