It’s finally my turn to share the birth story of my second child, my little girl Elle! I went in for an appt at 42 weeks and we decided to induce due to reduced movement. I was pretty bummed bc I’ve had Pitocin before and it was the devil, but with already being 3 cm dilated and 70% effaced I was hopeful it could be a low dosage, and I could still have the unmedicated birth I had in mind. They got everything started and I was feeling contractions, but they didn’t get really bad until the dosage was at 6/10. I have reallyyyyyy bad back labors, so I pretty much thought I was gonna die 😂 I spent most of my time on all fours on the bed or the floor trying to be strong. I was rolling with the contractions but they took a turn about 2 hours in, and I was begging for the epidural. I had them check me just to see if I was close since I was in so much back pain, but I was still at 5 cm although 100% effaced. Feeling defeated but also damn excited for relief, I impatiently waited for the anesthesiologist who took his dear sweet time. He finally arrived 30 minutes later and got started. Now listen. I’ve sat through an epidural during contractions before with my first. But these contractions were literally on another level. It was physically impossible to sit still. I’m hot as hell, sweating like a whore in church, screaming profanities, and quite literally begging someone to help me. While he’s trying to do the damn thing, I lose my mucus plug (still sitting on the edge of the bed at this point). A few more contractions right on top of another and I’m moving so much he tells me he just can’t do it. I AM DEVASTATED. Cannot go on lol. So he tells me if I can give him 2 minutes of sitting still he can do it. So I’m like BET. I got this. I found myself trying to get through the next contraction by staring at a piece of fuzz on the nurses shirt that I was bear hugging for relief 😂 Then my water breaks. And all hell broke loose. There was no sitting still. I feel the urge to push, so I tell my nurses who look at me probably thinking “yeah right, we just checked you 30 min ago and you were only 5 cm.” The anesthesiologist has yet to get the epidural in, so he backs away and I fling myself onto my back so I can push. I’m pushing and screaming at this point, asking the nurses what’s going on and if anything is coming out. They say not yet, but one push and her head is out. Another couple pushes and out comes the rest of her. I literally went from 5-10 cm in less than an hour and was obviously going through transition while trying to do the epidural. You know those movies where the woman is screaming like a crazy person giving birth, yeah that was me 🤷‍♀️ I was pretty quiet until I started pushing, then it just came out. Pushing felt good though, so I think the screams were more because I was terrified and couldn’t believe this was happening so fast. I don’t recall any ring of fire either! But out she came, and the best part was no tearing! 👏 As I was pushing I was yelling “she’s tearing me apart”, but turns out she didn’t lol. I don’t mean for this to scare anyone, as I’m sure my story is not the norm. It was just so wild and I definitely don’t wanna do it again 😂 Also after she was delivered and they laid her on me, I couldn’t open my eyes. I just kept saying “omg I can’t look at her, I just can’t.” I think I was just so overwhelmed with the whole ordeal I just needed a minute lol. I soon opened my eyes and it was all worth it 💕 Sweet baby Elle, born at 3:17 am, only 5 hours after starting the inducing process, weighing 8.4 beautiful pounds at 42 weeks. I’d do it all over again in a heartbeat, but this time with an epidural 😂