finally got this all written down. get comfy, it's long. as usual.
I once had a co-worker who said that all her babies' birth experiences reflected their personalities. Her daughter came early and turned out to be a very eager and prompt person, her son wouldn't come out and he ended up with a mean stubborn streak. . .you get the idea.
I've thought about this with my own kids and wondered how I could translate their births into personality traits that they have.
McKay had to be helped out with forceps. It's no secret that ever since he was a tiny baby that McKay has liked adults (meaning me) to be involved in everything he does. He didn't want to be born on his own, he doesn't want to play on his own. Although, with McKay, the experience was pretty much painless and very exciting/nerve wracking. McKay has such a pleasant personality and if you know him you know that his excitement about life and everything in it is almost tangible. Maybe I'm stretching here. . .lets move on.
Ellery's birth was nearly perfect. My water broke twenty minutes after Brian asked me to have the baby that day. I had cleaned my house and written in my pregnancy journal that I was ready for her to come the night before. Labor was easy, thanks to my epidural. There was one point where I was ready to push, my epidural had worn off and I was waiting for the doctor to make it back to the hospital for the delivery- it hurt. . .but only for a few minutes, until I got another dose of the epidural. Then, it was back to being perfect. I didn't have to push, she just came on her own. It was overall a very pleasant experience. My Elle, overall is a very pleasant little girl. She is almost all the way sweet, but has a little bit of sass to keep me on my toes.
I shared these comparisons with Brian shortly after Layla was born.
Then I continued, "And then Layla. . ."
"What? Came like a bat out of hell?" he replied.
Well. Not exactly the words I had in mind, but, in a way, yes.
* * * * *
The morning of August 24th came very early for me. Mild contractions that must have come on in the night woke me up before six. I laid in bed timing them on our bedroom clock. Realizing they were coming every six minutes I decided there was no way I could fall back to sleep.
I went downstairs. The house was quiet. I, as was very typical during this pregnancy, was famished and decided that if this was my last day being pregnant then I was going to eat blueberry eggo waffles for breakfast. Three of them. Loaded with syrup. Something I normally would never eat for breakfast. They were fantastic.
I then made my way to the couch and began writing down my contractions. Five minutes. Six minutes. Eight minutes. Five minutes. Five minutes.
I had never experienced this before- my body going into labor in it's own. With both McKay and Ellery my water broke and nothing happened. Induction was necessary. This was different. It was exciting, yet scary to me. Contractions kept coming, mostly five minutes apart, and not at all painful. I could feel them, yes, but I wouldn't say they hurt.
I decided to tell Brian the news. He had a million things to do, as it was his last week of school before his month-long break. Finals, projects, classes, training. It was a busy week. Upon hearing about my condition he got right to work doing whatever was on the top of his list. Brian's mom decided to get in the car and drive to Oregon by herself. I decided to go on a walk with the kids to see if I could get things moving along.
We walked to the duck pond. It's not very far. We went on to the frog pond to see the tadpoles. Just a bit further. I thought I might die. I was sweating profusely and had to sit down on the side of the road. I felt weak. I felt shaky. Somehow we all made it back alive and my body was telling me to eat. EAT! It was a blood sugar thing, I'm sure. Nothing a little Cinnamon Toast Crunch can't cure. Don't judge- it was my last day!
After eating and laying down for awhile, I got a boost of energy. My contractions were still coming and I was still timing. Not like clock-work, but fairly regular. Not painful, but getting stronger. It was then that I realized that McKay's birthday was in four days and I had done nothing. We had planned on a party at Chuck E. Cheese, but friends hadn't even been invited yet. The kids and I took a trip to the dollar store where I bought invitations and let McKay pick out items for the goody bags. He loved this and didn't even realize that his mom had put hardly any thought or preparation into his party. I spent the afternoon putting together the goody bags and delivering the invitations. This took a good couple hours, and by the time I delivered the last one, I was positive that I was in labor and that baby was on her way.
By six o'clock my contractions were still five minutes apart and getting stronger and stronger. We went to Subway for dinner and Brian was afraid I was going to have the baby in the booth. . .mostly because he's totally paranoid. After we ate I decided we should probably go to the hospital and just then my friend called and asked if we needed someone to watch the kids. I felt so much relief. I was dreading asking someone to watch them, although many sweet friends had offered to. It was just hard for me to ask. I was so glad she called and made it easy on me. We dropped the kids off and headed to the hospital.
By this point they were getting painful and Brian was pretty certain that I was going to have the baby in the car. This was our first time at this and we had no idea what we were doing. I thought I would like the new experience, but I just kept thinking how annoying it was to not know if we should be going to the hospital or not. When your water breaks, there's no questions- you just go. With contractions it's a guessing game. I didn't like playing the game at all.
We got up to the triage room where they hooked me up to the monitor to check my contractions. And wouldn't you know it, they completely stopped. Of course they did. I pretty much only had one while being monitored. I wanted to die. It was pretty humiliating. The nurses looked at me like, "Yeah right- you're in labor." They gave me the option to stay and walk around for a couple hours (what? hours???) or go home. It was easy for me to decide. Go home. The couch was calling my name. We picked up the kids, which was totally embarrassing, and I planted myself on the couch once they were in bed.
Of course as soon as we left the hospital things picked up again. I slept and "labored' until Brian's mom walked through the door at ten o'clock. She had driven thirteen hours in one day alone. She is an angel. It was such a relief for her to be there to watch the kids. Huge relief! We visited for awhile and then headed up to bed.
I am a religious face washer, but that night I contemplated leaving my makeup on. "There will be pictures," I thought. But comfort soon took over my vanity and I scrubbed whatever beauty I had left down the drain. Regret. You'll see. . .
Brian says I slept between contractions. It didn't seem like it. They were painful. They were strong. He could tell when I was having them because my breathing would change. They were coming and coming and coming. I laid there as long as I could clutching my boyfriend (aka, body pillow), but when I started feeling them in my lower back, I knew it was time to go.
I got up. The pain increased immediately. It hurt so much that I didn't even brush my hair or look in the mirror. It was hard to walk to the car. The pain was more intense now. Urgent. I told Brian to hurry. I arched my back through every contraction and could hardly get comfortable before another one came. It was one-thirty in the morning. The freeway was empty, but it seemed like it took forever to get there. It was on the freeway where I began to get extremely irritated. Why on earth did I have to be in so much pain before going to the hospital. I had waited at home, enduring countless contractions, for fear of being sent home again. And now the pain was getting to be too much. How much pain does a girl have to be in to get an epidural? I was annoyed. I was hurting.
We finally arrived at the front door of the hospital. There were two security guards sitting at the entrance. Brian dropped me off and went to park the car. I can't even begin to tell you the kind of walk I was doing, but I will say that I thought about being embarrassed that the security guards were watching me, but then decided that I didn't care. I laid down on a bench right beside them and waited for Brian. Who even knows if I was making noises as I laid there. The security guards know, that's who.
Sweet Brian ran into the hospital and held my hand as we made the loooong walk to the third floor. Here's what I'm thinking: "I cannot believe that people have to be in this much pain before coming to the hospital. I hate this. I need drugs."
We went through all the motions of getting to the triage room again. This time I'm pretty sure they knew I was in real labor because I was walking at a turtle's pace. Once in the room I asked for an epidural. "We need to check you first," is what they told me. Annoyed. They checked me. I was sure I was a nine. I was a four. A four?! I had progressed half a centimeter since they checked me earlier that day? Really, really annoyed. This mostly was taken out on the nurse who started my iv. She was being snitty with me when I repeatedly asked when I could get an epidural. (Some
Brian may argue that she was not being snitty with me. Who are you going to believe?) I may or may not have been a little snitty back. I was just so frustrated that I had not dialated at all, yet was still in so much pain. How much worse could it get? How much longer would it be?
They told me that the CRNA would be paged and I would get the epidural soon. "Can he just meet me in the room, please?" No. "But I think I'm going to die." He will get there as soon as he has all the paperwork. "I'm dying."
Thankfully they noticed that I would not be able to walk to the delivery room and they wheeled me on down. I said goodbye to snitty nurse and hello to cute Lisa, who reminded me of cute Jana who was my nurse with my other two. I somehow managed to make it onto the bed. I don't know how far apart my contractions were at this point, but I do know that I could not relax one bit between them. My back was arched the whole time and I couldn't even move to change to adjust myself on the bed, even though I wanted to get in a more comfortable position. Basically I was writhing around on the bed but doing it without being able to move most of my body. It probably takes talent to do that. "Please get me an epidural. Please?"
With each contraction I couldn't imagine them getting worse. Then, all of the sudden, my water broke. Sweet Lisa was out of the room and I looked at Brian with a panic in my eyes like he's never seen before. You see, I know that when your water breaks it means that contractions become harder and stronger. I
could not take anything worse than what I was already experiencing. Plus, I was at a four, remember?
Lisa came back into the room. I told her my water broke. She calmly walked over to a cupboard and got a new sheet and explained that she would swap out the wet sheet with a clean one. I wanted to tell her that I didn't care about the stupid sheet and that there was no way on earth that my body could physically move enough to replace it. (I'm really not this mean, but, well, you understand. Don't you?)
Brian was pretty much mute at this point. He was holding my hand. . .maybe. . .but I really wasn't even paying attention to him. He says he became mute because he could tell I was just about at my breaking point and that at any moment he was afraid I would lose it. Best to be quiet. Smart man.
Just as Lisa was about to tug the old sheet out from under me and just as I really was about to lose it I felt something. Someone. "The baby's coming. She's right there." I was beyond panicked. I was completely terrified. This was not supposed to happen. I did not sign up for this pain. I was first in line on the yes-i-want-an-epidural list. My husband is training to be an anesthesia provider. I am a supporter of anesthesia! I realized it was not to be. No epidural for me. This baby was coming out and I was going to feel every little bit of it.
Sweet Lisa was not alarmed at all and calmly said, "Okay, let me just check you." . . ."Okay. You're a ten." The panic in her voice was hard to hide.
Lisa asked Brian to push the emergency button. I asked if I could scream. She said I could do whatever I want. I asked Brian after if I did scream and he said no. I guess I just needed to know it was an option. She started running around the room gathering things. Putting on one glove. Trying for the other. . .
"I'm so sorry. But I have to push her out. I'm pushing her out. I have to. I can't help it. She's coming. . ." Lisa began yelling for help. I was beyond panicked.
So here's the thing. I knew I should have waited until Lisa was ready. I mean, at least until she had both gloves on and all. But there was nothing I could do about it. Nothing. It was time to push and Lisa couldn't have stopped me if she'd put a gun to my head. It was just happening. I felt bad for Lisa.
And then she was out. Lisa caught her with her gloved hand. The room soon filled with people answering her call. It was that fast. I went from a four to a ten in twenty minutes. She was born less than thirty minutes after arriving at the hospital. After my water broke she was born within two contractions. They immediately placed her on my stomach.
All of the sudden there was this baby. Wait. What? To say I was in shock is putting it mildly. I kept repeating, "Oh my gosh. I can't believe that just happened." over and over again. All the people in the room were bustling around and I was lying there, relishing in the relief that came immediately after she was out. Sweet relief. Brian picked up the camera.
You might be thinking, "Sarah, that is not your best photo." And you'd be totally right. But it's my blog and I can put ugly pictures of myself on here if I want to. And for some reason I just want to. Mostly because I think you can see exactly what I was feeling by looking at my expression. That was a smile. I was smiling there. There are even worse pictures. . .believe me. You should see my expression when I wasn't posing for a picture. Yikes!
When McKay and Ellery were born the doctor held up the baby and then they were whisked away to be poked, cleaned and weighed. But there she was. Placed in my arms just seconds after taking her first breath, where she stayed for over thirty minutes. Looking back I wish I could have enjoyed those precious first minutes with her a little more. But I was in shock. . .traumatized, really. I remember laying there putting my hands on her tiny body but not really even being able to register that she was out. It was surreal. I wish I could have experienced that with a clearer mind.
My mom and two of my sisters have each had some of their children naturally. Krista all four of hers. I had never planned on it. Part of me wondered if I could do it and kind of wished I could experience that, but I knew I would never actually do it. Or choose to do it, rather. I never once imagined that I wouldn't even have a choice.
One of my biggest regrets about Layla's birth is that I was so preoccupied giving birth and all that I just could not direct Brian in the picture taking department. He's a wonderful man, but lets be honest- photography is not his biggest strength. I wish I could go back and give him a pep talk before it all happened about the importance of photographs in a situation like this. But there wasn't even time for that. And to be fair, he was pretty involved in the process as well.
But trust me- she was absolutely beautiful. And quite honestly, she was worth every single horrendous contraction. No amount of pain could come close to the happiness she brings me.
Isn't birth a beautiful thing? Even when it's horrible.
Layla Ann Matthews
August 25, 2010
2:20 a.m.
