If you had told me when I woke up that morning that I would be holding my son less than twenty-four hours later, I wouldn’t have believed it, though I probably would have hugged you for thinking such a lovely thought.
He wasn’t going to come early, he just wasn’t. Being a first-time
mom & having my own mama go past her due date with her children more than
once (and only having her “early” babies one or two days ahead of schedule), I
didn’t see it happening. I still had five days to go, and I fully expected to
go even longer.
But that didn’t prevent me from doing everything in my power
to speed the process along. As I curled my hair for the day, I did squats. As I
walked up and down the stairs, I did lunges. The day before, my dad and I had
gone for Thai food, and I had ordered one of the spiciest things on the menu. “The
last pregnant lady who came in to our restaurant and ate our food went into labor that very
night,” the server had told me. “I wish that would happen to me,” I had
laughed.
I walked as much as I could, and earlier in the week, I had
gone to the park and walked with my mom and sisters up and down the sledding
hill. When they started to get tired, I just said, “Come on! I’m pregnant and I’m
still going!”
I knew that doing all of this didn’t necessarily mean labor
would come sooner, but I hoped that it would mean an easier labor. I had heard
walking and stretching helped prepare your body & at my last doctor’s
appointment, I had been dilated to a 2 and 50% effaced with my cervix
softening. “Maybe the next time I see you will be in the hospital?” I had asked
my OB hopefully. Him and I had a comical
relationship… he looked like Joe from Princess Diaries and had the funniest
sense of humor that paired nicely with my own dry humor. Maybe it’s odd to be
joking and laughing with your OB , but as
someone who doesn’t like doctors and hospitals (aka, is terrified of them), it
was refreshing to not be scared of him and to actually enjoy our conversations.
I saw his eyes sparkle at the poorly masked desperation in my voice, but his response
wasn’t exactly what I was hoping for. Another, “We’ll see.”
So with all of this in the back of my mind, I got out of bed
and got ready for the day. Brush my teeth, squat, brush some more. Pull up the
covers on our bed, lunge around the room, toss on the rest of the pillows.
Glance at my hospital bag, sigh because I’m hoping for the impossible, throw
another item in the bag anyways.
But breaking up my waiting game was the fact that Kristen
was coming over that day. The fact that she is one of my best friends and the
fact that she would distract me made me feel like I could make it through
another day. :P
She came over and around lunch time, I texted my sister,
Lauren, to see if she wanted to go out to eat with us too. We picked
her up from a nearby church where she had been doing make-up for the dress
rehearsal of a play my seven-year-old sister was a part of. They would be
performing the next day, and my mom’s parents were in town so that they could
see it as well.
Mom had told me this would be a good time to have the
baby so that her parents could meet him, but I had laughed the same joy-killing,
but well-meaning laugh my OB had laughed at
me. “We’ll see.”
After we picked Lauren up, we decided to eat at Potbelly’s
(har har har… a nine month pregnant woman eating at Potbelly’s…get it? Get
it? Yeah, but really, we did.)
As I drove, I found myself putting my hand on my stomach
every couple minutes. I didn’t know why I was doing it, and I didn’t even
remember doing it until later. We went in to eat, and suddenly I was STARVING.
I ate my sandwich & then stared at Lauren’s chips until Kristen bought me a
bag of my own. As we got back in the car, I put my hand on my stomach
again and something felt tight… probably just my seat-belt. I tried to adjust
it so that it wasn’t rubbing up against my bulging belly, but now matter how I
adjusted it, every few minutes, it would feel tight again. Maybe I had just
eaten too much.
Finally it dawned on me. “Guys! I think I’m having Braxton
Hicks! I know that doesn’t mean much, but at least my body is practicing!”
Kristen and Lauren were excited for me, but we all knew it didn’t mean
anything.
We dropped Lauren back off at the church, Kristen went home,
and I went for a walk. There’s a park at the end of our street (like three
blocks down) and round-trip it’s probably half a mile. I walked down there and
sat on the swings and thought it was funny that I was still feeling my stomach
get all hard every few minutes. “But there’s no pain,” I told myself. “Surely,
this CANNOT be it.”
As I started the walk back home, something different began
to happen. It was hard to breathe when the contractions would come. No pain,
but I had to stop each time and really breathe. And it felt like I was stopping
a lot.
I still didn’t even remotely consider that this was labor.
And when I got back, I saw that it was about 5:30 and I should probably make dinner.
So I started dumping ingredients into the mixer and pulled out my pizza
dough to knead it. Grammy was also in the kitchen and she was watching me
closely. Every two or three minutes, I would stop what I was doing and breathe.
She watched me and watched the clock and watched me some more until finally she said, “Your contractions are almost every two minutes!!
You should get ready to go to the hospital!!” “I’m fine,” I laughed. “These are
probably just Braxton Hicks!”
Suddenly, I had to pee (and there is no better use for the
word “suddenly” than when a pregnant woman suddenly realized she NEEDS to pee.).
So I went to the bathroom. Something felt different, and so, before I flushed,
I looked into the toilet and saw blood (part of my mucous plug). Interesting.
And as someone, who doesn’t like bodily functions/medical things, may I just say,
disgusting. I'm sorry you even had to read that.
Well, now, things were looking a little more serious. But I
washed my hands (just thought I should clarify that, haha) and went back to
making pizza. Christian was going to be working late at our house and I
wondered if I should text him or not.
When I timed the contractions, I noticed that they weren’t
even two minutes apart anymore. Grammy looked grim. “Don’t have that baby in my
kitchen!!” she half-joked.
I got the pizza in the oven and went to the bathroom again.
More blood.
Okay, maybe I should text Christian. “You might want to come
home now,” I texted semi-nonchalantly. Afterwards, I texted my mom. She asked a
bunch of questions and advised I call the doctor right away. But I continued to
hesitate. “I don’t know, mom. These are probably just practice contractions.”
She continued to urge me to call.
Christian got home and I told him what had been happening.
He was grinning, but just as cautious as I was.
“My only concern is that I haven’t felt him move in a long
time,” I said worriedly. “I don’t know if I’ve felt him move in several hours.”
We tried and tried to get him to move, but he wouldn’t. At the time, I didn’t realize that
THAT is also a sign that you are in labor. Whoops.
With concern for his safety,
and not really because I thought I was in labor, I called the doctor. By this time, it
was after office hours, and we got a nurse. She listened to my concern about movement
and then I told her about these mild contractions I was having. “How far apart
are they?” “I don’t know,” I said, “It seems like they are every one to two
minutes, but that can’t be right.” “How long do they last?” she asked. “Only
like fifteen seconds,” I answered. “Hmmm, well you should probably come in
since he’s not moving,” she told me, and said I MIGHT be in labor, but MIGHT
not be as well.
I told Christian and we slowly got our stuff together. He
ate the entire pizza, because if I WAS in labor, I didn’t feel like eating
pizza only to possibly throw it up. I told my mom we were going, and that I
would let her know if we were in labor and got admitted.
As we drove the six blocks to the hospital, we passed a
familiar street… Peter Road.
But they didn’t stop. And by the time we pulled up to the
Labor and Delivery portion of the hospital, I finally realized that the next
time I walked outside, it would most likely be with our baby in my arms. Our very own baby!
Christian and I got out and the valet parked our car. We
walked in and the person at the front desk looked up curiously. The hospital
was very quiet. “I’m here to have a baby,” I said and she looked surprised.
Even at 39 weeks, I wasn’t particularly huge, and under my loose-fitting dress
and winter jacket, I doubt those were the words she expected to hear. She
jumped into action and offered me a wheel-chair. “Nah, I’m good,” I said.
Christian and I walked to the elevator she pointed out and
as the two of us got inside, I couldn’t help looking at his face and feeling
like I had felt the first moment we had alone after getting married. The “did
we really just get married?!” feeling was instead turned into the “are we
really about to have a baby?!” feeling, but it felt just as happy and surreal
as ever.
I was surprisingly calm. The surprisingly part being my own
surprise. I don’t think I expected myself to panic in labor, but I also didn’t
expect to be so matter-of-fact “let’s do this thing” carefree about it all.
This was the moment I had been waiting for. And unlike that panicky, sick feeling I
used to get before a basketball game or before a debate tournament or before a swim meet, I was
ready. And even if I wasn’t, it was going to happen, with or without me… well, with me but...
you know what I mean.
We got out of the elevator and walked over to the nurses’
station and I again explained how I was here to have a baby. Since I had called
ahead, they were ready for me, and they immediately hooked me up to a fetal
heart monitor and a contraction monitor. I heard the steady beating of my sweet
baby’s heart and felt relief that he was okay. And then I started to laugh as
he kicked incessantly at the strap around my belly. “Well, THERE you are, you
little stinker.”
The nurse had left for a moment and Christian and I listened
to our child’s heartbeat and tried to interpret the lines going up and down
with each contraction.
“Your contractions are every one to two minutes!” the nurse
told me after she had re-entered the room, “and they are lasting a full minute, not
fifteen seconds!” “Oh,” I said sheepishly. I was dilated to a 3, I believe, and
more effaced than I had been at my last appointment. I told them about the
blood, and sure enough, I was losing my mucous plug. “Let me talk to your OB ,” the nurse said, “but it looks like you are here to
stay!”
I filled out paper-work slowly as I had to pause with each
contraction. They were just starting to become slightly painful, but definitely
still manageable.
Christian texted our parents and we snapped a quick selfie
while we waited to be moved to the delivery room. Mom was going to come and
help labor with me. That way her and Christian could take turns resting. Plus,
I don’t know if you’ve ever met my mom, but she’s like the best kick-butt coach
while simultaneously being a gentle encourager, so naturally, I wanted both her
and Christian by my side.
We were finally upstairs in the labor and delivery room, and
I was bouncing methodically on the birthing ball, watching tv. Christian was
talking to my mom on the phone and she was picking up milkshakes. “Do you want
one?” he asked. My face must’ve spoken for itself and he told her I would pass,
but that he would take a chocolate one. I rolled my eyes. Leave it to my mom
and Christian to turn this into a party. ;)
At this point I was relatively uncomfortable and dilated to
a 4, I believe (I honestly didn’t keep super good track, but I know every time
they checked me, I had progressed), but still hadn’t taken pain meds. I wasn’t
sure if I would need to or not, and in my mind, I had left that open to whether
or not the pain was tolerable. I would definitely prefer to do it naturally,
but I didn’t want to hold that up on a pedestal and then feel like a failure if
I needed them. Right now, the pain was tolerable, so I kept bouncing and
breathing, bouncing and breathing, bouncing and breathing.
Mom walked in around 10:30 and her face glowed with
anticipation and excitement. Christian’s face glowed at the sight of the
milkshake. My face… well, I don’t know if it was glowing, but I really had to
pee.
I got up and went to the bathroom, walked out, and noticed
there was a puddle at my feet. “Did you just pee yourself?” Christian laughed. “NO!”
I said defensively, “Well, I don’t know, I guess.” I watched more liquid
trickle down my leg and shuffled pensively forward. Another stream of liquid. “This
can’t be pee,” I laughed.
Our labor and delivery nurse (ahhh, can’t rememeber her
name!) was herself 38 weeks pregnant, and oh my goodness, we won the lottery by
getting her. She was the sweetest, most supportive nurse and I couldn’t have
hoped for anyone more perfect for me and my mom and Christian to have there
with us, answering our questions and encouraging me to do labor however I
wanted.
Anyways, she was called in & we explained the “is it
pee?” situation. She thought that it probably was, but when she swabbed it, the
stick immediately showed that it was amniotic fluid.
“Your water broke!” she exclaimed.
And it just. kept. breaking.
Fluid continued to eep out for the rest of labor and I feel
like I spent the next few hours in a sopping wet puddle.
12 AM (Saturday, March 12th)
At this point I was dilated to a 5 or 6, and after my water
broke, the contractions became increasingly painful. I started to feel my first
wave of panic as I knew I still had several centimeters to go and that things
would continue to get more painful.
I was also getting tired. If you know Christian and I, you
know that sleep is incredibly important to us and our ability to function. :P I
glanced over at my husband and saw his eyes looking heavy with sleep. Maybe I
could just take something to ease the contraction pain enough for me to get an
hour or two of sleep?
The nurse gave me a dose of something slightly stronger than
Tylenol and I immediately felt better. “I feel loopy,” I said to my mom and
Christian, and they both started to laugh. I knew better than to keep talking
and saying things they could use as blackmail, so I closed my eyes and tried to
doze off.
1-1:30 AM
I must have dozed off because when I opened my eyes, Christian was sleeping on the couch and my mom
was sleeping in a chair next to my bed. But I swear, 0.8 seconds after I opened
my eyes, she opened hers and asked if I was okay and if I needed anything.
The pain medicine had worn off and I was feeling the
intensity of each contraction. I knew I was getting closer and closer to the
point where an epidural wouldn’t be allowed anymore and I made my decision. I
wanted one.
So our friendly pregnant nurse came in and explained how it
would work. I had had a spinal tap before, so I was familiar with the idea of a
large needle being inserted into my back. The anesthesiologist was called &
I told my mom to wake Christian up. I wanted him by my side for this.
The procedure went off without a hitch and the
anesthesiologist waited around to make sure it worked. He kept pressing on my
legs and asking if I felt anything. “Yes.” “How about now?” “Yes, I feel that.”
“How about now?” “Yes, I feel all of that.”
For some reason, even though I still felt everything, he
left. Only my butt was numb (suuuuuuper helpful, right?). My legs were barely
tingling & I still felt pain with each contraction. It hadn’t worked.
2:30 AM
I told our nurse how I was feeling. “Are you feeling
pressure still or pain? Because pressure is normal, but you shouldn’t be
feeling pain.” “I’m feeling pain,” I said.
Another nurse wanted me to roll to my side and she was about
to help me when I did it myself. “You can move your legs that easily?!” she
asked surprised. “Yes!”
So they called the anesthesiologist back in and he upped my
dosage and said something about not taking my height into consideration. But
once again, it didn’t work, and I was still feeling everything with maybe only
the tiniest tingling/numbing
sensation.
Meanwhile I was dilated to a 6 or 7 now and I could feel how
LOW this baby was. My mind was still calm, though it finally started to dawn on
me that sometime, soon, this baby would have to come out. That there was no
pause button and no “can we do this another time?” option. The part of me that
hates feeling trapped started to panic a little bit, but overall, I was still on the
“let’s do this” train.
My body, however, started to go into shock. Whether it was
the medication or just the pain from the contractions, I started shaking
violently.
In the past, I have had panic attacks where my body shakes
violently, but in each of those situations, I’ve also been panicking in my
mind. Watching myself shake uncontrollably felt like an out of body experience.
As if I was calmly assessing the bizarre shaking of some other pregnant woman.
The nurse asked if I was cold and I assured her I wasn’t. My mom asked if I was
scared and I shook my head no. But my body wouldn’t stop shaking. It was weird.
And it started to unnerve me.
The next two or three hours felt like a blur. At one point,
I started to drift off to sleep again, only to have someone wake me and tell me
that the epidural had caused my contractions to slow a little and that they
wanted to give me pitocin and that once they did, things would speed along
quickly. I nodded my approval.
5 AM
I was dilated to an eight and the pitocin was definitely
doing its job. The contractions were happening every other second it felt like
and they were strong. I was starting to get a little bit panicky now. I called
Christian to my side and he and my mom reassured me over and over that it was
going to be okay and that I could do this. At this point I wasn’t contradicting
them, but I was starting to wonder if it was true. Could I do this? Could I get
a quick break? Could someone else take a few of these contractions? Just a few?
I could feel baby dropping and when they checked me again a
few minutes later I was at a 9. “I’ll come back and check you again in fifteen
minutes,” she said. Her shift was ending in an hour or two and I was really
hoping to have the baby before she left.
The moment she walked out the door something changed. I felt
him drop even lower and there was this intense urge in my body to push. I
looked at Christian with fear. “I can’t do this,” I whispered. “That must mean
you are ready to,” he said gently. My mom ran back out after the nurse as I
frantically shouted that I NEEDED to push. I almost screamed with the next
contraction and tried to keep myself from pushing before the doctor got there.
The nurse ran back in and looked a little alarmed and quickly
ran over to check me. “You’re at a 10!” she exclaimed. “Let’s do a few practice
pushes and then I’ll go get the doctor! Most first time moms push for at least
thirty minutes.” I pushed for the length of one contraction and could tell by the look on her
face that she was surprised and worried. “DON’T PUSH anymore! I’m going to get
the doctor!!!” She hurried out of the room and a moment later, my OB was flying into action. He quickly washed up as I
shouted “I NEED TO PUSH.” “DON’T PUSH!” he yelled right back at me. I almost
laughed for a moment because I felt like we were having a parent/child fight,
but at the same time I wanted to slap him. Don’t push?! I can’t help it!! He
rushed over and explained to me exactly how he wanted me to do it. I was
exhausted at this point, but suddenly, a wave of strength washed over me. “Do
you want a mirror so you can watch?” he asked. “uh, NO!” I said and he laughed.
Mom had left the room with prayers and encouragement,
because I had asked that it just be Christian and I for the delivery. He stood
at my side and as I looked at him, I could see the tears in his eyes as he held
my hand and reminded me not to clench my teeth with the contractions but to
breathe and bear down (yeah, he’s a really good birth coach you guys). “I’m so proud
of you, I'm SO proud of you,” he kept saying between reminders. “You are doing SO well.”
Meanwhile my doctor shouted “NOW! PUSH!” and I gave every
single ounce of strength I had into that push. Some women talk about how birth
makes them feel like they can do anything, how it makes them proud of their
bodies… and in that moment, I felt it. “I
am woman. Hear me roar,” I had read that in the past and chuckled. But now I
was roaring and I was going to get this baby out of me or die trying. The
doctor and nurses were surprised at my intensity and I saw pride on my husband’s
face. "You were made for this!" my OB said proudly, but then not even a second later, the doctor yelled “AGAIN! PUSH PUSH
PUSH!” and again I wanted to slap him, but instead I pushed, and Christian
shouted, “I SEE HIS HEAD.” I pushed again and *I* saw his head. Just a few more
pushes and he was out, but I didn’t realize he was out at first. I was about to
push again when my doctor was like, “He’s out!” And I was inwardly like, "Oh. OH!!!"
I didn’t hear him cry at first, but they sucked the fluid
from his lungs and he was fine, though he still didn’t cry. He was happy to be
born. Happy to be here. Christian cut his cord and they put this warm, wet, perfect little bundle of skin and arms and legs and his daddy's eyes and my cheeks and wavy brown hair and a perfect button nosed baby on my chest, but only for a minute before
whisking him away to be checked and weighed. Christian rushed to be with him,
but not before coming to my side with wet eyes and saying, “I can’t believe
you just did that!!! You were amazing. I can't believe he came out of you!! I can't believe you did that!!”
My placenta came out without any problems, and as I watched my husband adore our baby
nearby, the doctor turned to me. “You have two tears. They’re not too bad, but I’ll
need to stitch them up.” I inwardly grimaced, but was too distracted by my baby
who was OUTSIDE OF ME to care very much. “You’ll need to hold still so I don’t
poke myself with the needle.” I looked at him and said, “That’s
the least of my concerns.” He laughed outright along with the nurses and teased me back, but my
attention was already back on baby.
He weighed 7lbs. 7oz. and was 21 ½ inches long. He still
wasn’t crying, but he was alert. Christian finally carried him back over to me
and our little one looked so tiny in his arms. He laid baby boy on my chest and
all I could do was stare. I was feeling so many feelings at once that I couldn’t
focus on one at a time.
It wasn’t until my mom came back in after the stitching and
I saw her holding him that I fell apart and cried. My body had stopped shaking
the moment our baby boy emerged. It knew that it had done it’s job and could
rest now. Rest after nine months of carrying precious cargo. And now my mind was catching up and realizing that my mama was holding her daughter's son. Her daughter, now a mama too.
“Do you still want to name him Peter?” I asked Christian. He
nodded. “Me too.”
A nurse pressed on my belly and looked shocked. “In all my time working here, I’ve NEVER seen a belly vanish the way
yours has.” I looked down with just as much surprise. There was no more baby
bump. My stomach was gone and there was a very flat, though very squishy, belly
in it’s place. I felt empty and full all at once. “He’s here,” I thought, “I
don’t have to feel his kicks from the inside anymore. I can kiss his toes from
the outside.”
The rest of the day was beautiful and exhausting and
emotional. The calmness I had felt mentally during labor started to backfire
and I felt a little bit like weeping, a little bit like laughing, a little bit
panicky over everything that had just happened, and a little bit like curling
up in a ball with just my husband and Peter baby and sleeping for the next
three weeks.
He passed all his tests and he continued not to cry, but
just to be happy and content. He nursed almost immediately & was HUNGRY (some things never change, haha).
Both his brand new grandpas and brand new grandmas and brand new aunts and
uncles met him, and seeing my baby sister hold my baby son just about killed
me. Getting to see my dad (of four girls) hold his firstborn grandson still makes
me get all teary.
On the day I found out I was pregnant with Peter, before I
took the test, I had stood in the shower and scrawled the words, “My heart will
choose to say, blessed be Your name,” into the foggy glass. I wanted those
words to be my rock no matter whether God gave me a beloved child or
not. I wanted to choose to bless His name.
Peter (meaning: Rock) David (meaning: Beloved) Higgins...
I am so glad
that God chose to give us you.
