Baby is here: The Story

Baby Devlin is here! He arrived on August 19th (one day before his due date) at exactly 2:30 pm. He weighed in at 7.91 lbs and 18 inches long.
The birth story:
At 6:30 am I woke up thinking I had to go to the bathroom. The urge went away, but then came back, and again every 2-3 minutes for about 30 seconds. I soon realized this was likely contractions coming on fast. I called the labor and delivery department at the hospital and they confirmed this in fact sounded like the beginning of labor. I wasn’t expecting the pains to be as low as they were. The said that the length of the contractions weren’t where they needed to be yet. I was advised to get something to eat and drink. Take a shower and relax. I should call back when the contractions were lasting at least a minute each. I did as advised, got some breakfast and showered, all while logged into contractionmaster.com tracking the duration and frequency of each contraction. After the shower they were averaging 55 seconds and I called L&D again. The said gather my things, come in and they will check me out. At 10 a.m. we were in a hospital room and put on monitors, I was dilated to 4cm and fully effaced. They said a lot of the work was done, I was being admitted! The next couple hours went by and I tried to eat, had some juice, and walked the halls a few times. I was due to be checked again around 2pm. The contractions escalated around noon to be pretty intense. Around 12:30 lying in the bed my water broke. What a mess! I thought I might not know if it would happen if I was home. Never mind, this was like a water bottle bursting from within! The nurses got me cleaned up and changed and back into bed. At about 1 p.m. I decided I needed something to take the edge off of the pain. I was given an IV of saline and something for the pain. It was immediate relief, for about 5 minutes. I still felt the contractions coming and going but was just a bit woozy. Around 1:30 the pain was so intense I told Sean and nurse I really needed to go to the bathroom. I felt like I had to take a huge crap! The nurse was a bit concerned and said she wanted to check me first to make sure I don’t give birth on the toilet. It hadn’t occurred to me that when it’s time to push, you feel it way down there… Sure enough, I was dilated to 9cm!!! Nurse said we’re gonna have a baby here very soon! I went to the bathroom (to pee) and came out to the room being all set up for delivery. Certainly it couldn’t happen this fast? When I got back into my bed, the midwife on staff came in with the nurse. As my contractions came they were checking me and instructing me it’s time to push. I made a few attempts pushing on my back and the midwife suggested another position on my hands and knees. This position sounded odd and if I had any cares of what it would have looked like from their end, I’d have been mortified, but the position felt pretty good. I tried pushing through a few times this way and still no luck. I think around this time I had asked for an epidural at which point was told it would really stop the labor, slow things down, and not really time, baby was on his way! I went back on my back and tried pushing. The midwife suggested a “tug of war” where Sean was at my feet holding a sheet pulling against me in the tug of war. This allowed me to focus my pushing. This was a pretty effective tactic except baby still wasn’t coming, and his heartbeat was dropping. The midwife was concerned the cord was wrapped around the baby and said she wanted a doctor in there to use the vacuum if needed. In a matter of minutes a doctor and his team, plus the nurse and midwife were in the room prepping the vacuum and still trying to get me to push. A few good pushes and the aid of vacuum, out came the head. The head coming out brought on almost instant relief. The body was next and that came out pretty effortless, and baby was born exactly at 2:30 p.m.! The doctor cut the cord and ‘Lil D was rushed to the nearby table to make sure everything was okay from the chord. I soon heard him moving and making noises and knew Sean was there with him. I still had to delivery the afterbirth and the doctor was assessing my tears, I ended up with about 7 stitches. After doctor left I was handed my little bundle to hold and to try to feed before he was bathed and measured. He was so pink and perfect!
In the end, I cannot believe that I had as speedy of a delivery and natural! The nurses and midwife were also amazed at how fast this delivery progressed, as were we! Though I tried for more drugs, aside for one dose in the IV, I can’t believe I made it through without anything! One look at ‘Lil D and it really is all worth it, and the pain was almost forgotten. I stayed in the hospital overnight, Sean went home to Sloan. I had a pretty sleepless night just watching the baby, and being interrupted by nurses every few hours to take our vitals. I also was getting baby up every 3 hours to breastfeed. I was able to go home exactly 24 hours later as we were both fine and I wanted my own bed and shower.
So far, breast feeding is going pretty smoothly! I was nervous about that. It takes a few tries and he latches right on. My milk supply is on it’s way in, but for now he’s getting what he needs for now and going potty very regularly! Tomorrow morning we’ll go in and get baby weighed and make sure everything is still healthy and strong, though I know it is!
Here’s some links to photo albums that Sean set up:
From Nana
From our friend Heather
Other selected photos