unmedicated hospital birth story

We celebrated Izzy’s birthday in April, and in honor of that, I’m sharing her birth story! 🎂🧡

My labor with Izzy started the day after Easter. I didn’t realize my early labor signs were early labor. In the morning, I drove my son to daycare and noticed I was feeling crampy, I thought about how it felt like period cramps but didn’t think much more about it than that. 

I had already started my maternity leave, and around noon I was resting in bed and went to get up and heard a little pop and felt some fluid - I wasn’t sure if I peed myself or if my water broke. I decided to go for a walk down my driveway to see if the leaking continued. Boy did it! I didn’t make it far before I came back into the house, pants drenched. I noted a light straw color to the amniotic fluid. 

I waited around in my room a bit trying to rest and pass the time. Contractions started somewhere between 30 minutes to an hour later. A couple hours later I called my provider and discussed with the triage nurse my options - I could stay at home but it’s recommended to come in and get checked, I have been feeling baby movement as usual, and I wasn’t sure about the color of the fluid- it was very pale but not clear. 

Gus got home from work around 4 and I was starting to feel a bit anxious waiting at home, so we ate some buttered noodles, got our bags, and headed out. By this point contractions were on the milder side but requiring focus. In the car, I put on my hypnobabies tracks, which I continued to listen to for the duration of labor, and had on my tens unit. Contractions at this point were coming regularly every 10 minutes. I don’t remember timing them at home but I remember looking at the clock in the car and noting the timing. 

When we arrived we went to triage, they confirmed slight meconium in fluid and I agreed to a cervical exam and was 4-5cm. We decided to get settled into a room. 

My contraction pattern stayed consistent for a few hours and I was offered Pitocin to get things going, I declined. I was offered another cervix check a couple hours after triage and also declined that. 

I walked the halls and paced the room and Gus squeezed my hips. My mom arrived around 10pm, the intensity of the contractions had picked up some, but I also felt they weren’t at full momentum yet. I rested in bed and then around midnight I felt like it was time to call my doula. 

Shortly after she arrived, things started to pick up. Contractions were growing in intensity. I sat on the toilet and had my hips squeezed. Eventually I took off the tens and moved to the tub, starting with just the shower. 

As I made that move, I was feeling nausea, like I could throw up, and was thinking “Yupp, this is when an epidural would be nice”. Standing in the tub I was rocking in a lunge-like positions during my contractions and doing horse lips all the way through them, with the water being sprayed on my back and Gus still squeezing my hips. Contractions were now close, I didn’t realize it at the time, but looking back, this was transition. The sensations were big and the thoughts going through my head during the contraction was “I can do this” - thank you Hypnobabies! 

We filled the tub and I sat down, I still wanted my hips squeezed during every contraction. Not too much longer, I started to feel pushy and wanted to be checked. I got out of the tub, checked, and was almost fully dilated, a slight cervical lip still there. Per my doulas recommendation, back to the toilet I went. At this point I couldn’t not bear down with my contractions. 

Back to the bed after a bit on the toilet, and I got pushing like I was trying to make something happen, this was around 3am. I pushed for a while, trying out a few different positions including the squat bar. I hadn’t peed in a while and my nurse and doula mentioned maybe my bladder was holding things up, so back to the toilet I went. 

I couldn’t relax enough to pee, so I agreed to a catheter to empty my bladder. Then more pushing. I was very tired, I’d been pushing for a couple hours at this point. In between contractions I would nearly fall asleep. 

At 7am and with some roaring pushing, Izzy was born - sunny side up! That explained a lot. It took a lot of might and pushing was not at all how I expected it to be for my second - it was roughly 4 hours, whereas I thought as my second she’d just be comin’ right out! Her eyes were wide open right away, and I went from asleep in between contractions to the widest awake possible - that birth high! 

Somewhere along the lines during labor and pushing, we were continually offered Pitocin and discussed risks of prolonged labor and having ruptured membranes for longer than 24 hour, which we never reached. I couldn’t tell you how many times it came up, because Gus mostly managed these conversations, but I’d guess at least four other times.  Ultimately Gus and I both felt comfortable staying the course with allowing labor to progress on its own. 

The placenta came easily and followed by normal bleeding, I had previously had a PP hemorrhage so was looking for reassurance that bleeding was normal after the placenta. I kept Izzy’s placenta and we recently buried it under a new tree.