Maya's Birth Story

2017 edit: Husband's version of Maya's birth story is here, and our second daughter Annika's birth story is here.

Overall, the whole labor and delivery is pretty hazy and foggy in my memory, so I’m afraid that I’m not going to be able to do this post justice.  Whether the haze is due to the fact that the whole process was a bit traumatic (and this is my mind’s way of coping) or because it’s been too long since the birth itself (almost three weeks, most of which has been spent trying to forget the whole thing), I don’t know.  In either case, I’m going to do the best I can below!

(P.S.  Husband wrote his version of the birth story as well, so I hope to post it as a companion piece sometime soon.  I haven’t read his version yet, but from talking with him, his perspective is very different from mine - mostly because he doesn’t have any haziness!  It will make a good juxtaposition, I think.)

I went into labor during dinner on Tuesday, December 17th around 7:00pm.  This was exactly 8 hours *after* my parents and brother boarded a plane back to California - terrible timing!  At this point, my contractions were 10-20 min apart and pretty mild, but this was the most regular and consistent that they’d ever been, so I was incredibly hopeful.  Mostly, I was really, really excited - finally!  It was time!

So I hydrated with gusto and tried to get some sleep.  I woke up a bunch during the night and could feel the contractions every time, and they were still solidly regular - every 10-20 minutes.  I woke up a lot, but I felt like I had cobbled together a reasonable amount of sleep by the time the morning of the 18th came around.  I had been hoping that the contractions would be closer together by then, but they absolutely weren’t - nor were they any stronger.  I whittled away the morning doing I don’t remember what, and there was no progress whatsoever.  At some point, I emailed my midwife to tell her that I thought we were in early labor, but that we hadn’t even called triage yet to warn them that we should be on their radar since everything was going soooo sloooowly.

So husband and I did something insane.  We decided to follow up on some recent exciting bird sightings from fellow North Country birders and drive out about 25 minutes away to a cargo airport to look for snow buntings and snowy owls.  These both were life-lister birds for me, and I REALLY wanted to see them.  I wasn’t sure how I would handle the experience while being in labor - especially since we were likely to get skunked - but sitting around the house was doing me no good whatsoever.  So we went!

And lo and behold, we found both :)  No one ever believes us, but we (for real!) saw California condors during our wedding in Big Sur and now we saw snowy owls while in labor with our baby :)  Now I think of it as Maya’s totem, of sorts :)  We didn’t get any photos of the snow buntings, but we did get a few of a very-far-away owl...and we saw two of them, actually.  They were SO HUGE and absolutely unmistakable.  It was an incredible experience.

Labor owls!

The downside was that there were other birders out there too, and they kept trying to stop and talk with us.  One of them was headed out to find something after that - long-eared owls, maybe? - and kindly invited us to come along with him.  All I remember is smiling at him through a contraction and saying something like, “I think we’ve done just about all we can do today!”

After that, we headed home.  The contractions were still about the same, maybe a little more intense, and still no closer than 10 minutes apart.  Since husband had read so much about labor stalling out, he was gung ho about keeping me moving to make some magic happen - no sitting around on his watch!  So we went walking through the neighborhood, in the snow.  I don’t remember much about this, other than I think he made me do “the hill” (it isn’t much of a hill, but this is the Midwest, so everything is relative) a number of times.  The contractions got a little closer together, finally.  We walked for what seemed like forever.

Finally, sometime early afternoon, I said I needed to go home and lay down.  I went into bed and tried to rest - I was still hydrating at this point, but this was where I fell off the wagon.  I don’t know how long I laid down, just that at some point, I went running for the guest bathroom (the only one that has a tub) screaming that I needed a bath.  Husband was like “No!  You’ll slow the labor!” and I was like “FUCK OFF I NEED A BATH RIGHT NOW DON’T FUCK WITH ME!”  After that, all I remember is me shivering in the tub and moaning as contractions started to come way too close together and were pretty epically painful.  At some point, I started sort of yelling/moaning and husband finally decided to check on me.  I was definitely crying, so he decided to call triage.  My midwife Lisa was working that day, so she was the one who called us back.  Together, she and husband made the decision that we should come in before her shift ended - so we did.  I think we made it to the hospital around 5:30pm.

I don’t remember much of the car ride either, except that I complained a lot about how the contractions weren’t really giving me a break.  I remember walking slowly into the hospital and just crying in response to them asking if we were there to see a patient - um, do I not look like I’m 41+ weeks pregnant and clearly in labor???  I made husband answer questions while I dealt with more contractions, and somehow we made it into a triage room.

They set baby + me up on monitors, and eventually my midwife Lisa came around to check on us.  Mostly I remember it hurting and me making a lot of gnarly sounds.  My contractions were pretty serious now, coming every 3-4 or so minutes and often “coupling” (coming two at a time with no break in between, which ended up being my undoing, I think, in hindsight).  Lisa finally did a cervical check, and I was at a paltry 3cm - and she recommended we go home.  So I cried some more, mostly in frustration, wondering how the hell I was going to make it through this labor.  Baby’s heart rate was also too flat, so they thought I was probably dehydrated and had low blood sugar, so they made me drink a bunch of juice and change positions (I think I was on my hands and knees by this point).  Baby’s heart rate improved after a while and the recommendation was re-given that I should go home and come back later, but I think my crying allowed us to stay - they went ahead and admitted us.

At this point, things get really, really hazy.  After some incredibly long delay, we get to a room and I’m still whining about the contractions coming too close together and how I can’t get a break.  Some nurse asks us a bunch of totally ridiculous questions (“What kind of learner are you: visual, auditory, or learn by doing?”) about which at some point I snap at her to basically leave me the fuck alone.  This nurse, in comparison to others we had throughout our stay, was absolutely the WRONG one for me - I thought she was terrible, pushing me to get a hep lock because she was convinced I would be getting an epidural.  After she finally left, husband launched back into the “we need to get the magic happening” mindset because I wasn’t dilated hardly at all, and Lisa had told us to walk.  They had filled the tub for us, and in hindsight, I think that I absolutely should have gotten into it instead of trying to walk.  Quite frankly, I think I needed to slow down my contractions to better deal with the labor, not try to dilate more by walking - but who knows if this would have worked.  But anyway, I didn’t get into the tub, I went walking, which was a horrible epic failure.  I remember coming *this close* to puking, I remember being on my hands and knees on the floor of the dirty hallway, and I remember contractions that just would not stop coming, no breaks, no nothing.  I finally gave up and said I *needed* to get back to my room.

At this point, I again should have gotten into the tub and tried to slow things down - especially due to the god awful coupling, which was still going on strong - but again, I did not.  Literally, at this point, my contractions were coming even more frequently than every three minutes, when I even got a break at all.  I was a total mess by this point.  My mind was not thinking rationally, and I was completely incapable of looking at things coolly and objectively, even though my missteps seem pretty clear to me now.  Instead, I insisted that the new midwife on duty come and do another cervical check.  If there was progress, then I would keep going.  If not, I would get an epidural and try to get some sleep, because this labor thing was totally kicking my ass.  I remember some thought floated through my head about there being a civilized and an uncivilized way to do this, and really, was the civilized choice really all THAT bad?

So the new midwife came in and did the check around 11pm, and nope, I was still at (barely, by her measurement) a 3.  I cried some more and totally gave up.  I got the epidural sometime around midnight, and I felt (physically) instantly much better.  Husband and I went to sleep. 

The next morning (December 19th) was beautiful.  I can’t overstate this enough.  I was in an absolutely glorious mood, totally euphoric.  The sun was shining and everything was positively blissful.

The evil nurse from the night before was still around in the very early morning, and she said that since my contractions had slowed waaaaay down (~ every 15 minutes), I was probably going to need some pitocin - I was lamed out about this.  But then another new midwife (Cathy) came in around 7am and did another cervical check, and I was at an 8 - YAY!  I was progressing just fine on my own with no pitocin, despite the epidural, and they were just going to leave me be until I was at a 10 and ready to push.  I could not have been happier!!!  At that point, I was SO HAPPY with my decision to get an epidural, thinking that I had just been in a sort of panic without it the night before and totally unable to relax and dilate - that I had been actually working against my body, and in the absence of a doula (which I probably should have gotten), the epidural had been 100% the correct choice.  I called my parents and gave them the wonderful news, and told them that I would be pushing in just a few more hours!!

The rest of the morning was spent in a blissed-out haze.  I remember enjoying the sun streaming through the window, cooing with husband, and just smiling up a storm.  I made sure to roll positions frequently to help baby descend, and just enjoyed the process.  It was awesome.  We also had an absolutely phenomenal nurse during this time - Meredith, and I really can’t overstate how awesome she was - to whom I owe a lot.  She was exactly the *right* nurse for me.

Around 12pm, the midwife team (there was a trainee there too) came in and checked me again, and they gave me the awesome news that I was completely dilated and ready to push.  FINALLY!!  I was well-rested and absolutely ready to go!  I felt ready to move mountains!  I could feel all of my contractions perfectly (as pressure, not pain) through the epidural, so I was pushing with perfect timing.  Meredith coached me like a champ, and I PUSHED.  And pushed and pushed and pushed.  Everyone was super pleased with how well I pushed.  There was a whole team around my vag, Cathy+trainee midwife+Meredith+husband, all cheering through each push. We could absolutely see the baby’s head - and how much hair she had! - and I could touch her, no problem.  But then we kept pushing.  And kept pushing.  And kept pushing.  In all sorts of positions, including hands-and-knees, even despite the epidural.  I had been given a “hospital policy” three hour time limit on pushing, but three hours came and went with no baby.  Again, in hindsight, it was clear at that point that something was wrong, but I kept pushing anyway.  At one point, they pulled out a mirror for me to see how close she was, but while I could definitely see her head, I just remember thinking that she was still a loooong ways up there.  I should have also realized at this point that that much (really forceful!) pushing was doing considerable damage to my nether regions, but I didn’t really process that, either.

They let me push for a total of 4 hours before Cathy, as lead midwife, finally said that we weren’t getting this baby out without additional help.  Her guess was that the baby was posterior, and also stuck against my pubic bone.  She even threw out the words “c-section,” and I responded adamantly that I did NOT want one.  I insisted on getting the head forceps doctor, who just happened to be on duty, in there to evaluate the situation.  (Side note: at around this point, my epidural started to not work anymore, especially on my right side, but I didn’t really say anything because I just wanted the baby out.)  Head Forceps Doctor came with an ultrasound machine and confirmed that 1) yes, the baby was posterior, and 2) her head was extended rather than flexed, which meant that the presenting part of her head was somewhere between her crown and her face (and off-center, as it turned out), and 3) by the time the doctor actually arrived, she had regressed back to like a -1 station - which was too far up for him to do anything safely with forceps or vacuum extraction.  He said he’d go up in there after her if I really wanted him to, but that if it were his wife/baby, there’s no way he would do it - he would go c-section without question, if the decision was his.  That was clear enough for me, and so with some more tears, I consented to a c-section.  I was just pretty tired, pretty scared, and pretty overwhelmed at that point.

This is where things start to get really bad.

So first they said that there’s only one operating team, and someone was about to go in ahead of me - expect it to take a few hours at least, they said, before they even start prepping me.  I looked at the clock, and I think it was around 5pm at this point.  I tried to steel myself for a very, very long night, and I finally said something about my failing epidural.  It was clear to everyone because I started to struggle through my contractions again, pretty vocally.  Suddenly, someone busted in and says that the “night” surgery team was actually all in early, so they were available and willing to run a concurrent c-section with the “day” team in a second operating room.  Great, I said, let’s get this over with.  They separated husband and myself and say that as soon as my epidural is topped off (just a few minutes), they’ll start the operation and come get him.  Once I arrived in the operating room, the anesthesia team immediately starts to have issues (reminding you here that I can basically feel all of my contractions again, so I’m back in normal labor through all of it).  Since my epidural was failing, they wanted to put in a second one.  However, somehow I was also dehydrated, so inserting it proved beyond them.  They poked me a bunch of times, but only got another kind of half-assed one in.  Then the head anesthesiologist had to take over, and try for a spinal instead.  And then HE could only get a half-assed one in, again not really working on my right side, and started saying that they were going to have to put me under general anesthesia.  Again, I started crying and pleading with them not to do that.  Finally, they just pumped massive quantities of anesthetic into the half-failed spinal and decided to go ahead with the operation really, really quickly before it crapped out again.  The whole anesthesia thing took almost an hour, and I had to sit really, really still through all of my contractions while they tried and tried again.

They were in such a rush to operate on me at that point, they actually forgot husband in his prep room, where he was sitting and worrying about why it was taking waaaaay longer than it was supposed to to get me in there.  Someone finally runs out for him, and he gets in after the operation starts.  I’m not going to go into gory details about the c-section itself, except to say that  1) Maya was so stuck, they had to have one person push really hard on her head (up through my vag) while another one simultaneously pulled really hard on her legs/hips through the incision in my abdomen to get her out - husband said it was pretty violent, and 2) I was fairly sentient through the whole procedure, at least until recovery.  The grossest parts were when I could smell my own flesh burning and I had to ask them if they were cauterizing (they were) and when I puked while they were moving my organs around in ways they should never be moved (the nice anesthesiologist held the barf bucket for me, since I gave them ample warning).

Hearing her (very loud!) cry as soon as they got her out (at 7:10pm) was the best part of it all - god, I was so thankful that she was ok.  I cried some more.  Husband did exactly what he was supposed to do and stayed with her the whole time - good husband!  Finally, husband brought her over to me as soon as she was cleared. She was, and continues to be, absolutely beautiful.

And she was HUGE - 8lbs, with a 14 inch head!  Everyone said that her size probably did not help the delivery situation either :)

And thus began my very long recovery, both mental and physical.  I was in labor for 48 hours, *almost* pushed a baby out, and then had a c-section.  It’s not the birth I wanted, but it is the birth I got.  So how do I feel about the whole experience?  Well, I worry (but will never know) that the epidural may have screwed me.  Would Maya have rotated to a more favorable position if I hadn’t been chained to my bed?  Or would I have completely exhausted myself without one and been wholly unable to push her out anyway?  We will never know, so it’s not really worth thinking about.  Although I am jealous of all the women who got the vaginal birth that I did not, mostly I’m just happy to have a healthy baby and anxious to put the whole thing behind me since I can’t change any of it.

Besides, who has time to worry about such things with a newborn to take care of? ;)