Pippa's Birth Story
I never understood or really was into reading other people’s birth stories… until I was pregnant myself. Then I wanted to know EVERYONE’S birth story because maybe it would lessen my anxiety. I’m the first to say, I didn’t love pregnancy… and then the thought of actually having to birth. a. baby. Ehhh… it made my palms sweat. So if you are reading this, slightly panicking that you are going to have a baby, I’m here to tell you that if I can do it, you can too.
Once I hit 39 weeks, I was done. I had had enough and requested to be induced. My ob and I scheduled an induction for the next time she was on call. It’s very common that the ob you see throughout your pregnancy will not be the one to deliver you. My induction was scheduled for 40 weeks + 1 day. I had no birth plan other than deliver the baby in whatever way is safest.
The initial plan was to place a balloon outpatient the night before I was to report to the hospital. That would start labor and contractions. I’ll let you google Foley Bulb Induction. It’s a way to start labor without any medication and more mechanically. I wasn’t thrilled with it, but if that’s what I needed to do I would do it. I went to the ob for my appointment… and couldn’t do it. Too painful. Too uncomfortable. Wasn’t happening. So I went home and was instructed to call the hospital the next morning to see if a bed was available.
I called at 7 am Saturday morning and of course, “Sorry, no beds available. Call back at 12 pm.” I mean talk about anxiety provoking. What else are you supposed to do when you are literally waiting to be called to come have a baby. Called at 12 pm and they say, “Two women need to deliver then it’s your turn.” (What is this, restaurant reservations????) They told me to have a light dinner and call again at 8 pm.
At this point, I was losing hope. I thought no way they are going to bring me in tonight and prob push me to Sunday or Monday. So, I got In-N-Out for dinner. Not too light like they instructed. I finish my burger and think, “Okay, it’s 7 pm.. let’s call even though I’m a bit early.” And don’t you know the nurse says, “Yep! Come on in!!!” I figured that burger will be digested before anything happens. LOL.
And so it begins. All checked in and in the labor and delivery bed discussing with the MD and RN how this is going to go down. The first thing we did was Cytotec, a pill you put in your cheek to induce labor. I was still trying to get out of that balloon, which they told me I probably wasn’t going to avoid. Contractions began…. but mine were all BACK LABOR. Oh. My. God. More on that in a second. Contractions were happening so so frequently, but I wasn’t dilating too much. I was walking. I was bouncing. I was doing it ALL. To encourage dilation, we decided to place the balloon. Luckily in the hospital, I was given pain medication to help and it was SO DOABLE! I was holding off on the epidural because I wanted to get a little further so I didn’t stall.
The back labor was horrific. There is no other way to describe it. I couldn’t tell you what a normal uterine contraction feels like because the only thing I had was shooting back pain every 2 minutes. I think I had back labor because Pippa was head down, but face up. Also, known as “sunny side up.” We endured this all night long, until I finally said, “I don’t care how dilated I am, get me the epidural.” I was to the point I could not even think straight. Luckily, the balloon fell out and that means you are about 4 cm dilated and I thought, “PERFECT. EPIDURAL PLEAAAASE.”
I found much relief with the epidural… but man, I was dilating so slow. We began Pitocin some point Sunday morning. It all becomes blurry after the fact. I really thought I was going to have this baby by noon on Sunday. Nope. She hung tight in there. The nurses at Hoag in the Labor & Delivery rooms were amazing. I went through 3 nursing shifts and each one was a literal angel. Since I couldn’t get up on Sunday because of the epidural, the nurses had me in multiple positions with the peanut ball to encourage labor and hope to flip Pippa to face down. By 8 pm on Sunday night I asked, “When do we throw in the towel? Is this going to end in c-section??” I was exhausted. And hungry (because they don’t let you eat). Thank god for the In-N-Out burger. The nurse was sooo encouraging and was like you are having this baby tonight. Finally around 9 pm, nearly 24 hours from when we started the induction, I got to 10 cm. I pushed for an hour and a half and Pippa arrived at 10:22 pm. Honestly, I was most nervous about the pushing and at the end of the day (literally) that was almost the easiest part!!
Writing 26 hours of labor into a little blog post is almost laughable. I know I’m probably leaving out a LOT (like the fact I had gotten so many fluids that I was more swollen than I could ever imagine!!). Overall, labor was LONG. But I had one request - that we get her out safely and that’s what we did. WELCOME PIPPA JUDE!!