Hello! Today I’m bringing you a little #ThrowbackThursday story, more specifically my labor & birth story. I cannot believe it’s been over a year & I am definitely glad I wrote it out last year when a lot of the details were still fresh in my mind. As I edited this I found myself remembering some details I had forgotten & it made me smile. This is one of the reasons behind my decision to start this blog, to be honest I’m not sure how many people will find my life interesting or even read some of my posts but at the end of the day I will have some sweet memories documented for my son. But that’s enough chit-chat, on to the story. P.S. I won’t totally hate you if you don’t read all of it, I know it’s long lol.
I officially started going into labor at the early hours of Friday, at 12:34 a.m. to be exact. (Shout out to my husband for remembering the exact minute I woke him up that night, lol.) The night before I had woken up abruptly after I felt a sharp pain in my lower abdomen, which I now know was pressure from the baby dropping.
The contractions that I began to experience on Friday were spaced out so I didn’t think to start timing them. Truth be told, I had gone most of my pregnancy pain-free so my first assumption was that I was just experiencing “Braxton hicks.” That night I continued getting up to use the restroom every time I felt a contraction. Friday morning I woke up and started getting ready for work, I was scheduled to appear for an immigration trial that afternoon in downtown Los Angeles. My husband was sure that our baby would be making an early appearance and he asked that I pack my hospital bag, so that morning in between contractions I set out everything that I would need in the baby’s crib, next to the diaper bag not in the diaper bag. Why didn’t you pack, woman? You may ask. Well, silly me still thought that the contractions were just braxton hicks and well, I was still going to make it to 40 weeks.
That morning during my 17 mile commute to work I felt two contractions. Nonetheless, I still neglected to time the contractions. Once at the office I began to notice that the contractions began to get closer. At this point, it became difficult for me to speak through the contractions so I arranged for another associate at the firm to cover my afternoon hearing. How am I going to speak in front of the judge, I asked, if I have to stop every time I feel this pain? I also didn’t think I could make it from the parking structure to the actual courthouse with my roller, the files, and the sharp pain I was experiencing. If parking was a lot closer, I’m sure that I would have still made the trip to court and would have ended up giving birth to my child in court or stuck in traffic by myself.
I had a 3:50 pm OBGYN visit scheduled for that afternoon, so I stayed at the office until about 2pm thinking that I was going to go to my appointment just to be told that there was nothing to worry about just yet. On my way home I felt several contractions, and I finally started timing them only to realize they were about 3 minutes apart. Needless to say, this is the part where I started to panic. I texted my husband that he should probably come home because as I so eloquently told him “I think its time.”
The next few hours were a blur. I am unsure as t how I managed to drive home. I thought about driving to the medical offices were I had my appointment first but I opted not to since that was not where I was scheduled to give birth at anyways. The last thing I needed was to have to be taken in an ambulance from one hospital to another. Once I got home, my husband called me and stayed on the phone with me throughout his drive home. This was about a 40 minute drive. The contractions began to get closer and I could barely walk, or do much else for that matter. I began to feel sad because I was in so much pain and nobody was home. Per my mother’s advice I took a warm shower, which helped the pain. Finally when I got out of the shower my husband was pulling into our driveway.
Mind you, since we thought we still had about three or so weeks left, in a hurry, my husband had to install the car seat. We had just gotten the stroller system a few days before so he had to take everything out of the box and figure out what we needed and what we didn’t. This also meant he had to pack his hospital bag and finish putting everything in mine. Finally, at around 3:45 pm we began making our way to the hospital.
Here’s a quick tip: when you take the hospital tour, please please please remember that you can just park your car at the entrance when your wife is in labor. See, we didn’t remember that, so since my husband could not find the designated parking for expectant moms he parked in the middle of the parking lot and had me walk all the way to the hospital entrance. At this point the pain was unbearable, I wanted it all to be over.
Once I was finally up at triage and checked by a nurse I was told that I was 4 1/2 dilated and would be admitted right away. (It was funny because since I did not have a big belly, when my husband and I walked in to triage the nurses looked at me almost in disbelief that I could even be close to being in labor.) I was asked if I wanted epidural, which of course I did, and then it took them almost two hours to finally administer the epidural. This would probably be my only complain of the whole experience. According to my nurse, I was dilating very fast and I began to feel some of the more intense contractions prior to getting the epidural. Finally, at around 6:30 PM I could not feel the pain. I was overjoyed, to say the least, that I no longer felt anything haha. It was four hours later, at around 10:30 PM when I finally asked the nurse “are we ready?” … she proceeded to check and said “wow, I can see the head, its time.”
Quickly, my mom began to bang on the restroom door, which my husband had just gone into. “The baby is coming.” she began to say. My husband rushed out thinking the baby was actually out. For the next few minutes my husband and I pushed and pushed and finally, at 11:10 PM my baby was born.
I remember trying to count his little toes and fingers, I remember hearing my husband cry next to me and I began to worry, why was he crying? Why wasn’t my baby making noise? I suppose these are all first time parent concerns, right? Nonetheless, a few minutes later all was well in the world when the love of my life was finally placed in my arms.
I certainly hope that next time (If I do have another child), my labor and delivery story is as laid back as this one. One can only hope. I’de love to hear about the birth of your little ones so please share. I find these stories fascinating. Also, for those mommies with more than one, how did your second, third, etc pregnancies differ from your first?
