Well I had her, the most adorable beautiful thing in the world. What strikes me the most about this whole experience of pregnancy, labor, and motherhood is that nobody can ever really fully prepare you for it. No matter how many books you read or how many friends you have that already have children who are filled with advice and help.Being pregnant was surreal. I know I was pregnant, but I never really KNEW what that actually meant for my life. I loved it at times and I hated it more times than not. But it was the start of something, an adventure, a long needed life change. I always thought women were crazy when they said they miss being pregnant, but now I know what that feels like. I miss the anticipation of it all. Not the actual physical part, but the excitement and anxiety in realizing I was going to be a mother.
Labor? I NEVER could have prepared myself for that! During my entire pregnancy I would hear labor story after labor story and what I always came away with is that it will hurt. It could hurt a lot or it could hurt a ton. It might not hurt bad enough for an epidural or it could hurt more than enough for 10 epidurals…but it was going to hurt!
I started feeling contractions on Wednesday morning (Dec. 6th) although it took me most of the day to realize they were real contractions. D came home with a friend at around 6:30 who he had promised to bring to Target (the guy had never been!) so I decided to tag along to get up and walk around. While D and his friend were going all ga-ga over the LED Christmas lights I was walking aisle by aisle holding my belly and breathing through the contractions. I really can’t explain the feeling of being in Target, of all places, watching D shop for Christmas lights, while I held onto shelves when a contraction would take a little of my breath away. We got out of there fairly quickly once D realized I wasn’t just faking it and headed home to seriously time the contractions. After a couple of hours of seeing that they were coming pretty regularly at 3.5 minutes a part, we decided to call the Doctor who was on call(who made me cry by the way when I was talking to her cause she was so blase about the whole thing - bitch). She told us to head to the hospital to get checked out. With excitement and a bit of fear I called my sister and told her we were heading in. She said she would meet us there. After the nurse checked me out it turns out that my body had done nothing - no dilating at all! They said I could go home or stay and get a morphine shot to sleep and rest up for tomorrow. I decided to stay since I couldn’t imagine sleeping through them without help and since I had a chest cold and didn’t sleep at all the night before. The next morning they came in to check on me again and ultimately send me home, but just as the Doctor was talking to me my water started to break. I say started because what little came out of me was nothing compared to the gush that came a few hours later. They started me on pitocin at a slow drip to get things started and for most of the day I labored fine through that. I was even kind of proud of myself for remembering to stay calm and not fight the contractions. At this time my Mom, sister, and best friend had come to join in on the process. Every time I had a contraction that I really couldn’t talk through I would breathe through it then open my eyes to see them all just grinning at me like fools. I mean I know they were excited and all, but a concerned expression here or there might have helped! Instead I got the grinning fools cheering squad. They did have me laughing quite a few times though.
Finally the Doctor came back in to check me and I still had only dilated 3 centimeters. While she was poking and prodding around in there she saw that there was still some membrane intact. I heard her say “I’m just going to break this” which she did. A hush filled the room for a second and then I felt it…”Ummm…uh oh” and like a geyser, as D describes it, an entire lake of meconium filled fluid burst forth. I Heard the Doctor and Nurse both say a lot of “Oh Geez. Oh no. Oh my’s” as they scrambled to get out of the way from the spray. I looked over to see my Mom, sister, and D all sitting in a row as if they were catching a movie and as one they all leaned to the left to get a better view of the gunk rushing out of my body, then as one again they leaned to right to watch it’s path down my back and run on to the floor. “Ewww….grossssss….sorry about that!” I felt so bad for the nurse that was frantically trying to stop the flow. Finally the clan sprang into action and helped me from the bed. I stood there with the yellow fluid flowing down my legs, clinging to D, as my sister tried to towel me off. I think D was the one that had to pull off my squishy soaked socks. And after that, the contractions came fast and furious, and EPIDURAL was all I could think or say. I quickly found my threshold of pain. I had my head on the bed, ass on the ball, rolling back and forth crying out “I can’t do this. I can’t do this” while my family looked on. At that point I wasn’t aware of anyone in the room but me and this baby that was clawing her way out. OUCH! OUCH! OUCH! “well that’s why they call it hard labor dear” - this from my mother who may have been trying to be helpful but…well you know.
Then the door opened and in walked my dream - the guy that would take all the pain away. Thank god for the epidural. thank you thank you thank you. For the next couple of hours I slept on and off and continued to contract myself to full dilation. I knew it was time to push when I felt like I really needed to take the biggest dump of my life - a baby sized dump. That’s when they called in the Doctor. My friend told me later that I announced to the room that my butt cheeks were shaking from the effort of trying not to push to keep the baby in. Another friend told me that when she asked how I felt, I said “like a mack truck just drove out of my ass” That really does sum it up.
Pushing - even though I had the epidural it was still so hard, mostly because my lungs were filled with green gunga from the chest cold. I pushed for an hour and half, puking once, pooping a few times (you know a guy really loves you when he still calls you beautiful after farting, pooping, leaking, and bleeding all over him) until I just couldn’t do it anymore. I was hyperventilating just trying to get enough air into my lungs to push the baby out. In the end the Dr had to cut me, and from what the nurse said it was a bad episiotomy (and I can feel that it was now!), and then vacuum the head out of me the last little way. In a haze Stella came into the world. In one bloody slippery mess and gush she came free of me and was placed on my chest. I cried. D cried. And in that instance I became the woman I always mocked on “The Baby Story” on TLC. I was in awe of her instantly. She was - is - perfect. D in true form immediately broke out the camera and took a gazillion pictures of her - some containing a bit of my boob in the shot, and some of her hanging out on the warming table. I loved watching him freak out over her - it helped distract me from the delivery of the placenta and the neverending stitch-fest the Dr. had on my bottom. Nothing though, can distract you from the feeling when they start kneading your gut like a big pile of dough to help get things out. I whined like a little girl. But it was done! It was over and I had beautiful Stella!
Motherhood? I will never sleep again…it seems. And my nipples are two nubs of firey pain. She nurses like a champ but a the expense of my tender tender breats. But I am in love…I have never felt love like this before. As I alternate between beaming at her to bawling my eyes out at the thought of anything bad happening to her. It’s an emotional rollercoaster. I can’t seem to get off it right now. At any given moment I could cry - even now.
I’m going now…it’s time to go squirt warm water on my bottom, apply a couple of tucks pads, and pray my stitches won’t pop as they seem to want to do with every cough I have (I’m still getting over the cold!). Stella stirs as well. I hear her soft little squeak. I know when I get up and go look at her she will have her eyes open and she will be looking for me…for food really - for my boobs…someday she’ll look just for me though and I can’t wait for that.
