Welcoming Little Charlotte

Well, let’s just say Charlotte’s birth story was a bit traumatic.  Not that anybody walks out of labor and says, "that was a piece of cake; let’s do it again tomorrow.”  However, my body has never been so exhausted before in it’s life!  Thankfully, we have our precious little girl to make me forget about everything that happened (yeah right…that will be forever ingrained in my head!)

So let’s start at the beginning…I went into work on Friday, November 1st.  Keep in mind this was our original due date.  But ever since our first ultrasound, she measured to be due on November 8th.  No big deal because my cycles were never 28 days, so it was no surprise.  Anyway, with everything that happened with my family, I was planning on taking Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday off of work for bereavement days.  Thus, my next day back to work would be the day before I was due, November 7th.  I worked my butt of on Friday as if it was my last day there before maternity leave in the event something would to happen in that next week.  Thank goodness I did…

I got home from work that Friday a little early, and started doing things on our to-do list.  Derek was upstairs hanging some picture frames in the nursery and I was downstairs steam vacuuming our carpet.  I had a question so I yelled at Derek to come help.  All of the sudden, around 5:00, my water broke.  Not like a gush or anything…but almost as if I had peed a little.  I ran to the bathroom (thinking what the heck!).  I started just leaking every couple of seconds.  I told Derek I thought my water broke.  We just stared at each other for minutes and kinda giggled.  No way was this happening!!

Derek went into a frenzy and I just sat there (yes, on the toilet) thinking, oh my gosh, I’m having a baby SOON!  Derek wanted me to spring into action with him, but I just needed a few moments (ok, a good 10 minutes) of quiet time.  After that, I had Derek finish steam vacuum while I took a shower and got ready.  It was always my plan to eat and shower before heading to the hospital as I heard many moms say they wished they would have done these things.  About an hour later, we were heading to the hospital to have a baby!

Right before leaving for the hospital!

By the time we got to the hospital, I wasn’t feeling any contractions.  I was 3cm dilated and there were some contractions that I felt pressure, but other than that, I walked into labor and delivery feeling like a joke because I could calmly say, “I’m in labor.”  I always imagined it to be a bit more dramatic.

By the time we got into our room around 7:30pm, I was feeling every contraction.  I requested to be monitored every 20 minutes, so I wouldn’t be stuck in a bed.  Derek and I walked the unit around until about 9:30pm.  It was then that the contractions were starting to get a bit (ok, a lot) uncomfortable. 

Around 11:00pm and 6cm dilated, I decided to request my epidural.  Honestly, it was probably the best thing I’ve ever asked for in my life!  After midnight, I was ready to rock and roll.  We were really happy with how naturally and fast my body was progressing.

2:00am came and I was 10cm dilated.  The nurse came in and checked me and said, “Well, you’re at 10.”  Derek and I both asked at the same time, what does that mean?!  LOL, we didn’t know what was coming…

Seconds before starting to push (aka the hardest experience of my life!)

I started to push and it was at this moment the team realized our baby was in a weird position.  Throughout that whole morning, I had several doctors/health professionals try and turn her.  However, she wasn’t moving a bit.  After about 4 hours, things became a bit frustrating.  Our midwife was at a loss of what to do because she wasn’t moving.  She called in one of the on-call doctors from our practice and he delivered some bad news.  He gave me 2 options: 1) turn off my epidural or 2) have a c-section. Basically, I didn’t say anything for about 5 minutes because I was trying to collect my thoughts.  I was terrified of feeling those contractions again and I really wanted to avoid a c-section.  Basically, my worst case scenario was coming true…

I chose the turning off the epidural.  My attitude was still very positive at this point and I wasn’t ready to give up trying to do this birth naturally.  However, turning off the epidural was the biggest mistake I made that morning.  Their thought was if I felt the contractions, it would cause me to push harder.  Not only did it not make me push harder, it caused my body to become severely exhausted, and of course, I was in a lot of pain.

About 2 hours later around 8am, I stopped everything.  I literally couldn’t go on and there had to be an alternative.  At this point, I had been up for 26+ hours and my body was starting to run a temperature, my blood pressure was high, and I felt like I was having an out of body experience.  I would be talking and once I stopped, I would realize I just carried on a conversation with somebody but had no idea what was said.  I was d.o.n.e!  Thankfully, little Charlotte was unphased by the whole labor process.  She was quite content.

Our midwife said she would request for another physician to come in (from home, bless his heart!) for another opinion of what to do.  There was a mention of using forceps, and honestly, I didn’t care what they had to do to get her out of there!  An hour later, 9:00am, he walked in and assessed everything.  He said he could use the vacuum as long as I could give him 2 more pushes.  I didn’t believe him at this point and swore that I was going to be the first pregnant girl in the world to be pregnant forever.  However, after 2 contractions, Charlotte Mae was out and wailing.  She was born at 9:33am.  I couldn’t believe my ears and eyes that she was here and I had delivered our daughter!



I ended up with a "nice little" episiotomy involving 50 stitches; but hey, at that point I didn't care and just wanted her out!  Surprisingly, recovery has been pretty doable and I started feeling better about 5 days after delivery.  I'm just so thankful she is here and everybody is healthy!!  I'm trying to soak in every single moment I can.