Part I is here
It was 9 a.m. and I was in a hospital gown strapped to several monitors. I was 3 centimeters dilated and 90% effaced. When the doctor completed her internal exam I screamed fuck, as the pain was incredible. She pretended to be shocked, but I’m sure she’s heard much worse. The nurse asked if I wanted an epidural. Hell yeah, I wanted an epidural, but the anesthesiologist was with another patient and it was going to be a while. The contractions were close together and intense. I had paperwork to sign and all I wanted were drugs to make the pain go away. A resident showed up and introduced herself. I hated her immediately. Another resident with a hairy chest and gold Star of David introduced himself. I liked him, but only because he was a big hairy Jew.
Boyfiend tried to get me to focus on my breathing. I was breathing through my contractions just fine, thank you, but they still really hurt. He brought out a blue plastic turtle-shaped back massager that we’d bought for the occasion. I know I glared at him, and may even have cursed at him when he told me to use it as a focal point. He put it away.
The anesthesiologist finally showed up and asked me to rate my pain on a scale of 1 to 10. How on earth does one rate their pain? It was indescribable, yet I’ve never had my arm caught in a tractor or experienced third degree burns, so who am I to rate my pain? I think I rated it somewhere around 7 or 8 as I didn’t want to seem like a pussy. He had me sit on the edge of the bed holding a pillow. All I could feel were the contractions as he inserted what I’m sure was an enormous needle into my back. In a few minutes the pain lessened. I could still feel the contractions, but after a half hour I didn’t feel any pain at all.
Around 11 a.m. medical staff suddenly swarmed around the room. Something was wrong, but the epidural had kicked in and I was too exhausted to really register what was going on. All I knew that the baby’s heartbeat had slowed to an alarming rate. The heartrate monitor wasn’t working so they had to attach something to his head by screwing it in. I knew that that probably wasn’t a good sign, but the hairy Jew seemed rather calm as he attached it. He had to break my water to get to the baby’s head. I was 4 centimeters dilated and 100% effaced. The baby’s heartrate returned to normal. Someone told me that the slowed heartbeat was the result of the epidural- sometimes the drugs cause the baby’s heartbeat to slow, but it returns to normal rather quickly. Everyone left the room.
The blonde resident I didn’t like returned and told me my mother was waiting outside and wanted to come in. The hospital has a policy that only birth coaches are allowed in the room. Boyfiend and I made it clear that she was most certainly not a birth coach. I think my mother must have annoyed the shit out of the hospital staff. She came into the room to visit. She was surprisingly well behaved. The doctor told me she was leaving since she’d been there for 24 hours and that her partner would actually be delivering the baby. Since he was the reason I chose that particular practice (he was on vacation when I switched OBs at 24 weeks)I didn’t mind at all. She asked why I couldn’t have gone into labor a day earlier.
Epidurals are incredible. I was still contracting regularly and I could pretty much feel when they were happening, but they didn’t hurt at all. I could still feel my legs, but I was pretty numb from my belly to the middle of my thighs. When nurses would change the pads beneath me I was able to lift myself so they could get to them, but I couldn’t feel hot or cold or pain, I could just feel (if that makes any sense.) Around 1.30 I took a nap. Boyfiend rubbed my forehead until I fell asleep. My mother tried on my sneakers while I fitfully slept. Boyfiend wanted her to leave. I would have, but the drugs kept me pretty mellow.
At 2 my cervix was checked again. I was between 4 and 5 centimeters dilated, which according to my doctor wasn’t enough. Because of the epidural my contractions had slowed to 4 to 5 minutes apart. My doctor, who hadn’t left yet, put me on a pitocin drip to speed up the contractions again.
My dad showed up and they somehow let him in, even though he wasn’t a birth coach either. He flirted with the nurse and the resident I didn’t like. He told the resident he was a proctologist. She believed him. The second doctor came in to say hello. He said that I’d probably deliver around dinner time. Boyfiend’s parents showed up in the waiting room. He went to say hi. I watched Oprah with my dad. Boyfiend came back and my parents went out to eat. I was incredibly hungry and thirsty since I’d had nothing to eat or drink since around 9 the previous night. The new nurse on duty brought me a popsicle. Orange. It was delicious.
Around 5 p.m. I was between 7 and 8 centimeters dilated, 100% effaced, and the baby had moved down. It seemed like things were moving along. I could really feel contractions and the baby in my pelvis and it was starting to get uncomfortable again. So uncomfortable that I was squirming and kicking my legs. It wasn’t quite painful, but I didn’t know if I could take another couple of hours of it. Another anesthesiologist came in to increase the epidural. I had to rate my pain on a scale of 1 to 10. I told him it wasn’t pain, it was just uncomfortable. He asked me to rate my discomfort on a scale of 1 to 10. I wasn’t very good at it. Boyfiend said it looked like I was pretty uncomfortable. I think I rated it a 6. Again, I didn’t want to seem like a pussy.
The new epidural slowed things down again. I was comfortable but growing impatient. Residents and nurses kept coming in and looking at the monitors. They kept saying that my baby was very happy and very comfortable. They upped my pitocin and my contractions started to come closer together again. I could feel them, but they didn’t hurt. I was really hungry, thirsty and tired and I hadn’t even started pushing. I wasn’t even fully dilated yet. My ice chips melted so I got to drink water. It was delicious. We watched Jeopardy. A resident came in to check on me. I answered a question in the middle of her sentence. Boyfiend said it looked like I was feeling better. A third nurse was assigned to me. We watched American Idol. The doctor was in the middle of an emergency next door. A woman’s baby had died and she was still pushing. My cervix hadn’t been checked in an awfully long time and I could really feel the baby down low. It felt like I had to poop, but I knew it was just the baby’s head.
Finally, at 9 the doctor was finished with his other patient. He came in, checked my cervix and told me it was time to push.
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