Henry’s Birth Story

I woke up early on the 19th of September to get some work done before my weekly prenatal appointment. At the appointment they did the NST monitoring (baby’s heartbeat and my contractions). I was contracting every 4 minutes but they were painless. The doctor came in and checked my cervix and I was still at 2cm or so (like I had been for weeks). She said my cervix was really ready and stretched me a bit and said that it might help ‘get things going.’

I went home and got back to work feeling pretty normal. Clay came home a bit early and we took a very quick trip to costco. I had a few irregular contractions at costco that I noticed and I felt really tired by the time we left. We got home and I started cooking for my meal exchange group. I made 6 cheeseburger casseroles and put one in the oven for us.

A little before 6pm George asked to play outside. I took him out and we threw the ball around a bit. Several of our neighbors also happened to be outside so we chatted with them, as well. One of them, Gillian, was our night time babysitter plan for labor. She said I looked like I was about to have the baby and I laughed.

Around 6:15pm we went inside for dinner. I started serving up and noticed contractions that were mildly painful pretty regularly. We sat down to eat and I started timing them. Every 2 minutes. Hmm….

I told Clay I wanted to go get in the bath and see if they eased up. The bath was nice, but they got worse. I didn’t think I was in labor because my water hadn’t broken like it did with George.

Clay brought George up and we started getting him ready for bed. By this time the contractions were getting very painful and my poor little boy noticed that his mommy wasn’t feeling good. It really upset him. He just kept wanting to hug me and we couldn’t get him to relax. He was crying for me and it was so hard. Much worse than the pain. I would hold him and sing during the contractions to try to calm him, but we realized that we needed to go. It was about 7:45pm and I had been “really” contracting for about an hour.

We put the plan into action and called both Gillian and Misty. Gillian arrived first. Misty came after and put George to bed–he knows her really well and she got him to sleep in about 15 minutes (AMAZING). Once I knew Misty was coming and Gillian could stay the night I was able to relax and focus on the labor.

We drove to the hospital and got there a little after 8:15pm. The whole way there I just kept telling Clay I wanted the epidural really, really bad. The pain was really intense by then and I was dying for some relief.

While Clay parked the car I walked up to L&D (with someone following me with a wheelchair, which now is comical to think about). I checked in at the desk and they asked how long I’d been contracting and I said 1.5 hours. They started to put me in triage until another contraction hit about 1 min later and I mentioned my last labor was only 4 hours. Suddenly a wheelchair appeared and I was taken directly to a delivery room.

I don’t remember a whole lot from this point–they checked me and I was 7cm. I was begging for some pain relief and they really tried to get me some, but it became pretty clear it wasn’t going to happen. Clay was incredible. He looked into my eyes and help my breathe/moan through each contraction. Some were so strong I couldn’t focus on anything, but he was always right there.

The nurses were also great–and I got my OB! With Kaiser, you have to take whomever is on call, but it happened to be my doctor. I love her, so it was wonderful to know she was there. (She even came into my room the next day to act out my labor–which was hilarious but also a little embarrassing). 🙂

I stood and labored next to the bed for awhile, but then sat on the edge of the bed because I kept thinking they would bring the epidural ANY MINUTE and I wanted to be in position. Clay said I kept saying, “I need medicine.” Ha.

But then, my water broke with shocking force and I could feel him coming into the birth canal. I scooted back onto the bed and everything in the room went nuts. They got my doctor in and she was yelling at them to break the bed down because she knew he was coming fast.

She told me to push and with one crazy animal wail and a big push his head was out. She unwrapped the cord from around his neck and I pushed again and he was out. They put him on my bare chest and he latched on right away. I have never felt pain like that in my entire life, but it was all over and there was my boy looking up at me.

Henry James Williams was born at 8:42pm on 9/19/13 after about 2 hours of labor. He was 7lbs 6oz and 21.5 inches long. Totally perfect and healthy. And I never got my damn epidural.

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