Madeleine Clare's Birth Story

WARNING: There is probably more about my body and birth than you may want to know. Proceed at your own risk! :)

The evening of my due date, February 11, Eli did NOT want to go to bed. This is unusual for him, usually by bed time the little guy is tired and ready to sleep. He fussed and procrastinated and generally was crabby about it. He said he'd miss me, which I thought was odd. I finally got him to bed and went to bed myself. I woke up at 2:30am with strong back labor. I got up, used the restroom and while I was up Eli came into our room crying that his legs hurt and he needed mama cuddles.
I was in quite a bit of pain already so I gave him so ibuprofen and some water and sent him back to bed with lots of cuddles and love from mama.
I went back to bed and tried to relax through what was already extremely strong back labor. The contractions started off right away at 1 minute long and 5 minutes apart. By 4 I was tired of timing them and rolled over, choosing to ignore them and focus on sleep. I was able to dose between them, but had to sit up or curl up and focus through them. By 5 I was unable to lay down any longer. I woke Geoff up and got in the shower. Geoff called my mom and asked her if she could come take care of Eli. I stayed in the shower until the hot water ran out and then got out and got dressed and ready for the hospital.

My mom arrived around 8 and Geoff and my mom encouraged me to call my midwife and see if she could check me. I didn't want to go in and then be told I was only a centimeter or two or worse, get to the hospital and then give them time to say I hadn't progressed enough in the right amount of time and be pressured for a section. The back labor however was so intense at this point I was having to moan through the contractions and Geoff was having to push pretty hard to offset them. Geoff was worried if I waited too long I wasn't going to be able to tolerate the car ride or worse, I'd give birth before we got there :P

I called and one of my favorite midwives was on duty. She is the picture of a hippie midwife. She grew up on a farm, birthed 7 children, cloth diapered, breast fed, just all around my kind of people. She was the right person to have by myside during this labor and delivery. She checked my cervix and declared me a 4. I had lost my mucus plug and was having lots of bloody show and she felt like I was making adequate progress to go ahead and go in to labor and delivery. I explained my concerns to her and she assured me she was on duty all night and would let me labor to my hearts content as long as baby was OK. Geoff and I headed out for the hospital, stopping at Kum and Go for a cherry limeade icee :)

Once we arrived at the hospital the nurses got me registered, asked me to change into a labor gown and wanted to hook me up to an IV and continuous monitoring. I was frustrated. How was I supposed to move this baby down and get the counter pressure I desperately needed from bed?! I asked to be left to walk around and move the baby down. They tried putting on remote monitors but couldn't keep the baby on the monitor. Maddie was fine, but as I was moving she was moving away from the monitor and they'd lose the trace. They tried probably 12 times to get her back on the monitor and had so much goop on my belly I had to discard the gown and my labor was fizzling. I broke down at this point. I wanted nothing more than to go home to my boy and my bed. I was in tears when my midwife came in and asked what was wrong. She gently cleaned up my belly for me, and told me I could go home or I could stay and get serious about birthing this baby. I told her I was serious but couldn't get in the zone because I kept being interrupted every 4 minutes by someone adjusting something. She went up and talked to the doctor (since I was a VBAC, the midwives were my primary but they had to be supervised by a doc) and got the OK to do 20 minutes of monitoring every hour. This was much more agreeable to me and I was able to get back to business. After some time on the birth ball my labor picked back up and was immediately excruciating. My midwife came in to monitor some contractions and help coach me through keeping my mouth low and open to encourage my bottom to open. She ran me a bath with some bath salts and told me to soak and relax and let the baby come down.

I got in the tub and felt like time stopped. I don't know how long I was in there, but more or less I could deal with the contractions in there. Once the water started cooling off I got out because Geoff couldn't apply counter pressure with me in the tub. My midwife commented she had rarely seen such intense back labor, even though Maddie was positioned pretty well, I felt like my spine was being smashed with a hammer through each contraction. She asked if I would like to be checked again once I got out of the tub and I agreed, wanted to get an idea of how much work I had left to do.

Around 1pm I was at 6cm and barely coping. Around 4pm she needed to monitor me again and asked if she could check me again because I was not coping well. I was barely able to hang on through continuous, long contractions. My contractions were lasting 1-2 minutes each and some were double peaking, meaning I was basically having two on top of each other. I was in tears, screaming through them. I felt like I was going to crawl up the wall, exorcist style. My midwife tried helping to encourage Maddie to rotate, as we suspected she was OP, she tried the birthing ball, massage, a hot bath, lunges. etc. Maddie would not turn.

Around 5pm I had bruises blooming across my back and Geoff's wrists ached from constantly pushing so hard against the pain. I was screaming hysterically through the pain. I asked to be checked again and was only at a 7. The nurse I had  mentioned that I had the right to pain meds if I changed my mind. I was pretty firm going in that I didn't want them. Geoff asked me to think about, because, frankly I think I was scaring him. I was texting two good friends of mine, Katie V and Katie Z, at the time and both of them encouraged me to follow what I knew to be best. I cried and cried and finally asked for the epidural. As Katie Z said "better living through pharmaceuticals".  In hindsight, I am afraid I would have had to do a c-section with Maddie if I had waited another hour or two. My body was starting to shut down. I was screaming and out of control during the contractions, vomiting and shaking, and out of my head. I tried to meditate and find my peace and I could not. The nurse pumped half a bag of fluids in me and got anesthesia up to start the epidural.

Once the anesthesiologist finally got up there I was in for the worst 10 minutes. My contractions were double peaking and coming every 3-5 minutes. I was barely holding on with intense counter pressure from Geoff and now had to hold stock-still to let him place the needle.

I expected the relief to be almost immediate. It was not. Apparently placing an epidural is not an exact science and I ended up with a "window" where it would not reach in my right side. I was now stuck, flat on my back, with a fairly good sized area in my back on the right side where I was feeling the contractions and couldn't do anything. They gave me another medicine I could push every 10 minutes to keep pumping extra meds in to counter the pain. Around 8 I was finally pretty comfortable. I got to where I was only feeling the peak of each contraction, then the peak of every 3rd or so. I continued to labor and rock my hips as best as I could to deal. After a couple of hours (? I am not sure how long, maybe 2 hours?) I had an anterior lip of cervix left around 8:30 my midwife asked if she could break my water. I consented, with much trepidation because once they broke my water with Eli, things went south fast. My bag was bulging though and she felt comfortable seeing how Maddie was doing without the sac. Maddie was a trooper! Her heart rate would accelerate with my contractions, apparently she liked it. My 10 I only had a small lip of cervix left. My midwife asked me to go ahead and try pushing and see how I did. During my next contraction I pushed. Maddie liked the pushing, but as soon as I stopped her heart rate tanked. She needed the force of the contractions apparently. At this point the epidural was hardly working and I could feel mostly everything. I had a small pocket around my cervix and bladder that was still numb. They inserted a couple different probes and catheters to internally monitor Maddie. I finally felt her turn and drop down. My midwife called the doctor because she was very concerned about Maddie's heart rate as I was pushing. The doctor came up and had me push through 6 or so more contractions, and told me if I didn't push her out they were going to have to do something else. I screamed at her that I was pushing her out!

Finally the doctor got out a small vacuum to help. I yelled NO! and asked her what the risks were and she said they were minimal at this point compared to the risk of continuing to push. I consented and in two more pushes with very minimal pressure from the vacuum, Madeleine Clare was born onto my chest at 10:59pm. I cried, and cried and couldn't believe I did it. Geoff cried too and kept telling me how proud of me he was.

Maddie pinked up pretty fast and made her way to the breast. She latched right on and nursed and nursed. They finally cut her cord and weighed and measured her. 7lbs 6oz and 20 inches long. She was here. As soon as they set her on my chest the nurse came in and said my mom and dad had just arrived and asked if they could come in. She sent my mom in and left my dad in the waiting room as they were still stitching me up, I had a 2nd degree tear that required some stitching.

I can't believe I did it.

birthy thoughts

No, R2 is not here yet. However I have had so many birthy thoughts swirling around in my head that I felt like sitting down and releasing them into the world and into God's hands would be soothing to my soul. I felt so much relief after I posted the blog post about trying to conceive this little lady, I wanted to see if writing everything out helped me focus and get ready to birth her.

Ever since Eli's peaceful, thought out, respectful but emergency cesarean birth, I have wanted to try again. I want to birth a baby the way women were designed to. I harbor no bitterness or resentment towards Eli's birth. Every step of the way I felt like my wishes were honored, respected and my voice was listened to. I believe that is all anyone can hope for in a birth, unexpected things happen all the time and that is why *I* chose to birth in the hospital, it gives me a sense of peace. Eli was delivered at PVH in Fort Collins, which is part of University Health Systems. When I discovered I was pregnant with this baby, we immediately decided to deliver at PVH's sister hospital, the brand-new, state of the art, MCR. We automatically assumed our experience would be the same, the same amazing staff, respectful environment and supportive experience that we loved so dearly with Eli. My main midwife. K, was on board with my plans to VBAC. We discussed the causes of Eli's cesarean birth (OP and asynclitic presentation, basically he was sunny side up with his ear to his shoulder and the cord wrapped around him multiple times) and we discussed how I went into labor on my own, how I progressed on my own all the way to 8cm, how I tolerated labor with no pain meds and everything was great....until it wasn't. After they broke my water with E (with my consent after stalling at 8cm for a while) his heart rate tanked. My heart rate tanked. I was blacking out, and hardly breathing on my own. My amazing doula had me turning over in bed as much as I could after we made the call to get the epidural. At that point I knew, he would be a c-section. Honestly the word brought relief to me. I knew Eli wasn't going to tolerate labor much longer. K agreed that everything surrounding Eli's birth was basically the perfect storm of things to happen to lead to a true emergency c-section. We tried everything we could, and I am grateful for modern medicine that safely brought my boy into this world.
However, this birth is different. This baby is different. And I want to try to birth her vaginally. I felt like everyone was on board, until I saw a different midwife in my practice around November. She was colder and more "interventiony" than K. This lady immediately started in on how MCR doesn't allow VBACS (I HATE that word "allow" how do you NOT allow someone to use their body for the thing it was designed to do?!!?!) and I would need to accept a repeat c-section. I was in tears. I left the appointment and called Geoff, frantic about trying to change providers and deliver at a different hospital. At my next appointment I saw K again and she reassured me it was not a big deal, we just would refuse the csection, they can't force me to have surgery if I don't want it. I have been anxious and frustrated since then. I once read in Ina May Gaskin's book that the cervix is smart, she writes about mothers who have been in active labor only to have someone enter the room, or circumstances change only to have the cervix reverse dialate and close back up. I fully believe this is where I am sitting right now.
I had not seen that midwife until last week, at my 38 week appointment. Before I get into that, I want to mention I fell at work and had to go to labor and delivery to be monitored for 4 hours, standard procedure. One of the other midwives was there and ordered a quick ultrasound to check placenta and fluid levels. The ultrasound tech came in and did a very quick ultrasound, with no real pictures of the baby except to confirm she is in fact head down and facing my back (yay).
Anyway, at my 38 week appointment I was scheduled to see that midwife again, the one who shattered my confidence earlier in my pregnancy. She came in my room, spent 3 minutes finding the heart beat, asked if I was still planning on a TOLAC (trial of labor after cesarean) and marched me up to the receptionist and ordered I meet with an OBGYN and schedule and ultrasound, because all the sudden this baby is "too big" to birth vaginally, all of this despite the fact I JUST HAD AN ULTRASOUND and I was NOT measuring large, at all. I was in shock. She starts ranting about how VBACs are dangerous and carry such a high risk of uterine rupture and how I need to be prepared to not have one in case R2 is too big.
In shock I made the appointments as directed and left, feeling defeated and scared. I called Geoff and relayed all of this to him, in tears. His response was perfect, basically he said "eff that, you do what you want".
I debated it, talked briefly with an old friend about it, and decided to cancel the ultrasound. I felt like the entire purpose of it was to give them a reason to tell me I couldn't attempt a VBAC.
I kept the appointment with the doctor though, as it is in fact hospital policy. I had that appointment on Wednesday this week, at 39 weeks pregnant I dragged Eli with me to meet the doc.
I had already decided I was going to refuse a vaginal exam because I have heard of doctors stripping membranes or breaking water without asking and I did NOT want to give anyone the chance. Not to mention I was extremely uncomfortable with the situation and didn't want someone I just met sticking their hand up my hoo-ha! The nurse was annoyed that I refused to undress and immediately called the doctor in. The doctor was pushy and rude, and kept saying she couldn't tell if I was a good candidate for a VBAC without checking my pelvis for physical anomalies. I politely stood my ground and refused the exam. I tried to explain my reasoning but was cut off everytime I started talking. I was humiliated and frustrated. The doctor then pulled out the form for me to sign to consent to the VBAC. I basically signed a waiver saying that even though there is >1% chance of uterine rupture (the same chance of uterine rupture in a NON VBAC is labor is induced or augmented with pitocin) that I had to accept all risk and responsibility. The doctor wasted no time going into a long diatribe about all the graphic and terrible things that could happen to me and my baby.
I am not even in labor and they're playing the dead baby card. I finally said "I understand, can I sign and go?"
The doctor admitted I sounded like I had done my research and she didn't see any reason I shouldn't at least try to VBAC.
So here I sit, at 39w1d (Eli was born at 38w6d), as pregnant as I have ever been, scared to go into labor because I feel like I am walking into a fire fight as soon as I step foot into that hospital. Its a frustrating and scary feeling. I don't have my heart 100% set on a VBAC in the sense that I am going to be crushed if it doesn't happen, but I would like to feel supported and trusted that my body can, or might be able to, or at least not doubted until there is a reason to doubt. I strongly feel like Eli's birth was a fluke, a weird circumstance, and a perfect storm of weird situations that aligned for him to be born via cesarean. I don't feel like its my only option, I don't feel like I have no choice, I don't feel like I am doomed to fail. I do not want my baby cut out and removed from me like a tumor. I want to labor, and birth her. If, for some reason, circumstances dictate otherwise, I will relent and consent to other options, but we don't know that yet. I just want to be trusted to try.

I spoke with a lovely mama friend on the phone a night or two ago and she prayed for peace over me and this baby, and for this baby girl to come in her perfect time with the perfect people in the room. I am offering that prayer up to God now. I am ready, I am trying to be ready anyway, for this baby girl to come in her perfect time and in her perfect way. I am praying the midwife on duty when I get there is the right one with the knowledge and skill to help me deliver the way that God intends. I am also praying I know exactly the right moment to leave for the hospital, as my own mama has to drive 2 hours to get here to take care of Eli. I am trying very hard to shake off the fear and doubt and worry that I am feeling right now and prepare my mind, soul and body to do its work. Geoff and I made the call the tomorrow will by my last day of work. I am doubting that decision now as I physically feel like I could work through Wednesday (my due date) next week, but believe it is the right choice for us because now I can use any time I have to rest and relax and mediate on this sweet baby girl. I am terrified, I feel like someone is going to jump out at any time now and yell "April Fools! No baby for you!" Like this was all some sick joke. I am trying to let go of the doubt and face the reality that I *can* and will have this baby sometime soon.
If you are the praying kind, and you have read this far, please pray for my birth, Pray that R2 comes in God's perfect time, and in God's perfect way. Pray that this fear and doubt that is plaguing me disappears and I am strong and capable. Pray that we know the exact time to leave for the hospital and the perfect people to be with me in the room when I deliver. I surrender all of this to God's hands.