Birth Story

For those of you interested in all the details. I totally understand if that's not your thing, though. Feel free to skip it.

From the beginning of my pregnancy my dates have been a little unclear. You can read more about that here. The office I was seen at determined my due date to be October 13th based on an ultrasound done in February. I have always felt that was about a week off, but really a week isn't a big deal...until you're in those last few miserable weeks. Anyway, the pregnancy progressed normally and there was never any reason to worry.

Fast forward to my 36 week appointment. For some reason I was losing weight and my belly was only measuring 32 weeks, so my midwife ordered another ultrasound to make sure baby was growing well. Everything looked good and they estimated his weight to be 6 pounds exactly. Right on track.

So yesterday (Oct 14th) I went in for my 40+ week appointment-basically ready to beg, plead, cry, or whatever it took to get this baby out. I was dilated to 5 cm, baby was very low, and ready to come any second. My midwife stripped my membranes to get the contractions started, and told me to go walk a while and then come in to Labor and Delivery when the contractions started.

I didn't go walk, but went home and got things ready and dropped Tyler off with a friend. By the time we got to their house I was definitely in active labor.

We got to the hospital right around 6:00 and got checked in, blood drawn, and papers signed. That took til 7:00. By then, my midwife was there and asked about pain management. I had wanted to try doing it naturally, but honestly was a little scared of the unknown. I told her I wanted to get in the whirlpool tub and pray about it for a few minutes before I decided. Keith, my mom, and I all prayed about it and decided not to get the epidural. I was in the tub, which was wonderful and relaxing, for about 30 minutes before I decided to get out and have her break my water. Since we had made up our minds, we might as well get the show on the road. I had been dilated to a 6 when I first got in the bath and when I got out 30 minutes later, imagine my surprise when I was dilated to a 9. She broke my water, gave me a dose of pain medicine through the IV, and about 30 minutes later I was ready to push. I pushed for a very intense 30 minutes, during which I was confident I would sooner die than push that baby out. But out he came. All 9 pounds 9 ounces and 22 inches of him. Wow!! No wonder I thought I was going to die. He was one ounce shy of weighing 2 pounds more than Tyler did. Having him out was such a relief.

After he was born, given his size and the fact that my placenta had already started to calcify, the midwife determined that he was more overdue than we thought. But he is here, healthy, and wonderful. We are so thankful for this wonderful blessing to our family.

So there you have it. The story of my big boy.