I don't know nothin' 'bout birthin' babies

If I use the programming for TLC as a compass, it is clear that people love a birth story (there are seriously at least three shows about giving birth on this channel). So I'm going to share my birth story with you. If you don't like birth stories, you should probably skip this one.

Before getting pregnant, I didn't know much about babies or pregnancy. I was the baby of my family by seven years. My parents and brother even refer to me as "the baby." Most of my friends were just starting to have babies. I'm good with little kids -- taught them horseback riding lessons, was a camp counselor, and an arts and crafts director, but babies were a mystery to me. I learned all I could about pregnancy during its duration and read the Bradley Method natural childbirth book; however, none of it fully prepared me for the actual event, as the title of this post indicates (which is a quote I borrowed from Ms. Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind).

I checked in at Piedmont Hospital at 9 a.m. on January 19. My amniotic fluid was starting to get low, as I was four days past my due date. Our midwife wanted to see if we could get labor started with Cervadil, which softens the cervix so it can dilate. The day before, I was only dilated to 1 centimeter, and you have to get to 10 before you can even start to push the baby out. Labor is really just contractions of the uterus working to open the cervix those 10 centimeters.

The night before we checked in to the hospital, we ate dinner at Scalini's, which is famous for its labor-inducing eggplant parmesan. If you eat the eggplant parmesan and give birth within 48 hours, your baby is a member of the 2nd Generation Club -- http://www.scalinis.com/Bambino.htm. We figured even if it didn't work, it would be delicious. It was delicious (and it did work -- this means that we get to eat a free meal and Annabel gets a Scalini's t-shirt).

At the hospital, the Cervadil was administered at 11 a.m. The plan was to leave the Cervadil in for 11 hours, then to put another Cervadil in and wait another 11 hours. If that didn't work, we were going to have to move on to Pitocin, which starts artificial contractions. I really did not want to go that route, as my midwife well knew, so we were all hoping for the best with the more conservative course of action of Cervadil. I had been having some contractions, but they were not terribly painful or frequent. The nurses told us our baby would hopefully be born sometime in the next few days. Fox and I settled in with Season 1 of Arrested Development and got to waiting.

However, at 3:15, my water broke. It wasn't nearly as dramatic as I thought it would be (perhaps because my fluid was a bit low) -- it was really just a trickle that caused me to call the nurse and say "I think maybe my water broke?" She confirmed that it had broken. It caused the Cervadil strip to fall out though. My contractions were much more regular at this point, and I was hopeful we were making progress. Judith, my midwife, came in around 5:30 to check me... but I was only 1 1/2 centimeters along. However, since my water had broken, and I was having regular contractions, she moved me to a labor and delivery room at 5:55. Fox and I got back to watching Arrested Development. The contractions got stronger, so we started walking around the hospital, which I had read was helpful in both dealing with contractions and moving the baby along. It was great to be able to move around. That is another benefit of not having pain medication administered, which confines you to a bed. I had to sit in a chair and have monitors strapped around my stomach for 20 minutes every hour so the nurse could monitor both my contractions and the baby's heartbeat to make sure that she was handling the contractions well, but other than that, I was free to move about however felt right.

At 7:40 I got my first big surprise of the birthing process. I had gotten incredibly nauseated and started barfing. That was not pleasant. I also started to get very hot during my contractions and very cold in between them -- so cold that I would shake pretty violently. There were at least three minutes between each contraction though, so I could rest during that time. The worst part was not knowing how much progress I'd made. There were at least three other births going on that involved my midwife, so I had not been checked since 5:30.

At 9:00 I started to get scared. The contractions were coming one on top of the next with no breaks in between and had been for a little while. I was starting to feel the effects of staying up late the last three nights with Kerouac, and I was worn out physically and emotionally. I was just laying on my side on the couch in my room, trying to be as limp as possible and trying to send my brain to a very calm place. I felt like I must still be 8 to 12 hours away from starting to push the baby out based on how long I'd been at the hospital, and I knew I could not keep this up that long and still have energy left to push. At 9:30, I caved in and expressed this fear out loud to Fox. I told him I had to have the epidural so I could sleep through the night or else I was going to end up with a c-section because I was too tired to push. I asked him to find Judith to check me so we'd know how far along I was.

Poor Fox. He had been trying so hard to reassure me during this last hour and a half that had been so difficult. He would rub my back and tell me I was doing great, but he had no idea how far along I was either. He went to find Judith, but she was attending to another birth and there was no one else around to check my progress. I was starting to get desperate -- once I had given in to the idea that I couldn't have the natural birth I wanted, I just wanted to get the epidural and sleep. Fox finally found a nurse who said that a bag of hydrating fluids would have to be administered before I could get an epidural, so she started that going and said it would take 20 minutes. This was at 10:05. At 10:25, only 1/3 of the bag was in me -- I have no idea why it was going so slowly. Luckily, word had finally gotten to Judith that I was asking for an epidural, so I think she knew it must be pretty bad for me. She checked my progress. I was at 9 centimeters.

I was on the bathroom floor on my hands and knees working through another series of contractions, but I heard Fox talking to Judith. He was asking how long before we'd have the baby. She said it would be before midnight whether we liked it or not. I had them stop the hydrating fluids and told Judith that I didn't want the epidural. She started running a bath for me in which to finish my labor. I got up to go to the bathroom before I got into the tub. At that point, I realized that I didn't have to go to the bathroom -- I had to start pushing the baby out.

Fox helped me to the bed, and I laid on my left side. I was feeling really good because the contractions had stopped. They had been replaced by a feeling of intense pressure, which though uncomfortable, was a good sign. Judith told me to tell her when I started to feel ready to push and to put my chin to my chest and curl around my stomach. Fox held my left hand, standing on top of the towel that was covering my barf. I held my right knee to my chest and got ready to give my first push. At this point, Fox remembered the birth mix and turned it on. I gave my first push to Nada Surf's "Blizzard of '77." It felt good. I rested.

I probably pushed 6 times with about five minute breaks in between. During that time, I heard Van Morrison's "Moondance," Pink Floyd's "Breathe In the Air," and Elton John's "Tiny Dancer." I remember each one. Judith told me she saw our baby's hair (and she had a lot of it), and I decided to get serious. Nirvana's "Drain You" came on, and I laughed to myself. I gave the biggest push yet and wow, did it ever burn. The worst part about pushing was knowing that as soon as you stopped, you lost some of your progress, as the baby slipped back some. My favorite Beatles song, "I Will" came on, but I knew it was so short that there was no way she'd be born to it. I knew this would be my last push. I was not going to relax until she was out this time. I rested all through "I Will." Next up was "Mayonaise" by the Smashing Pumpkins. If I thought the last push burned, I was wrong. I felt her head crown, and I stopped pushing. This is known as the "ring of fire" and once you get there, you are supposedly home free because her head will not slip back once it crowns. You are supposed to stop pushing to give yourself a little time to stretch. I looked down and could see the top of her head. I thought it was over at that point, but unlike most babies, ours had shoulders wider than the circumference of her head. That part was unpleasant. Fox told me what I said (shrieked?) at this point, and it was pretty funny.

After the shoulders, everything was magic. Annabel Jane Fox had entered the world at 11:28. Judith cleared off Annabel's nose and mouth (which gave one short cry) and gave her to me immediately. We spent an hour together, skin to skin, while Fox cut the cord, I delivered the placenta, got two stitches. She started nursing within 20 minutes of being born. She was very alert but did not cry -- she merely seemed to take it all in. I thought I would cry, but I didn't. I just felt very calm yet exhilarated. Once those shoulders were out, I felt amazing.

Looking back, the hardest part of labor was just not knowing how much I'd progressed. It hurt like crazy, but the worst part was thinking that it was going to be like that for the next 8 or so hours, when really I'd gone from 1 to 9 centimeters in 5 hours (which is why it hurt so much). But, I wouldn't change a thing, because overall, it was amazing and resulted in an amazing new person.

She's now 12 days old and a very sweet girl.