The day that we came home from the hospital with our first son Cooper, we promised ourselves that our next birth experience would be different. Not that Cooper's was a bad one it was just full of circumstances that we could have prevented had we educated ourselves as well as some unfortunate things that we really had no control over. I was induced (for really no reason other than I was tired of being pregnant), I was on epidural meds for over 12 hours, Cooper had jaundice and was a horrible nurser (which I blame on his two week early arrival) and last but not least when administering my epidural they ended up causing me to leak spinal fluid resulting in a spinal headache for the first 2 weeks of Cooper's life. If you have never heard of these or experienced one take a migraine and multiply by ten. I wasn't even capable of sitting up straight. Remembering that experience, the first thing we did when planning our birth this time around was hire a doula. I knew that if I wanted to have the best chance of having a normal first few weeks of being a mother with no spinal headache and a good start to breast feeding that I was going to have a natural birth. Hiring Danielle as our doula was the best decision we could have made. Not only was she our friend already but she helped educate us and encourage us as well as keep me excited all throughout my pregnancy.
Coming to the end of my pregnancy, I had the thoughts that every 39 week pregnant woman has........"This baby is never going to come out! I just know it!" In the last few weeks before Reid was born I had done everything I knew of to start labor: Eating spicy food, walking, sitting on an exercise ball, etc with no avail. It really didn't help me with having patience when starting at week 36 my midwife told us that I was already 3cm dilated. I continued to dilate all the way to 6cm by week 38 with practically no discomfort. I was so excited that everything seemed to be moving quickly and was praying Reid would come meet us sooner than later. I felt that it would still be a week or so before he came cause I still wasn't feeling any contractions.
Milt's father came up to stay with us for a couple of days after hearing how my doctors appt had gone. (looking back it's a godsend that he did!) My sister was here for her masters classes the same weekend. She begged for me to go into labor all day and night on Friday. We went for a walk around the block and talked about how great it would be if she could be here when Reid was born.
Saturday morning Cassie went to class and Milt, Cooper and I slept in and got up around 8am to enjoy a family day together. Milt was wonderful and made us breakfast: eggs, bacon, and biscuits. I finished eating and just felt like lying down. So I laid down on the couch while Cooper watched cartoons at about 9:30am. Before I could even get comfortable, my water broke. I think the conversation went like this............
Me: (trying not to yell from the living room)Um..........Milt, I think my water just broke!
Milt : (from the kitchen) Huh? Ok......um......at least let me get dressed!
I called my doula and she told me to not waste to much time at home since I was already so far dilated, but to go ahead and get a shower and start timing contractions once the came. Once my contractions started, after taking a shower, I remember laughing about how silly it seemed that I had called my doula almost everyday the week before trying to decide if what I was feeling were real contractions! LOL There was no doubt in my mind what I was feeling now! They started off pretty bearable but very close together. (this was about 10:30am) We waited through about 5-10 contractions and decided after calling our doula that it was time to go to the hospital. Milt's dad was at our house by this time so we had no worries about Cooper at all. We called him in our room before we left and explained in two year old terms what was going on and that he was about to meet his baby brother. (not sure if it registered or not!) Milt then helped me waddle to the car and we set off for the hospital. I was still in a very excited mood and so ready to meet our son!
Halfway to the hospital my contraction were getting stronger and less than 60 seconds apart. I was so ready to get off the road and into a hospital room with Milt and my doula so that I could concentrate.
To be continued..........................
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