Home birth (long)

I’m 2 weeks PP and just wanted to share my little experience. Started laboring on my due date 40 weeks exact. I thought little girl was going to come on time, but she decided fashionably late would make more of a statement.

Labored through the night woke up still didn’t feel like I was there, went to the gym and contractions evened to every 5 minutes 1 minute long, call the midwives and I’m only 2cm 70% effaced. Okay no big deal! I keep going and try to sleep that night. Middle of the night I’m waking up every 3 minutes for a contraction. I call my midwives and I’m still at 2 or 3 cm and maybe slightly more effaced. So I take some Benadryl and try to get what sleep I can.

Next day the contractions have lessened and become more infrequent. I’m doing everything I can to get them to pick back up, stretches, side stepping up and down my apartment stairs, resting, anything I can do I’m trying. The contractions end up picking up a bit before bed but not enough for me to feel the need to call the midwives. That night I try and sleep and my contractions start going hard. Breathing through is getting tough. I have to get in the bath to deal with the pain. The contractions are every 3 minutes and more than a minute long. I’m feeling like I’m going to mentally break if this doesn’t happen soon. Call the midwives and I’m only at 5 cm about 90% effaced. I feel a little better hearing I’m at 5cm, so I try to go back to sleep with some medication that’s suppose to be like a stronger Benadryl. I still wasn’t able to sleep through the contractions and they’re climbing in intensity. I’m going through wave after wave with hardly any break in between. Finally my water breaks!

After that the contractions got even more intense (I seriously have no idea how they possibly could have but they did). I’m making noises I’ve never heard come out of my body and literally frozen in place rolling through contractions. My partner calls the midwives and they say to try and go back to sleep (wtf!?!? how!?!?) and call them again in 30 minutes to and hour if things pick up any more. I got back in the bath and it did not help (I have no idea how I was making it through these contractions I’m glad we have thick walls because my neighbors probably would have called the police otherwise) My partner calls the midwives again and is like…you need to get here now. It takes them an hour (!) and I for sure thought I was about to birth the baby on my own. I was also super scared they were going to tell me I was only at 6 or 7cm, but I was at about 9cm (my midwives did say I had a lip on my cervix that was making it hard for baby to come all the way down). My partner and mom fill up my birthing tub and now the midwives are here I get to try to start pushing.

Pushing feels way different than I thought it would. It was like once I was mentally ready my body just started doing it itself (really does feel like when you puke and it’s just involuntary). When I started helping my body push, I was able to get my girl out in about 5-6 pushes. Also nobody really talks about how you have to wait for a contraction to really push so you don’t hurt yourself. I was just on my knees with her head out waiting for what felt like forever for the next time to push. I got her out on the next one though because I was not about to wait like that again. I think pushing was the easiest part of labor. Once I finally got there I had her out in 20 minutes. It took 60+ hours and I definitely understand why most women get epidurals but baby girl was so worth it either way. Her dad is a tough I don’t cry kind of guy and he sobbed when he saw her. It’s crazy how the world just melts away once your baby is in your arms.

That’s it sorry this was so long! I just wanted to be able to share and also have something to remember everything. Thanks for reading :)