…Eventually, I heard
Chris wake up to go to the bathroom. He must have seen that I wasn’t in bed, so
he opened our bedroom door and saw me bent over the table swaying in pain. Bet
he didn’t expect that…
I checked the clock
and saw that it was 3 am….
I told him I was having contractions and they sucked but
that I didn’t know what to do and that I was wondering if I should call Thalia,
the lead midwife and owner of Childbirth Services. I remember Chris saying “wow, this is really
the beginning of the real thing” or something like that. We were both in denial
that a real baby would eventually come out I suppose. I explained to him my
crazy birth logic (that I would have a 3 day labor, that I thought this might
stop soon, etc ,etc ,etc).
We decided to wait, but to go ahead and start packing our
stuff for the birth center, just in case (ha ha ha ha ha ha ha). I packed
clothes for me and Gianna and Chris did the rest. I was literally the least
helpful human on earth because I spent 8 of every 10 minutes (yes, this is a
total approximation) on the ground on all fours swaying my hips back and forth,
trying to deal with the back labor. The contractions just wouldn’t stop and I
couldn’t catch a break. They were one on top of the other it seemed. It was
like going up a huge mountain and reaching the peak and coming 40% down and
then going back up again—like I could never get back down to the ground.
Remembering to take deep breaths and relaxing and letting my body worked helped
to relax me, but truthfully all I could think was: THIS SUCKS!
At 4 am I finally told Chris that we needed to call Thalia
because I didn’t think I could do this much longer and wondered if there was
something I could do to ease the pain (ha ha ha ha…like have the baby?). Well,
HE needed to call Thalia, because I wouldn’t be able to make it through a phone
conversation. I didn’t do much talking at all that whole early morning, not
really even making as much as a peep. I kept really quiet and just tried to get
through each minute, because when it comes down to it, I really had no choice.
It’s not like I could press the pause button and take a break, it was just a
constant submission to the pain. Talking and making any kind of noise took too
much effort…my attention needed to be directed elsewhere.
Side bar: Remember people, Chris at this point had just been
diagnosed with the flu that morning and was running a fever, yet, somehow
miraculously, was functioning like a normal human.
Chris called Thalia, relaying all the information faithfully,
assured us that I was doing everything I should be doing to cope, and confirmed
that G was probably posterior. She was headed to the airport for something I
can’t remember, but let us know that Carmen would meet us at the birth center
and that she would call us when she was almost there so we could head over.
Carmen lives over 30 minutes away, so that time, plus getting herself ready,
meant it would be a little bit before we could head over. That was fine,
because I had prepared myself to stay at home as long as humanly possible so
that I wasn’t sitting around the birth center wondering when it was going to
“happen” (I hate the idea of being a watched pot). In the reading I’d done, one
of the biggest mistakes couples make is going to the hospital/birth
center/calling the midwife/doctor too soon, getting there, and ending up being like
2 cm dilated and not even in active labor. I was determined not to be that girl. At this point, even though my
contractions were kind of on top of each other, I still kept thinking how
embarrassing it would be to get to the birth center and be told that I wasn’t
in active labor. I would be
- SO EMBARRASSED
- Disheartened
- Really rethinking my decision of natural childbirth and questioning my sanity and the sanity of every other woman who has had a child au naturale (if it was already this painful….)
Somehow we got everything packed
in the next 2 hours (those were a
complete and utter blur…did I really tolerate 2 more hours of that
horribleness???) and headed to the birth center sometime at 6ish, I think.
I had a contraction on the way to the car, and then 2 contractions on the 4
mile trip there. Truthfully, that was a break from what was going on at the
apartment. I’m pretty sure we also hit nearly every light. SERIOUSLY!?!?! SERIOUSLY. I wanted Chris to turn on the
hazards and run all the lights, but he didn’t.
We got to the house (birth center…it’s in a house) and
waiting for Carmen to unlock the door. I was wearing some crazy orange shorts I
picked up for $1 at old navy, a shirt I can’t remember, my short blue robe, and
some black/grey flats—very cute LOL. Clearly, fashion was not my main concern. I
seriously probably looked like a homeless person. We headed to the “Blue Room”
(there are two birthing rooms…the blue room and the pink room…guess what colors
they are decorated in…LOL) and I proceeded to have contraction on top of
contraction while leant over the bed, swaying my hips back and forth to that
now all familiar labor dance, thinking I hope I am in real labor, I hope I am
in real labor….
It was 6:15 am.
Stay tuned for the final 2 installments of the birth story! Get
excited because the next part has pictures (no nudity eww) I just picked up a
copy of the “labor transcript” from the midwives on Wednesday, so I’ll even
have REAL TIMES to report (glad someone
watched the clock lol)
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