It took us five years to conceive our firstborn. Anyone who has experienced the long years of waiting and hoping for a child will likely understand the fear that can accompany the nine months leading up to the arrival of your baby.
All that fear bubbled to the surface when my labor began. While I did not take any birth classes, it was very obvious from the get-go that my labor was not following the typical pattern. I had terrible back labor, and my contractions would become extremely intense and very close together only to stall out. That cycle repeated over and over for a few days.
My first contractions started on Sunday night. I remember being so nervous but excited that we were finally going to meet our baby boy. They were sporadic that night and throughout the next morning. By early afternoon they were pretty intense and coming close together. My doctors did not do a great job of preparing me for how to know when it would be time to go to the hospital, and my mom was induced for all her labors and had never labored at home. Because of that, I felt so lost, and we decided to go to the hospital. Unfortunately, I was barely dilated. Since I had back labor, the triage nurses were pretty sure that my son was sunny-side-up and sent me home with tips to try to get him in a better position.
We went home, and again, my contractions became sporadic. I tried to get some sleep but was consistently woken by a contraction. I was also starting to feel anxious. I didn’t know exactly what to expect during labor, but I could tell at this point that mine was not ideal. That scared me.
What if I waited all those years and then another nine months only to have something go drastically wrong during delivery? Someone very close to me had a stillborn baby, so I knew that although rare, stillborn births can happen.
Now, it was Tuesday. The contractions continued coming intermittently. They had backed off from the intensity that had sent me to the hospital but were still coming regularly. My husband actually left for work that morning because I had no idea how long it would be. I went over to my mom’s house and continued laboring there. By early afternoon, they were again coming very close together and even more intense than the day before, so that evening my husband and I decided to go to the hospital again.
My contractions were coming in waves, sometimes 1-2 minutes apart for a chunk of time, but then they would slow down. It was not at all what I expected, and again, that scared me. When we got to the hospital, I was disappointed to find out that I was still barely dilated. Since I had barely slept the night before, the nurses gave me morphine and once again sent me home.
The morphine worked quickly. I remember barely being able to keep my eyes open on the drive home. I was able to get a few hours of sleep, and at around 3 AM, I was jolted awake with the most intense contraction yet.
Again, I felt scared. Going from a deep, peaceful slumber to horrible pain is alarming.
At that point, I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t want to go back to the hospital only to be sent home again, but the contractions were incredibly intense. I was so uninformed about labor and delivery and felt so incredibly at a loss for what to do. My husband was a saint. He googled tips for helping with back labor and learned how to apply counter pressure. He was starting to get worried too, but for hours he was my steady rock as he helped me withstand wave after wave of pain.
From the moment I woke up until probably 11 AM or so, my contractions were consistently coming about 6 minutes apart. Then they started to get a little farther apart again. Frustrated and worried, we made the decision to go the hospital.
After all that time and work, I was still only dilated to about 3 cm. It was so disheartening to hear that I had made so little progress. They decided to admit me since I had been in labor so long and had actually been scheduled to be induced that day. I remember being super emotional because I had not really slept for two days.
I had planned to try to give birth without any interventions, but the nurse suggested that sometimes an epidural helps women to relax and their body is able to dilate. At that point, I was desperate and agreed. I was not the hugest fan of not having use of my legs, but both my husband and I were grateful to get some much-needed rest.
The nurse came in periodically to help me switch sides I was lying on. At one point, she told me they were going to give me Pitocin because my contractions were not consistent enough. There was no discussion to see whether that was something I wanted or not, but at the time I was too tired and emotional to think that there was something wrong with that.
A while later, the doctor came in to check my progress. I was about 6 cm dilated, but even though I had made progress, she told me that she thought it was time for a C-section. I was devastated. I knew that the C-section rates had risen dramatically, but I never thought that I would need one. I just figured that since billions of women had delivered babies before me that I would be perfectly fine and capable. I am a sturdy woman with wide hips. I had no reason to believe that giving birth would be a problem for me.
I honestly don’t remember why the doctor told me she thought I needed one, and I can’t help but suspect that it was because my labor was taking too long and that she needed the room for someone else.
One of the nurses saw how disappointed I was. She was so kind. I don’t know exactly what she did, but she told me she was going to try one last thing to see if it helped my labor progress.
My water broke shortly after whatever she did, and when she checked me I was dilated to 9.5 cm. It all happened incredibly quickly, and I remember being so full of hope again. Unfortunately, I got stuck at 9.5 cm for several hours. At one point, she told me to get ready to start pushing and that she would be back soon with the doctor. Sadly, when he came in he dashed my hopes again.
When he checked me, I was indeed nearly fully dilated, but there was a little bit of meconium, and he told me I needed a C-section. I remember asking if there was any possibility for me to try pushing for a bit first. Instead of him telling me the risks of trying to push my son out and why he thought a C-section would be best, he told me that the baby wasn’t in a good position and that he is not the type of doctor who takes any chances.
His comment didn’t strike me as wrong at the time. It had been an exhausting few days, and I had no real knowledge about the birthing process. Now I believe that he was completely wrong to make such a comment. It should have been MY decision not his to decide how much risk I was willing to tolerate especially because a C-section is not itself without risk.
A short while later, we headed to the operating room. It was a somewhat traumatic experience for both me and my husband. My husband had to wait outside until the procedure started. The operating room was cold and bright. Everyone was rushing around me, but nobody took the time to explain to me what was happening. They grabbed both my arms and strapped them down without speaking to me. One nurse would randomly acknowledge me, but it was in passing as she was hustling around the room paying more attention to her tasks than to my responses or reactions.
I will never forget how scary it was when they began the procedure. I began yelling, “I can feel that!” Nobody came to reassure me or calm me down, and my husband was not by my side yet. It was quite frankly terrifying. I now know that feeling pressure is not the same as pain, but somebody should have taken the time to prepare me. Unless you have gone through it, it will be hard to understand. The best way I can describe it is the lower half of your body feels like it is on a roller coaster. When you are expecting to feel nothing, the intense movement and pressure is quite alarming.
I barely noticed when my husband came into the room. He was also completely unprepared for having to walk past my already cut open body and later told me that the doctors had to yell at him to keep moving when he became paralyzed with fear. The shock of that sight sadly caused him a bit of anxiety in the months following our son’s birth.
The last thing I remember is hearing my son crying and my husband saying, “That’s your baby!” They ended up knocking me completely out because according to my husband I was shaking so uncontrollably. I’m not sure how long exactly I was out. I woke up some time later to a nurse trying to get my son to nurse as I lay there conked out. It definitely was not how I imagined the first moments with my long-awaited son.
Over the years, I have slowly been waking up to the problems in the medical system. Like I said earlier, during my birth I did not recognize the bullying and mistreatment that was taking place. It is only after several more C-sections as well as the 2020 insanity that my eyes were completely opened to the problems within the medical system. We must give the power and freedom back to the patients and their loved ones and demand true informed consent.
Like most, I was completely asleep in 2017. Jaden’s birth was the first gentle nudge that caused me to stir a little, but it did not manage to wake me up. My journey to becoming a warrior for medical freedom continues with the birth of my daughter, Josette.
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