Daddy's Story

Before I forget (not that I ever will), I wanted to share our birth story, this one from Daddy's perspective.

Early last week, Jess was getting pretty uncomfortable and since we were really hoping to meet Abby sooner rather than later, we tried a little acupressure massage. A quick google search showed me a couple pressure points that were known to sometimes trigger contractions. One of them was the "Haku" pressure point, located in the webbing between the thumb and forefinger. Another was the "Spleen 6" pressure point, located about 4 finger widths above the inside of the ankle. On Tuesday night, I did some of this acupressure...who knows...maybe it worked?! Jess started showing some early signs of labor on Wednesday night and full-on contracations starting Friday afternoon.

We both went to work on Friday and I got a call from Jess around 4:00pm. Jess had been timing her contractions (using a cool contraction timer app I downloaded to her new Droid phone!) and they were regular, about six minutes apart. I rushed home, picked up a few groceries and relaxed with her at home Friday night. She was starting to have some stronger contractions and tried to take her mind off of them by doing some baking. She made some tasty pumpkin chocolate cookies and cheescake, which proved to be a good distraction. In retrospect, I should have made her drink more water, since when we ended up arriving at the hospital around 1:00am, she was very de-hydrated and needed to get some IV fluids.

We went to bed around 10:30, pretty certain that this was the real deal and we'd be waking up in the middle of the night to head to the hospital. Around 12:30, Jess jumped out of bed with a very strong contraction, claiming that her water had broken. I called the nurse midwife on call who chatted with Jess for a little while. She told us to come down to the hospital.

Thankfully, we're only about a 10 min drive to the hospital. We arrived at the ER, and they took us to the labor and delivery ward (which is absolutely beautiful, by the way). Some of the best views of the Lake and city I've seen. When our midwife Marty arrived, she examined Jess determing that she was 3 cm dilated. Marty's exam really triggered some intense contractions and I did what I could to help Jess through them. It was a really helpless feeling for me and I did my best to do what I could to encourage her. During some contractions, she looked at me in utter pain as her contraction began. I knew it would be tough to see her dealing with the contractions, and it definitely was.

They had a hard time giving her an IV since she was dehydrated and they had trouble finding a good vein. They had to call an IV nurse, and it even took her about 30 minutes to get the IV in her. Jess' plan was to do the natural childbirth experience, but unfortunately she had to work through some extremely strong contractions while in bed waiting for them to give her an IV. She wasn't able to move around to the tub or birthing ball as we had hoped to. After a couple hours, Jess declared that she wanted the epidural. Jess had told me beforehand to try to talk her out of it if she asked for an epidural in labor, so I did. Of course, I was totally fine with her getting an epidural (it was tough to see her in pain), but I did what I could to talk her out of the epidural. Then she said, "I know I told you to talk me out of it, but really, I'm going to get one. There's no award for doing natural childbirth. These contractions are for the birds". Surprisingly, there were very few if any curse words that came out of her mouth!

The epidural fairy showed up around 4am. At that time, she had progressed to 5cm dilated. After the epidural, we both slept for an hour or so. Around 6:30am, she had progressed to 8cm dilated and made a phone call to her Mom, who later told us she was surprised to hear Jess is such good spirits. The epidural really helped her out a lot.

They examined her again around 8am and she had progressed to 10cm, fully dilated and was ready to start the pushing stage. A new midwife and nurse, Krista and Allison, arrived to take over at this point. She started pushing at 8:30. Krista and Allison was *awesome*, coaching her loudly through each contraction. Later, Jess said that Allison reminded her of one of her old field hockey coaches. She was very encouraging and had a great sense of humor. After this whole experience, I have so much more respect for labor and delivery nurses.

Allison mentioned that an average pushing stage lasted 2 hours. Jess' pushing ordeal lasted twice as long. She really showed her true colors during the whole pushing ordeal. Lots of endurance, perseverance, and strength. It was a very "two steps forward, one step back" process, but Jess never was discouraged, pushing just as hard with each contraction. She was such a trooper and did a fantastic job. With all the intense pushing, her eyes became really swollen and sensitive to the light. The IV fluids made her really stuffy in the nose and it was sometimes hard for her to take the breath she needed before each push. I kept giving her a cold washcloth to wipe her face. Toward the end, we kept the washcloth over her eyes since it hurt for her to even open them up.

Before going in, I wasn't sure if I'd be able to watch the actual birth. When Abby's head finally started emerging, I found myself watching every progression! Jess wasn't able to see anything so we told her how things were going along the way.

At 12:37, Abby's head finally emerged followed immediately by her elbows, arms, and feet. The midwife, Christa, immediately put Abby on Jess' chest once she was born. I think I started crying before Abby did. Abby (aka Conehead at this point) was healthy and happy. Jess was swollen in the face, but happier than I have ever seen her. I didn't tell her until later that with all the swelling, she was barely even recognizable. Thankfully, the swelling went down pretty quickly and by Monday she was almost back to normal.

Jess' Mom arrived at the hospital about 45 minutes after Abby was born. Here's a photo of Mimi holding her new granddaughter:


A couple hours after the birth, we moved from the labor and delivery room to the maternity ward. We stayed there for a couple days as Jess got some help with the breastfeeding process and we enjoyed our first couple days with our new bundle of joy. Here's a photo of the little bundle, taken just after we put her to bed last night, our first night at home:


What an experience this has been so far. Jess and I continue to stare in amazement at our new creation.