Montgomerie's Birth Story (Part 1: Is this labor? Is THIS labor? IS THIS LABOR?!)

[You can read the intro to this birth story series here.]

My biggest fear in not being prepared to give birth without medicine, was that my labor would progress too quickly and I would miss the opportunity to get an epidural. I've heard it's pretty common for the birth of a second child to be faster and easier than the birth of a first child. But, since my water broke and I had to be induced with my first, I had no frame of reference for how fast labor naturally progresses in my particular womb. It could be days, it could be hours.

So, after hearing horror stories from my mom about how her neighbor was feeling fine one minute and calling an ambulance the next (because she was about to give birth to her second child), Mike and I made the following birth plan: 1. Get to the hospital as soon as possible. 2. Get an epidural as soon as possible. 3. Hope that my labor didn't progress so rapidly that neither of those things were possible.

I also wanted time to emotionally prepare. It's hard enough making the transition from being pregnant to being a parent over a few hours of labor, but making that transition in mere minutes is unfathomable. I needed time to rehearse my response to the miracle of birth so that the doctors and nurses didn't think I was a horrible human being. Aw, she's so beautiful. What a wonderful blessing! ... instead of ... Gross! That is disgusting! I can't believe that just came out of my vagina!

Anyway, let's begin with step one of our birth plan: getting to the hospital. Seems pretty straight-forward, right?

Well I didn't have any signs of labor up until I was 37.5 weeks pregnant. That was the night the baby "dropped." I went from feeling like I could easily carry her for a few more weeks to, Arrggh get this baby out of me right now!, in a matter of moments. Immediately after the drop (which literally felt like a door opened up under my belly and dropped the baby on to my bladder), I started having all kinds of pain. Some in my back, some in my belly, some in places that I don't even know names for... some of it was constant, some of it was rhythmic. I freaked out and yelled to Mike something like, "I think the baby just dropped! And I'm in all kinds of pain! And I don't know what's happening!" And he was all, "Should we go to the hospital?! Are you in labor?! What do we do?!"

I had no clue if I was in labor. After googling "how to tell you are in labor," I decided to lie in bed and breath steadily to relax myself. A lot of the pain decreased over the next few minues so I decided that I was not, in fact, in labor.

I was incredibly uncomfortable for the rest of my pregnancy, but a few days passed before I started having contractions again. Although they weren't very painful, they were pretty consistent at about 7 minutes apart. Naturally, I thought, I must be in labor now! After googling "how to tell you are in labor," I decided to take a shower to see if my contractions grew stronger or weaker. They disappeared. I was not in labor.

About a week later, I woke up with fairly painful contractions that were also pretty consistent. I took a shower and they persisted, so Mike called off work and proceeded to get our three year old ready for daycare. This is definitely labor! By the time we were ready to walk out the door, the contractions had ceased. I was not in labor. Mike went to work.

I had a couple more nights of painful contractions that never progressed. I'm not sure why I always got them in the middle of the night, but I didn't like it. It is hard enough to sleep when you're nine months pregnant without the discomfort and anxiety from false labor!

Anyway, finally, at 4am on the morning of November 20, 2012, I was stirred awake by fairly painful contractions. I timed them for about an hour and they were consistently seven minutes apart. I was pretty confident this was the real deal. I tried to sleep for the next couple of hours, but didn't really. I timed them again around 7am and they were about the same. Took a shower, about the same. I mentioned having contractions to Mike and my mom (who was there to help with Addison), but didn't let on that I thought this was for real. I was tired of looking stupid.

Mike and I needed to run some errands so I told him to grab the hospital bag "just in case" and we headed out the door around 9am.

The contractions kept coming and they were about six minutes apart now, so we decided to call my OB. She said it sounded like I was on the border so I could come in to her office to get checked out rather than go to triage if I wanted. Getting to the hospital was my first goal, but I knew I would have to wait forever if I opted for triage. And I knew waiting forever would not be worth it if I then got sent home because I was not actually in labor or because I wasn't far enough along in labor to warrant a room. Fortunately, my OB's office is in the hospital, so this was an easy decision. We headed to the fifth floor of Magee and Dr. Lareau verified that I was, in fact, 3cm dilated and in early labor!

Step One: Complete. 


The saga continues with part 2 of Gummie's birth story...


Meanwhile, here are some maternity photos that our friend Lissy took. Now, if I link to this blog post, I will have lots of images to choose from other than my profile picture up there on the right!

Gummie Bear!