Two weeks later: The birth of Stevie

It has been about two weeks since Steven’s birth and I finally thought I should take some time and write my experience of what it was like to become a mother by going through the birthing process. I wanted to write this post to have as a journal entry for myself and have this post for those that are interested in knowing what Steven’s story was like coming to this earth.

Starting at 37 weeks I prayed he would come. I wanted him to come early, and I really thought he would. I didn’t want a big baby, and I was hoping I would give birth to a baby around 5-6 pounds. I was terrified to give birth but wanted nothing more than to do so because I was so tired of being pregnant!

Well, October 29th (his due date) came and I was pretty upset. I had prayed literally every day for him to come. I wanted him to come early and now he wasn’t even coming on his due date! The next day, I had an appointment to discuss what was going to happen for him to come. The next step would be to induce me using the foley ball method.I was very nervous and I really, really didn’t want to be induced. I wanted him to come on his own and to see if I could just birth him naturally. But because he wasn’t coming, the doctor had said that he needed to be out by 41 weeks. They scheduled me to be induced on November 2nd, around 4:30, so he would come the next day. I was so scared. I had looked up this foley ball method and saw nothing but terrible reviews of how painful it was. (And for those who know me, I have a very low pain tolerance.) So I went home, and once again, tried everything. Literally EVERYTHING. I had looked up so many things to start my labor like walking, exercising, drinking some tea. Nothing worked.

I called my parents and told them that I was scheduled to be induced on November 2nd and that they could plan to come down when they wanted. The next two days passed and still, no baby. I was certain in my head that I was going to have to go through this terrible inducement and hate every minute of it. My parents came down on Wednesday and we were ready to head to the hospital the next day and have the baby.

Well, at 11:57 PM I had a pretty weird pain. I was almost positive it was a contraction, but didn’t want to get my hopes up. I laid there and waited to see if it would happen again. The same pain happened an hour later, and then 45 minutes later, and then 30 minutes later till it was 5:00 am. I woke my husband during the biggest contraction and that’s when the fun began!

We stayed at home while my contractions got closer together and endured through them. At around 11:00 am, the contractions were about 10 minutes apart and my mom convinced us to go to the hospital. I was so afraid that I would go to the hospital and then they would send me back, so I just prayed so hard asking that if we went to the hospital, I would have the baby, and they wouldn’t send me back.

Around 11:30, I got done talking to the doctor and was told to head to the doctor’s office to find out if I had dilated any more and see how my contractions were doing. They had me sit in this chair for quite some time and they monitored me. Lucky for me I was dilated to a 4 and was allowed to go to labor and delivery. This was it. I was having this baby!

We got there around 12:00 pm and I kept breathing through the contractions. I was honestly so scared, but just kept telling myself to stay calm. I remember being so stressed that every time my dad, or husband would say anything I would yell, “shut up!” haha. It was stressful, but I had the goal earlier in my pregnancy that I wanted to try to give birth naturally.

The nurses had to give me an IV because I was sick with a cold. They had to give me antibiotics so I didn’t get the little baby sick. Well, that was probably the worst thing for me (besides birth, or course). They missed my vein three times and I have bruises on my arms to this day. Obviously the nurses knew I was in a lot of pain from the IV because they kept coming in and asking, “Are you sure you don’t want the epidural?” Yes, they probably thought I was a big pansy when it comes to pain but I wasn’t going to let that stop me from doing this naturally.

The contractions were continually getting worse and I was getting so tired. I remember I had to go to the bathroom and while doing so, my water sack started coming out before it had even broke! No one knew what was going on and everyone was super shocked. I had to spend the rest of the time in bed so it wouldn’t come out.

At that point, it was about 4 pm and I asked everyone to leave except my husband so I could focus more during the intense pain. Well, right after, I started to have this urge to push. The nurse told me not to push because I was only dilated to a 7 and I needed one more set of antibiotics before I could push. But they couldn’t put in the last set of antibiotics for another hour! I kept having the urge to push and when the nurse left my husband told me to go for it. Haha. Five minutes later, I told my nurse again that I needed to push. So, she checked my cervix and I was at a 10.

The nurses rushed in and started setting up everything. They were all shocked and looked pretty confused. The doctor wasn’t in yet, so once again they told me to wait to push, but I couldn’t control it any longer. I had to push. The doctor finally came in and started to coach me through the birth. They had me push three times for every ten seconds each which made me exhausted. I was scared out of my mind and slowly going into shock. I heard the nurse say, “You need to keep pushing, your baby is in distress. Your baby’s heart rate is at 89.” If anything was going to make me push it was someone telling me that my baby wasn’t doing well. I pushed as hard as I could 3 times, ten seconds each and BOOM the head came out! It was honestly the worst pain in my entire life. I don’t remember a lot of what happened after this because I went into pure shock from feeling so much pain. I was asked to push one more time and he was out!

Our little boy was born! Everything up to this point was a blur. You would probably expect me to be super happy and joyful that my baby boy was finally here, but the truth is, I was not happy. I was in so much pain that I didn’t even have the energy to hold him when they put him on me. I was so confused and I had no idea what was going on. Lucky for me, my husband helped out a ton and was super supportive during this time.

Chris invited my parents in to meet little Stevie while the nurses measured him and checked everything. I slowly started to come to my senses and could finally start to appreciate the moment.

Anyway, giving birth is HARD. Especially naturally. But I can say this: Birthing him was the hardest thing I have ever done, but I have felt nothing but joy having him here, safe and healthy, at home with us.

I owe a big thanks to my husband for all the support through pregnancy and through this whole experience and my parents for all their support postpartum. Definitely couldn’t do it without them.

Send us your birth story! Whether you had a home birth, hospital birth, 37-hour labor or emergency C-section, we’d love to read the tale of your little one’s grand entrance. Write up your birth story (click here for tips on getting started) and email it, along with a few photos, to birthstory@pnmag.com. We’ll share it on our Birth Day blog and may even print it in an upcoming issue!

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