On April 29th at 12:45 am I woke up and felt my water break. It is funny because I really thought I would just go into labor with contractions and not the water breaking, but I guess God had other plans. I woke up my husband and we prepared to go to the hospital. I took my time and showered because I had heard that there really is no reason to rush, especially with the first baby. We got to the hospital at 1:30am and they confirmed I was in labor at 1 cm dilated and 80% effaced.
We waited several hours for something to happen but the contractions were very slow in coming and I was not making any progress. We walked for awhile up and down the halls and finally I gave in and allowed them to start a very small dose of pitocen to move things along. Looking back I am hoping I will be able to avoid that with my next baby. Anyway, the contractions began to pick up soon after. I tried very hard to breath through them, but I just could not mentally handle the pain enough to relax and let them come and go. After several hours and at 5cms dilated I asked for an epidural. It was amazing...I am all for natural birth, but I do not regret my epidural for a moment, especially because I would have ended up with one anyway given he circumstance of the delivery.
I progressed very quickly after the epidural but then stopped dilating at 9cms. For whatever reason I could not get past that last little bit and it took hours before I was ready to push. I tried for 3hrs to push him out but he would not budge. The doctor seemed to be getting nervous and finally he offered me the option of a c-section or forceps. My mind was in such a fog from all the pushing and sheer exhaustion and it was a difficult decision to make. We decided to try the forceps ( despite the urging of a very opinionated nurse who wanted me to do a c-section) to avoid the scarring and long term damage caused by a c-section. I had no idea how difficult the delivery would be with forceps..
The actual delivery seemed to take hours. Several nurses and the doctor came into the room and warned us that the baby may have to be resuscitated after he was delivered and not to worry. I don't know why they thought that would make me less worried, but I guess they have to warn you. I was so dazed that everything seemed unreal to me at that time.I just laid there praying and listening to my baby's heartbeat on the monitor. I think this was probably one of the scariest moment's of my life. His heartbeat was slow and every few minutes it would come to almost a complete stopped. I just laid there praying I would not have to hear it stop completely. As it slowed the doctor would stop and reach in to rub his back and stimulate him until his heart rate rose again. It seemed like hours but finally they told me to push and he was born. They placed him on my chest and he started to cry. I was so relieved to hear him crying and to just have him out and alive!
It took the doctors almost 3hrs to stitch me up and I had been given a large dose of medicine's for the pain. Benedict was 6 pounds 12 ounces and perfect to me :) The doctor said his head had been turned in the birth canal and that was why he would not come out on his own. He had several bruises from the birth and a large bruise on the back of his head which healed quickly but did cause some problems with jaundice.
