Two Labors and a Delivery...the emotions...

What a reality check maternity leave has been!!  I thought I was going to have a bunch of time to stay on top of this blog, the laundry, the cleaning, etc.  Hmmmm...not so much!

Which, at the end of the day, is a good thing.  I really needed some time to digest by labor and delivery experience before I wrote about it.  I am starting to feel like I am really moving to the other side of the grief, so that thinking or talking about it doesn't tie me up so much emotionally that I can't be rational (or that I cry uncontrollably).  Speaking of crying, I also had to get on the other side of the hormone let-down.  Now that I am not crying at EVERYTHING, I can sit here and be much more productive! 


As I stated in the last post, I feel a strong desire to write about the emotional element.  If for no other reason than to still defend the beauty of going natural.  But also to expose what the other experiences were like for me, as well.  I don't know if anyone cares to read about it, but this blog post is more for me (and us) than for anyone else.  It's more for emotional catharsis than anything else, really.  So here goes...


Labor #1: Hours 0-15
First of all, having never been pregnant, I had no idea what to expect.  I wondered before if I would know when my water broke or if I would "know" when I was having real contractions.  Having not even experienced Braxton Hicks contractions, I had no idea what to expect.  I have had many women tell me that they did not know their water had broken, or that their water didn't break until they were will into their labor.  However, in my experience, there was no doubt that my water had broken.  And my longer contractions at home in the wee hours, after my water initially broke, confirmed this.  Once the contractions got going, I knew they were the real deal.  And they hurt like hell!  But that was okay, really, because they were for a good cause.  Also, I had someone before hand tell me to think of labor like running a marathon (which I have never done, but I got the point).  As a result, I started thinking about the fact that this is heading somewhere, to a goal, and this made it more bearable.


Once I woke JP up, he was in the game from the moment his eyes opened.  He panicked at first, saying "I haven't finished reading the Bradley Method book!  I only got through the first stage of labor!!"  It made me giggle.  I love him so much, and his willingness to follow me down that rabbit hole is one of the many reasons I knew he would be a good partner during my labor.  The funny part of it all is that he started doing what the literature suggested the coach should do.  This meant trying to calmly talk me through my contractions, telling me that I am doing a good job and reminding me to breathe.  Well...after the first contraction he was with me through, where he was trying to tell me I was doing a good job, I tried to politely ask him to not talk during my contractions.  At least this is my recollection of it.  His is something like a satan voice where I tell him to shut up.  I am quite sure the truth lies somewhere in the middle.  Of course, we both laugh about this now, and it's one of the ways we bonded during my labor.  This also happened when he started making breathing noises during another contraction.  What we came to understand is that I was intolerant to ANY talking or major noises during my contractions while I was laboring naturally.  God bless the doula and nursing staff at the hospital during this time.  Ha!


I could keep giving a detailed run down of what happened next, but I will try to keep it simple.  I think JP puts it best when he talks about our experience - he tells everyone that this was the time we were most bonded - to each other and to the labor experience.  We were in it together - me as the person in labor and him as my husband, partner and coach.  He held me up, emotionally and physically, pushed me to keep going when I wanted to quit, cleaned me up, and stayed with me through it all.  I have always known I am blessed to have him as a husband and a partner, and this was only confirmed in spades while I was in labor.  Although this was the time when I was in the most pain, it was also the most meaningful time.  Again, this is because we were 100% connected to the experience, to each other, to the commitment we made to fully experience everything as God intended.  


It literally took us feeling completely exhausted and hopeless to progress naturally to give up the idea of continuing to labor naturally.  After 15 hours I was finally convinced that I could not progress naturally.  Once I did that, I was truly desperate to be free of the pain.  Knowing it possibly had no end make it excruciating, and yet I still felt so very sad at the prospect of giving up the natural labor process.  After making the decision to have an epidural, I waited an hour for everything to be prepped so I could have it, and it was a very painful hour.  There is something about being able to manage the pain, physically and emotionally, when you feel there is a goal, or end, in sight.  When you take that goal off the table, making the process possibly endless, the ability to manage the pain becomes impossible.  


Labor #2: Hours 15-25


There were to very distinct things that happened once I had an epidural.  First, I became disconnected from the labor process, and in turn from JP (and JP from the labor process).  We both went from being active members of a process that was happening with my body, to being bystanders, nothing more than witnesses.  We watched as the contractions were documented on a screen, but I had no more control or participation in the process, at least psychologically and emotionally.  This, although initially a relief, became a frustrating aspect, especially for JP.  In the first 3 hours we progressed from 6.5 to 9.5 centimeters, so we still had high hopes for a vaginal birth, and our spirits were high.  Actually, the second distinct thing that happened when I had the epidural was that I was no longer intensely focused on my contractions and labor, and I literally became almost manic.  When I really should have been taking time to try to nap or rest to keep my strength up, I was extremely energized, talking nonstop and interacting with everyone.  


After the first 3 hours, we stayed at 9.5 centimeters for another 7 hours.  I noticed it's effect on JP sooner than on me, seeing where he was becoming more frustrated - going outside to walk around the parking lot, getting up and pacing, and becoming impatient with the process.  It was about 8 hours in that my temperature started going up, signaling that there might be an infection.  Although there was no obvious distress to the baby, they did start administering antibiotics to prevent infection from spreading to the baby.  It was about this point that we started to realize that we were probably not going to be able to give birth vaginally, but wanted to hold out one more hour.  We agreed that we would agree to a C-section if we hit the 24 hour mark without progressing to 10 centimeters.  The next hour was a process of each of us going through the stages of grief in our own ways.  For those who don't know about the Stages of Grief, the following video outlines them in a humorous way:

First, the denial.  That was actually the first 23 hours of labor.  Looking back, all signs pointed to failure to progress from the beginning, but it took us exhausting all other options to accept it.  Then the anger, which was the most pronounced for JP.  My anger came after everything, and more took the form of a variety of self-pity in the vein of, "Why is it that everything I wanted to commit to doesn't work out? And why does it ALWAYS work out for people who don't care?!?!"  For JP, he was angry that I was going to have to have surgery.  He couldn't even talk about it for a while.  While he was experiencing this, I started bargaining, praying for God to just let us PLEASE progress during the final hour.  It's amazing how these things can make you feel things that aren't there.  Over that  23rd hour, I kept willing myself to feel pressure that wasn't there.  Depression for us both came over the final hours, during the C-section, and the next couple of days.  JP went to the bathroom and broke down.  He was very scared about the procedure, as was I.  Acceptance came once we were home and had time to really get into meeting our daughter.


The Delivery: Caesarean Section
Vaginal births provide a birth catharsis that is absolutely impossible with a surgical removal (which is what a C-section is).  One minute my baby is still safely tucked into her womb, the next pulled out into the open, leaving me with just an empty feeling.  I couldn't see her, I couldn't touch her.  I could hear everyone saying she was a big, beautiful baby, and I have no reference to what they are talking about.  I spend nearly 10 months carrying her, and I am totally detached from what is supposed to be the most wonderful part of having her...the delivery.  And to top it all off, JP is called over to where they are, and I am left alone.  Well...I had my doula, who was awesome, but I am still scared, confused, and now I feel alone (physically, in that JP was attending to our daughter and in that my child is gone from my womb).


I can honestly say that I do not understand why someone would elect to give birth this way.  No matter how you spin it, it is major surgery.  It puts a person at risk for infection, for surgical complications, for a more difficult recovery, and for limitations post-surgery.  I realize that our experience is a result of our expectations, in that it was a traumatic experience for us due to the fact that it was something we did not want to happen.  But it is traumatic, emotionally and physically.


At the end of the day, we are so very grateful.  We have a beautiful and healthy baby girl.  She is truly miraculous! And this IS our focus.  But this doesn't change the fact that the C-section was hard on us, and that we have had to grieve having that experience.  I have to stress again that my doctor, the hospital staff and every one involved was amazing.  They literally did everything humanly possible to try to preserve a chance at a natural birth, and then at a vaginal birth.  I just wasn't meant to happen for us.  And I am not going to feel guilty for being honest that this made me terribly sad.  


I am sitting here, almost a full month postpartum, and I have a very different perspective than I did when I sat down and started this post.  I am so very in love with my daughter.  And I am so very in love with my husband.  And I love our little family.  I am going to write a post about all of the things I love, but I wanted to leave this post on a positive note.  And the reality of this situation is, even though we had to grieve the process of her birth, our daughter is beautiful and there is so, so much more to this experience.  The birth is a shadow of a memory and the love and pride I feel each day with her so outshines any feeling that I may have had about the birth.