| I never wrote down the story of Marisol's birth, and now that I am studying child development I want to record some details, while they are stll relatively fresh in my mind.So here goes.I really wanted a water birth after looking into all of the birthing options, and I knew I wanted to be drug free.?Kaiser ( where I had my health insurance) Santa Rosa doesn't offer water births.Still, I spent most of my labor in the shower, with the hand held shower wand on my abdomen, and it was so great (compared to no water.)My labor progressed super quick, I was expecting to have hours laboring at home, going to the hospital for a dilation check, and being sent back home... nope, my water broke at 3:30 pm while I was cleaning the snake cage.I went and changed my pants, put in a pad, and finished cleaning.The contractions started right away.I then tried to assemble the co-sleeper in the bedroom, but found I had a hard time concentrating on the directions because of the contractions.I started thinking about it, and realized that I was supposed to call Kaiser when my water broke, so at around 4:30 I called Kaiser, they told me to come in around 6:00.I was still expecting to be sent back home.They monitored me and examined me in between running around delivering other babies, and at 9:00 they said they were admitting me. I sent John home to put the puppies away, and relax, eat some dinner, and I settled in for hours of contractions.I got in the shower, and am working thruogh the pain, with the wand, and I notice that the shower is draining really slow, and it just has this tiled lip and a shower curtain, no door.So I am standing in water, and really out of it cause I am working through the pain, 15 minutes later the nurse walks in the room and Gasps.It seems the shower was not draining at all, but was overflowing onto the floor, and had flooded the entire room.Mind you, I have been in the shower, eyes closed in all kinds of pain, so I was not paying attention.So they move me to another room, shortly thereafter the hospital alarms start going off, lights and bells and automated voices.I guess the water from my former room traveled down from level 3 to level 2, and was flooding the O.R. down below.Whoops!!Teehee.I spend the next hour or so trying to relax without the shower, and the midwife comes in to rub my legs and feet...ahhh so nice!At 10:30 the midwife tells me that if I want to have anyone there with me for the birth I should call them now.My contractions are a minute and a half apart or so, and I am dilated to 7.I call John, and my dad, and I get back in the shower.At 11:30 or so, My body is experiencing spazms.They had told me not to push, but I could not help it!My body was gonna push whether I liked it or not!I could feel the baby coming out!I called to John, who was on the phone with my mom, and told him to call the nurse, NOW.I was trying to get out of the shower, but my body was so racked with spasms I couldn't get my coordination going.The nurse arrives, and helps me out of the shower, to the bed, checks, and says she sees why I am having problems not pushing, I am fully dialated, and baby is coming right NOW!!Everyone runs around all crazy, getting suited up, separating the bed and just as they put my feet in the stirrups, my dad and Jaqueline arrive, hauling all of the gear we had agreed upon for the calm, coached, drawn out birthing process I thought?I was going to have, relaxing music, washcloths, tennis balls, massage oil... so much for our well laid out birth plan!Pushing was excruciating!Hot firey burning pokers of shooting pain in a very sensitive region.They say you eventually forget the pain, I think that is a load of hooey, I think you just enjoy the payoff so much, you are willing to endure it again.I had the best birth team, an extraordinary nurse, encouraging, kind, humorous, and in my face when I needed it most telling me I could do this, and instructing me how best to keep calm, and stop screaming.Just when I would get overwhelmed with the pain, and start to panic, she would bring me back down.My midwife was calm, kind and nurturing, and since I went through most of the main labor alone, or with one of these two women, I was really glad to have had two extraordinarily wonderful women to help me on this unique journey.Don't get me wrong, I had plenty of offers of people who wanted to be there for me, it's just that when it got right down to it, I was in so much pain, and so focused inward, while I was going through all of the stages of labor, I did not want to have to deal with anyone else being there, who might make me lose my focus.Plus, the whole thing happened so fast.?So they put me in the stirrups, My dad and his fiance arrive just in time, and it is finally time to push.Contractions suck, really really suck, but pushing is a realm of pain previously unexplored by yours truly, and I have had all kinds of pain in my life.I think it would make a truly effective torture method, I would have given up any secrets, anything to make it stop.It doesn't stop until it gets worse, you have to push through the pain, into it,?push into the burn.A dozen big pushes later,?her head forces it's way out, her hand is on her face, and the rest of her, so soft and malleable compared to the head comes sliding out so quick once that head clears.They put her on my chest, I laugh in relief, no more pain, she is here, and then they start fooling around, trying to stop the excessive bleeding.I've got at least one or two hands in there trying to scoop out blood and tissue, and trying to squeeze shut the offending bleeder, and the nurse is squeezing my uterus from the outside through my abdomen, trying to get it to start contracting, and closing back down.I guess they call it a lazy uterus, I call it "she has had enough, and she is officially done now, thank you."I am trying to enjoy my slippery, waxy weird looking beautiful daughter, on my chest, but to tell you the truth, the shit they were doing to my torn, bruised battered?organs and orifices, I could not even focus on her at all, I was in too much fucking pain.They take her away to do their clean up and record keeping stuff.They give me a shot of pitocin to try to get my uterus to contract back down.Eventually they stop the bleeding, and then it is time to try to sew my poor battered Judy back together.??I got 4 sutures in my perineum, and one in my labia, which hurt like hell, they can't really numb that area.I was on the phone telling my mom I had the baby, when they started the labia, and I said, "ok?THAT really hurt!Mom, I gotta go, call you tomorrow."No one tells you how much pain you are in for the first two weeks at least after having a baby.That you can't walk, that going to the bathroom is horrific, burning pain on your broken sutured upness.In addition you have this little squalling rooting nipple mangling beast that needs caring for, and of course, I wanted to do everything, we were together 24-7 (five months later, and I still barely let her out of my sight).I also had the addition of six puppies, and three dogs, and a cat, for whom I am the primary caretaker.I could have asked for help, sure, but I am stubborn, and somehow thought that getting outside to pick up poop would be a good break for me. Not understanding that I would be in excruciating pain later for it.I also had to go back and forth to Kaiser like 15 times that first week, Marisol had Jaundice, and had to stay in the incubator for light therapy, and I decided I would feel better if I went home and slept, instead of lying in the hospital bed crying that my child was locked away in an acrylic box, and I could not hold her.Then there was the insurance snafu that required several trips to all parts of the Kaiser campus, 2 days after I had given birth, and the doctors appointments for Marisol, and the Lactation specialist for me, because right from the start, Marisol was a good eater, she latched on before the nurse could show us how, and sucked so enthusiastically I got blisters on the tips of my nipples, which turned into raw, cracked, ?bleeding sores, and I still had to let this little milk troll suck hard on that every 2 hours...I was in so much pain I thought we were doing it wrong, and the lactation specialist said it would get better after a few weeks... and it did.All the pain went away eventually, those first miserable weeks melted away into the bliss that is motherhood for me. This little being is so amazing, so truly wonderful, and I am so incredibly in love with her, I would do it all again in a heart beat.If I was to change anything, I would have a water birth, in a tub, and not in a broken shower.But still, it makes a good story.?Every day I am amazed and amused and more in love with this little angel baby.All of my anxiety, depression, and related symptoms disappeared when I had her.I have been in a situation that should have put me in an anxious tailspin into the morass of depression, for almost a year now, and yet, no such thing.I have been medication free, substance free, and haven't touced a cigarette for over a year and a half, and I feel more calm, more focused, and happier than ever before.I have found new direction for my life, and am determined to be the best mother possible to Marisol.I am also enrolled at the JC full time, online classes, to finish my education, and create a more secure future for us.Who would have thought that the complicated process of having a child would allow me to fully come into myself, into the being I was supposed to be all along.I would do it again in a heartbeat.She really is the best, smartest, most beautiful baby in the whole wide world.?I know?all moms think that about their children, but they are mistaken, that title belongs to my daughter, my Angel-Baby, Marisol Rowena Ridley Harmon. |
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