Sarah's Birth Story

On August 6th at 5:45am, I woke up having a contraction. I had woken up to a contraction every morning for weeks so I didn't think much of it. I rolled over and prayed Sylvia would sleep in past six so I could get a little more sleep. Ten minutes later I had another contraction and then ten minutes later I had another. This wasn't common so I started getting my hopes up. I got up and started puttering around and snacking and paying attention to any possible twinge. The contractions were hardly painful, but they were consistent and getting closer together. I was pumped. My original due date was August 6th and it got changed to August 15th so this was a very pleasant and very needed surprise. This pregnancy was hard on me, physically and mentally. My belly was heavy and huge, bigger than I had gotten with the other two girls and mentally I was not myself--anxious, depressed, exceptionally irritable, etc. I needed this pregnancy to be over and these contractions were my reprieve. Alas, they started spacing out again until they came to a complete halt by about 10am. I was bummed. The day went on as usual and at about 4 o'clock I suddenly had a long, hard, painful contraction. Pain means business. I was thrilled. By 4:30 they were five minutes apart and the real deal. I called Jordan home from work, got the girls situated with babysitters and we were on our way. I was breathing fine through the pain, in control, and trying to decide if I wanted an epidural or not. I had an epidural with Scarlett but it didn't work on one side and it was not a good experience. I had an unmedicated birth with Sylvia and it was equally as exhilarating as it was awful.

When we got to the hospital I was six centimeters dilated and the contractions were two minutes apart. I decided I just wasn't in the mood to be in pain and asked for an epidural. I really wanted to see what it would be like to have one that worked. I wanted to compare my "natural" birth with Sylvia, to a medicated birth with Sarah and put to rest in my own mind the epidural vs no epidural debate. I got my epidural and envisioned myself having a pain-free, relaxing hour or two and then I would push a few times and have myself a baby. But the epidural wasn't working. Panic set in. I had already mentally checked out. I was counting on relief and it wasn't coming and I was devastated. The back pain and pressure were gone but the main source of pain in my lower abdomen wasn't even touched. The same thing happened with Scarlett. It is hard to explain, but having this happen was almost worse than not having an epidural at all. When you aren't medicated, your whole body is reacting to the contraction. For some reason, when you can't feel the pressure and the forces of your body and can only feel the pain of the contraction, it is actually more painful. It is so sharp and concentrated in one area that you can't cope and breathe. Couple that with the unmet expectation of relief and you have yourself a thrashing, moaning crazy lady. I could see the concern on the anesthesiologist's face. He told me to lie flat on my back to force the medication upward. It turns out lying flat on your back during a contraction is the worst position to be in. It is excruciating. I sit straight up when I am in labor. It works for me, so lying on my back was torture and nothing was changing. He kept giving me more medication and fiddling around with stuff and finally it slowly started taking the pain away.

When I was all the way numb, waves of euphoria engulfed me. When you are in the hardest part of labor, you get cold and shaky. I was warm and relaxed. I said many times to Jordan, "Why would anyone ever have a baby without an epidural? This is AWESOME." The doctor came in and said it was time to push and I was like "Oh really? I had no idea. I can't feel a thing." Again. This is AWESOME. I started pushing. And pushing. And pushing. And pushing. And I was getting nowhere. 20 minutes passed and I was thinking "Huh. I had Sylvia out in ten minutes. This is my third baby. I thought they were just supposed to slide out by now." With Sylvia, the urge to push overcame me and I could feel exactly how and when to push. I could feel her moving down which is incredibly motivating and I had her out in minutes. The problem with Sarah was my epidural was so dense I had zero muscle control. They would say "Push" and I would say "How?" I had no idea how to do it. They would say "Yes, right there. Push exactly like that" and I'd say, "Am I doing it now?" and usually the answer was "No." I was getting really discouraged. And tired. Remember how I felt so warm and relaxed? Well warm and relaxed equals sleepy. I had no more pain so I had no more adrenaline. I just wanted to go to sleep. And my doctor was kind of condescending when she would tell me I was pushing right or wrong and I just wasn't getting the encouragement I needed. I felt awkward and annoyed and after 45 minutes of pushing I finally said, "I can't do this. I can't feel anything. We need to turn off the epidural and try again when I can feel something." My doctor acted kind of frustrated, and said "Fine. I'll be back in 30 minutes and you are going to get this baby out." So I just sat back and waited. And I must say I was really proud of myself for figuring out what I needed to do and sticking up for myself. Slowly the abdominal pain came back along with some much needed adrenaline and I could very faintly feel her head moving down while I pushed.  Once I could feel her, I had her out in minutes. At 9:45pm, Sarah Kate was born. 8lbs 14ozs and 21 inches long. She was a big baby and I felt very validated in my belief that I was bigger with her than the other girls. She had swallowed/inhaled some meconium (baby poop) so they had to immediately suction her out with some sort of machine. I couldn't see anything, but I guess they stick tubes through her nose and down her throat and completely clean her out. She was prefect. She was mine. And she was FINALLY OUT OF MY BODY. And here she is:

The signs and letter Jordan and Scarlett made for me and Sarah.

Four days old and Sylvia wouldn't (and still won't) leave the baby alone.

Two weeks old

Three weeks old

Four weeks old

As far as the epidural vs no epidural debate is concerned, I still don't know which is better and what I'll do next time. Based on my experience, there were actually more cons to the epidural and more pros to the unmedicated birth. The only pro to an epidural is pain relief and that is a hefty pro. If I do get an epidural next time, I am going to tell them to turn it off when it's time to push and let it wear off before I waste so much time and energy. Some women can push just fine with an epidural, but it turns out my body reacts differently and the epidural needs to be really dense in order to work. So there it is.

And as a side note, we didn't purposely make an S theme for our kids' names. It just so happened the only names we could agree on were S names. And funny enough, our boy name that we have had picked since we were engaged is an S name so we are pigeon-holed now I guess. And I feel like I need to write it down somewhere that Kate is after my sister Brittany Kate. Because she is my best friend and she got me through this awful pregnancy.