Birth Story

This is going to be short and sweet…just like my labor!

I started having braxton hicks contractions, and lots of them, around 32 weeks.  I think this also contributed to the insomnia of the third trimester because, of course, this mostly happened late at night.

My due date was March 11th, but I had convinced myself that since this was my fourth child and it was so close to my last pregnancy that this baby would come early.  So, in the weeks leading up to his birth I saw everything as a sign that I was going into labor, but of course nothing happened.  So, when March 11th came and went without so much as anything I started to think this baby was going to be late, like his older brother who came 5 days after his due date.

I took a shower and climbed into bed at around 11 pm.  In the shower, I had decided to do squats.  I was hoping that the up and down bouncing motion would get things started sooner rather than later.  Surprisingly, I fell right asleep.  I woke up around 1:15 am with not exactly a pain, but more of a feeling like I had just gotten punched in the stomach.  It didn't hurt, but was enough to wake me up.  Then, I had a wet sensation.  I immediately got up and ran to the bathroom.  A few drops of something dripped down my leg, but I wasn't sure what it was.  I sat on the toilet for a few minutes and…nothing!  I thought maybe I had just peed myself a little bit.  Hannes got a waterproof diaper changing pad and laid it on our bed, just in case, and I went and laid back down.  The second I laid down there was a gush and I was 100% sure that my water had just broken!  I was in disbelief, in all 3 of my other pregnancies my water NEVER broke.  I always had to have it broken.  Henry was almost born still in the sac.  I've always heard stories of people's waters breaking, but figured it would never happen to me; especially, since I hadn't yet had one real contraction.  Almost immediately after that the contractions started coming.  They were not painful at all and were only lasting 30 - 40 seconds, but they were coming fast, less than 2 minutes apart!  Hannes got up and started packing his things and I got my, already packed, bags ready.  I debated curling my hair, but opted for a ponytail since it was the middle of the night.  We called the hospital and let them know what was going on and then waited.  I kept going back and forth about leaving, but my contractions still weren't painful.  Then, I started to get the pooping urge and decided we needed to leave…like right that second!!  I remembered that right at the end of my labor with Henry I had this feeling too.  So, I got really worried.  At this point, it was about 2:15 in the morning.  The hospital is close so I wasn't too worried.  We grabbed all of our things, told Emily that we were leaving and headed to the car.  Since, we live in the city we park in a parking garage and of course, we completely forgot that the garage is locked from midnight until 6 am.  Like you cannot get in or get your car out locked.  We do have a special key fob with a code that allows us to get in and out, but…we didn't remember the code!!!!

We stood there in the parking lot behind the garage frantically calling every number we could to get them to either unlock the garage or give us a code to get in.  No one was answering.  I finally got through on one of the numbers, but they couldn't do anything and just told me to call the other number.  At this point, at least 15 minutes had passed and I was in a serious panic!  I told Hannes to just call an ambulance because I was worried I was going to poop my pants or have my baby in the parking lot, and the contractions were starting to get painful.  I had to bend over and breathe through them.  As soon as he got through to someone at the emergency number and began explaining our situation a security car pulled up.  What timing!  They unlocked the door and, like a man, Hannes froze.  He had been holding the car seat and a few bags and suddenly he had no clue what to do with them.  He set them down on the entrance ramp to the garage and then decided that wasn't a good spot and picked them up and went to put them on the exit ramp and then decided no and as he was wandering around I yelled at him to just set them down by me and to hurry and get the car!!!  A few moments later he came down and I jumped in and we sped to the hospital.

When we got there, they took me back to the observation room.  Before we had even settled in I mentioned that I had to poop and she rushed us back to a delivery room.  They hooked me up to a few monitors and checked my progress.  I was about 4 - 5 cm, but she said my cervix was soft and would easily dilate.  Then, I asked if I could go to the bathroom.  They took all the wires off and I was finally able to go!  I was in there for about 20 minutes when Hannes said the nurses were getting impatient and really wanted to check me again.  I came back and they checked my progress, I was at about 9 - 10 cm, but his head was high.  The contractions were almost constant and extremely painful at this point.  I took a few breaths of laughing gas, but it doesn't help at all with my pain so I dropped it.  I was really getting the urge to push so she helped to hold everything open during the next contraction and I pushed.  Then, I had the weirdest feeling in the world…he completely rolled around!  His head had been facing forward and he spun around so he was now facing my back.  Then I pushed through two more contractions and he was born at 3:26 am!  We had been at the hospital for about 45 minutes and my entire labor was less than two and a half hours long.  It was an insane, painful few hours, but I could not believe that it was so short!!

We had no idea if the baby was going to be a boy or a girl and after the baby was born it was lying between my legs and I kept yelling at Hannes not to look!  I really wanted both of us to look and see at the same time.  He could see the head of the baby, but I couldn't see anything.  When they handed him to me a few moments later and we looked and Hannes said it's a boy I thought I was going to pass out! Part of me was really hoping it was a girl during my entire pregnancy, but at that exact moment I couldn't imagine it being anything else.  A boy sounded just perfect.  We looked at him and Hannes said I think he looks like a Carson and I was like he does!  That is exactly what he looks like and that is how he got his name.  It wasn't on any list I had made and it wasn't even one I had considered, but somehow it just fit him.