I’ve been meaning to write up Jack’s birth story and he just turned 6 months old yesterday, so I figured it was time to do it before I start forgetting things! The human brain is sneaky that way. I want to preface this by saying that it’s not a totally feel-good, positive birth story (despite all my efforts lol). While everything turned out totally fine, if you’re pregnant and looking to only read about positive, smooth births…this may not be for you haha And I totally get needing to protect your mental space and not allowing extra anxiety to creep in! I was the same way and I think it was really beneficial. With that being said…here we go!

For some context, leading up to Jack’s birth I did a lot of reading and research into natural birth. I of course read Ina May’s Guide to Childbirth (a cult classic for a reason) and I also took a hypnobirthing class online. I listened to the hypnobirthing tracks at night when I was falling asleep to start to associate them with relaxation! To be honest, my mom had three totally natural births with zero complications and my mom and I have the exact same body type…so I genuinely thought things would be pretty smooth sailing lol I didn’t have my mind absolutely set on not getting an epidural, but I definitely wanted it to be a very last resort if I was in labor for too long and felt I wouldn’t have enough strength left to push.

Anyways, fast forward to my due date…which came and left. And then another week went by…still nothing. At this point, I had been on maternity leave since 39 weeks, but my “official” 12 weeks didn’t start until Jack was born…so I was using sick time and PTO to cover my time off and I was also beginning to feel like I would never go into labor on my own. So as much as I never wanted to be induced, suddenly I just felt like it was the right decision. I didn’t want to wait anymore and I felt like it was starting to mess with the head space I was in. So we scheduled my induction for 10 days after my due date on Monday, January 27th at 5:30pm. The plan was to start with Cervidil (which is a cervical ripener and helps get your cervix softened and ready for labor) and then if I progressed, we’d start with pitocin (the drug that actually gets labor started).

We went in that evening, checked in, and they got me all set up in my room. They placed an IV because I would likely eventually need it, but nothing was hooked up to it at the time. By the time I was all set, it was probably about 7pm. They said the doctor probably wouldn’t be in until 8pm to place the Cervidil so we ordered food to-go from our favorite restaurant, Red Heat Tavern (if you follow me, you’re not suprised lol), and Adam went to go pick it up. I wolfed down that last meal and then we watched some Netflix while we waited for the doctor to come in. He didn’t actually come in until about 9pm. He checked me to see where I was at and I think I was at like 1cm and then he placed the Cervidil. I was super nervous about this part because I’d seen other women say it was uncomfortable…but guys, it was literally like a tiny piece of paper on a string lol Less intimidating than a tampon. It was placed in like 1 second flat with zero discomfort and that was that! I immediately started feeling cramping like I had my period. It wasn’t labor contractions, it was just that continuous pain/ache like a period cramp. They weren’t awful, but they were definitely towards the strong end of any period cramps I’ve had. I was still able to just hang out and watch Netflix, but I was just uncomfortable and annoyed basically because it was continuous pain haha

We went to sleep probably around 11. There was a pull out sleep chair/sofa for Adam that I imagine was super comfy lol I think I fell asleep around midnight but was in and out because of the discomfort. I finally woke up at 4 feeling more uncomfortable and like I needed to go to the bathroom. I went in and the Cervidil fell out at this point. They were going to leave it in until 8am, so I wasn’t sure if they’d need to insert a new one. I’m also pretty sure my water partially broke at this point when I was on the toilet and the rest of my mucus plug/bloody show made an appearance. I went back to bed and called the nurse to let her know the Cervidil fell out and she was basically just like “Okay good to know” but they didn’t replace it or anything, which was nice! So at this point I had nothing in or on my body lol *no striiiings attached* (Nsync)

I was able to doze a little bit more until about 5:30am but at this point the constant cramping turned into more traditional contractions. They were coming about every 5 minutes or so and I quickly realized after one or two that they were MUCH more intense when I was laying down so even though I desperately wanted to keep sleeping, I got out of bed and sat on the yoga ball that was in my room. Over the next couple of hours I let Adam sleep and I just kind of moved around the room with my headphones in, listening to my hypnobirthing tracks. I did several contractions on the yoga ball, leaning over counters, etc. It was still dark out and with the hypnobirthing tracks playing, it was just really peaceful!

Around 7:30am Adam was awake and I said we should probably order breakfast before things really got going. So I ordered an omelet with some fruit and bacon and ate it on the yoga ball in between contractions, which were about every 4 minutes at this point. After breakfast, I had my earbuds in and just turned on the hypnobirthing tracks when a contraction started and in between I’d just hang out and talk to Adam. But with the contractions coming every 4 minutes, it was a lot of switching back and forth into labor mode haha For the next few hours, Adam and I tested out various positions to see how they’d work. We mostly did contractions with me sitting on a yoga ball and him massaging my lower back throughout. I felt the contractions all around, but the pain was especially strong in my back. At this point it was probably around 10am and I started to notice a few things:

1. The contractions were coming about every 3 minutes
2. I definitely had back labor and it was continuous. So in between the contractions in the front, the labor in my back NEVER STOPPED. So I wasn’t really getting any of those breaks in between that they promised in my birthing class lol
3. My contractions were on X GAMES MODE. Each one was lasting over a minute and many of them had two peaks. So I’d get to the worst of the contraction and it’d start to ease up and then it would ramp back up to another peak. So basically it was 2 continuous contractions back-to-back. Adam kept asking, “Is it over?” and I’d barely be able to speak enough to tell him that it was still going.

There was a little bit of time that they hooked me up to a contraction monitor just to make sure my contractions were strong on their own and I wouldn’t need pitocin, so I got to visually see the double peaks in my contractions and how close together they were. I was excited that I went into labor on my own and wouldn’t need pitocin, but my body was doing a little too much for my liking lol Adam and I walked the halls for a little bit, pausing when I had a contraction so I could lean on him. But eventually I just wanted to head back to the room and get in the shower.

Probably around 11am, I got into the shower in our room. It had a detachable shower head so I just sat on the bench in there, jacked the heat way up, and moved the water over my belly and back with each contraction. Adam sat on the toilet and blasted my hypnobirthing tracks (it was hard to hear it in the shower). It was very quiet and calm and I felt like I was in a little birthing cocoon lol I should also mention that we had all the lights off and had set up a bunch of little electronic tea candles. So it was good vibes in my room for sure. The nurses said they loved coming in! haha The contractions were pretty intense but the water helped SO much. I stayed in there for probably an hour…but the ventilation wasn’t great and I felt like I was overheating a little bit. I was continuously sipping on coconut water and gatorade to stay hydrated, but I thought I should take a break. So we went back to laboring on the yoga ball. But at this point the contractions were intense and my back labor would just not quit so I got back into the shower for a while.

I think it was maybe around 2pm when I requested to go into the birthing tub. They have one big spa tub on the floor that you can labor in or give birth in and I was saving that as my big relief! But it was at this point that I was starting to feel a little panic creep in and the thought “Oh god, I don’t know how long I can do this” just kept popping up. It would have been one thing if I had breaks in between my contractions, but the contractions had been like 3 minutes apart for HOURS and the back labor was continuous. So the little time I had between the contractions in the front, I didn’t really get a break to calm down and recoup because the pain in my back never stopped. I can’t remember when exactly they checked me, but at some point they did and I was 4 cm dilated.

I got into the birthing tub and internally I was flustered. We darkened the room, put on the hypnobirthing track, and put on the candles. I sunk into the tub and just closed my eyes and tried to focus on the hypnobirthing. It did help and I felt more relaxed, but the water was kind of just luke warm and I kept floating up so my belly wasn’t even covered by the water. I think from the outside I looked really zen because my eyes were closed and I wasn’t making any noise but inside I was struggling. I stayed in the tub for about an hour and towards the end I had just reached my limit. The contractions were continuing to be 2-3 minutes apart, lasting 1-2 minutes each time, and the back labor hadn’t let up for hours. I was worried that I’d have nothing left to give mentally when I finally did get to the point where I could push. I had planned on trying nitrous oxide before doing an epidural, but at this point I felt like I just needed to do the epidural. I was really disappointed in myself and felt like I was letting myself down and that Adam would be like “Wow, already? What a wimp.” But obviously Adam did not say that lol He told me how I’d already done more than anyone could expect of me and I’d been so strong and whatever I wanted to do was fine.

So we got me back to my room, they gave me some IV fluid, and then they came in to do the epidural. I honestly didn’t even feel nervous about it, but I know some people are scared so I’ll just say that it was literally NOTHING. It felt about like getting a shot in the arm, but just in your back and then that was all I felt. That little sting was over in a second and then I didn’t feel anything. And thank god my body got with the program and gave me a break because I didn’t have any strong contractions while they were doing the epidural. #blessed.

Once the epidural kicked in, they checked me and I was dilated to 7cm. It was probably about 4pm at this point and I was so exhausted that when I was finally not in pain, I slept for the most blissful two hours of my life. I will say that as soon as the epidural kicked in I was like OMG THIS IS THE BEST I’VE EVER FELT IN MY WHOLE LIFE I’M SO GLAD I DID THIS lol But my labor did slow down once I was on the epidural, despite them diligently making me switch positions every 30 minutes, so they did end up putting me on pitocin to keep things moving. Obviously I didn’t feel it though. And then by 6pm I was fully dilated to 10cm and they said I could start pushing! While I was pregnant I saw 2 midwives regularly and one of them was on call so she’d be the one delivering me. I was pumped and ready to go!

I remember Adam asking how long the typical person usually pushed and my midwife said it was usually about an hour….lol Oh if only we’d known. They turned my epidural all the way down so I could feel when contractions were coming and we started pushing. I pushed on hands and knees, squatting, on my back, on my side. All over the place basically lol My epidural was so low that I could move anywhere I wanted on the bed and had full control of my legs. After 2-3 hours of pushing, you could see the tip of Jack’s head when I pushed, but it just wasn’t getting up and under my pubic bone. My midwife said the way my pubic bone is positioned, it was a really narrow opening so it was hard for him to make it out. I would push 3-4x with all my strength and then take a break until the next contraction. This went on like this for 4 hours. There was a midwife-in-training that I said could attend my birth so she was with me the entire time. Every time I pushed she would yell “That’s it! That’s the push!!” and I just wanted to yell “BITCH it is NOT the push! He hasn’t moved an inch in hours so stop making it sound like it’s the final push! There will never be a final push!” lol Honestly though, I will say this was the absolute hardest part of my entire labor. He was so far down in the birth canal that the pressure was unbelievable and I had the most intense constant pain in my back. I was sobbing and covered in sweat and just felt like I was trapped and would never escape this situation. I couldn’t feel myself making any progress and the pain was too much.

My midwife could see that I was just having a total mental breakdown and she said that we should take a half hour break. Jack was tolerating the position just fine, so they turned my epidural back up for a half hour and let me recoup. It was exactly what I needed. Just after a half hour, I felt mentally ready to go again. They said they’d let me try to push for 45 more minutes before they’d need to do something else. My midwife said there was a doctor on call that used forceps and knew how to do it really well, so that would be my next option. At this point, I wanted to get him out on my own, but I was willing to do whatever it took to get him out.

Well, I gave it my all for those last 45 minutes. Every ounce of strength I had left. But he just wasn’t budging. Adam was cheering me on with every single push and surprisingly he was actually watching the business end of things to see if his head was coming out lol So finally, after pushing for 5 hours, I had the doctor come in to do the forceps. And good lord, when he put those in, I saw stars. It was so much more painful that I could have imagined, even with the epidural. I had my arm over my eyes and was just crying. But once they were in, we were ready to push again. I pushed, he pulled, and Jack finally started to make some headway. The doctor was awesome because as soon as the forceps got him lowered enough, he took them out and let me take over. So I was able to give a good push and get his head out. I definitely felt the ring of fire people talk about, but there’s so much going on that you just push through it. At this point I could hear how excited Adam was. He was excitedly yelling that the head was out and I was doing it and he was almost here! I could tell he was getting really emotional and almost in tears.

And then shit hit the GOD DAMN fan. Suddenly I looked up and they had pushed Adam to the far wall of the room, saying “DAD MOVE”. They had someone hit the code button, tons of doctors rushed in, people were yelling to get the NICU team. My midwife jumped up so she was STANDING on the bed and threw my legs over my head and then started pushing with both hands down on my stomach HARD. I had heard about shoulder dystocias in things I’d read and listened to and I kind of knew that’s what was happening. But in the moment, it was so unbelievably painful, I just tried to disassociate. I remember just staring up at the ceiling and feeling like I was in absolute zero control of what was happening to me and like my body wasn’t my own anymore. The doctor was reaching with both hands inside to try to dislodge Jack’s shoulder and pull him out and I can’t even begin to describe how that felt. Finally after 2 minutes, but what felt like a life time, they got Jack out, snipped his umbilical cord (no delayed cord clamping here) and handed him over to the NICU team in the room. I could see them all hovering over him on the little warmer but I couldn’t really see what was going on. At this point my placenta basically shot outta me and my doctor was frantically like “AND THAT’S THE PLACENTA” lol which even in the moment I found slightly hilarious. At this point I heard Jack cry and I took a huge breath of relief. I didn’t know what happened to him but I at least knew he was breathing.

It was a blur but they said something about him being fine but them needing to go check his respiration and it still felt like an emergency. The lead NICU doctor quickly brought Jack over to me so I could kiss him (and see him for the first time). It was literally probably 2 seconds…just long enough for me to feel how soft his skin was and see his little face. And then they took him out of the room to go to the NICU and Adam went with them. This was 11:45pm.

Which left me alone in the room with the doctor and midwife-in-training. The doctor confirmed that it was a shoulder dystocia and I told him that’s what I figured. He said he basically had to reach up into my uterus because of the way that Jack’s shoulder was stuck under my pubic bone and the position his arm was in. The doctor, who was about 50, said this would be one of his most memorable births lol Yeah…same, man. And because of this emergency man-handling that had to happen to get Jack out, I tore in FOUR places with 2nd and 3rd degree tears. One tear was through my sphincter…so I was literally ripped a new asshole lol. I laid there while he stitched up all the tears, just trying to wrap my mind around what the hell just happened. So just as a recap, we went in for the induction on Monday, January 27th at 5:30pm and Jack was born at 11:42pm.

With shoulder dystocias, the baby’s shoulder gets impacted behind the mom’s pubic bone and the air supply gets cut off because the umbilical cord is being compressed. So it’s a rush to get them out. Thankfully Jack’s only lasted two minutes so it didn’t affect his brain at all. And because of the rough way they have to get them out, they often have broken bones or nerve damage, but Jack had neither! So after 5 hours in the NICU, they cleared him and brought him to my room at 5am where I finally got to hold him and snuggle him for the first time.

This was absolutely NOT how I imagined my birth would go at all. But I’m so thankful that my labor ended up being atypical and I decided to get the epidural because I can’t even IMAGINE how terrible the forceps, shoulder dystocia, and tearing would have been if I didn’t have that to offset it…because it was still so incredibly painful. The hardest part of it all was going through all of that and then feeling like I got robbed of the one moment I was most looking forward to–have Jack laid on my chest right after he came out and getting to look at him and see Adam’s reaction. Having to be separated for those 5 hours was so hard and something that I’m still coming to terms with. And despite logically knowing that getting the epidural was absolutely the best thing that could have happened for me in this situation, I still feel this nagging guilt like “You could have done it without it. You gave in too soon. You’re less of a badass woman for not doing it naturally.”

The doctor said a future vaginal birth wasn’t out of the question, but my midwife said she would highly recommend me just doing a c-section because of how narrow my pelvis was and then the shoulder dystocia risk on top of that. Jack was only 8lbs 8oz which doesn’t put him in the higher risk category for a shoulder dystocia, so it’s not like his weight was definitely the cause. In fact, there’s only a 1% chance of a shoulder dystocia for a baby at that weight. I got 99 problems, but babies sliding easily out of me ain’t one. As much as I’d rather not have a c-section, I definitely do not want to go through labor all over again just to end up in that situation. So we’ll see what I decide to do.

Healing from the birth was also such a long and painful process because of all the tearing. The first time they tried to have me stand up the following day, I passed out cold. And then there was so much swelling from all the tearing that my pee couldn’t come out and they had to put me on a catheter…which was actually the best thing ever because I didn’t have to deal with that area at all yet haha I couldn’t really walk around easily for about a week and a half and at that point I was still in a lot of pain. At about 5 weeks, I was still in a lot of pain. It was constant throbbing when I was standing. I ended up going to see my midwife that week because I thought I had mastitis and I mentioned the pain to her, asking if it was normal. I figured it was since all I had gone through. She decided to do an exam and told me that at some point the stitches on my third degree tear at my perineum popped out, so that whole area was just open….:) She said she couldn’t believe how high my pain tolerance must be lol At that point there was talk of me getting restitched, but they waited until the following week to see if it would heal a little on it’s own. It did not. So at 8 weeks pp, I had to go back in so they could recut and restitch the area. Just what I wanted after everything I’d been through. Originally it was just assumed that they’d sedate me…but Covid hit and it wasn’t as easy to get that scheduled, so we had to just do a local anesthetic for the procedure. So then finally about 2-3 weeks after that, at 11 or 12 weeks postpartum, I finally felt almost back to normal.

It was quite the experience…but Jack is worth it a million times over. And he’s one lucky little dude to have made it out through all of that totally unscathed.