My birth story! All night I was feeling really uncomfortable. I was having lots of pressure and…

My birth story!

All night I was feeling really uncomfortable. I was having lots of pressure and couldn't seem to get to sleep. Around 2:30 am I felt a small gush while laying in bed. I got up to go to the bathroom. But my bladder was practically empty. I decided to lay back down and wait for either contractions to start or another gush before i woke my husband up. There was no wetness on the bed so it definitely wasn't enough fluid for me to know for sure if it was my water or not. It was a pretty uneventful morning. I got up to have breakfast with my husband before he left for work. I didn't move around too much because of how much pressure I was feeling. Then around 1:30 pm I was laying on the couch when i felt another gush. Again I ran to the bathroom. And again my bladder was practically empty. At this point I text my husband and let him know that I think my water is broken. I tried doing a couple squats to get more to come out and nothing. Then while I'm just standing there, I start dripping fluid down my legs. So I text my husband again and let him know that this is the real deal and I needed him to come home. While I'm waiting for him i head upstairs and put a pad on and start double checking the hospital bag. I still wasn't having contractions so I just was nonchalantly doing my makeup and whatnot 😂 I stood up from my vanity and started feeling more gushes of fluid. At this point the fluid just kept coming in large gushes. I was leaking through pads so I knew for sure that it was my water. My husband gets home and we start heading to the hospital. Around 3pm we arrived in the labor and delivery unit. We were put in triage and hooked up to monitors. My doctor comes in and swabs for amniotic fluid. Which immediately confirmed that my water had broken. They told me that I was around 5 centimeters dilated and 60 percent effaced. But they weren't picking up regular contractions on the monitor. So they stripped my membranes and told me that they'd give me a little bit of time to start having contractions on my own, but if I didn't then I would be induced. Around 7:15 pm they get me into my labor room. They hooked me up and started me on the lowest dose of pitocin because I still wasn't having consistent contractions. Pretty quickly after starting the pitocin I started having very strong, very frequent contractions. The pain quickly became unbearable and I was in tears. I couldn't breathe through the pain at all. So the nurse called for an epidural to come up and help me. By the time the epidural got to me it was only around 8:30 pm. I had only been in active labor for about an hour and 15 minutes. I felt so defeated. Since it had been such a short amount of time that I had been in active labor, the nurse didn't even bother to check me for dilation. I was shaking uncontrollably. Starting to feel nauseous. I didn't think I was going to be able to hold still to get the epidural. My contractions were coming probably about 2 minutes apart and in waves of 2 at a time. Somehow between contractions I managed to hold still long enough for him to get the epidural catheter in. I still had no received any pain medicine at this point. I told the nurse that I felt like I needed to poop. She said once he finished up back there and they could get me laid down that she would check me for dilation. Then wave 2 of that contraction came and I told her that I seriously needed to push. So he manually puts one dose of the epidural in because he didn't have time to get the drip going for constant medication. I get laid back and the nurse checks my cervix. I was dilated to a 10 and baby was on his way out! I still was not numb and was in a lot of pain. At this point I had fully dilated without any pain medicine whatsoever and suddenly it hit me that I shouldn't be disappointed in myself at all. I dilated hard and fast and that's why I was in so much pain. But it was time to push and I still wasn't numb! So the anesthesiologist starts manually pumping as many different pain medicines that he safely can through my epidural catheter. After about 10 minutes I was finally numb. I'm pushing away. They never got the chance to put a catheter in me. There's so much pain medicine in me that the entire bottom half and right side of my body was numb. Once I get him crowning, the nurse calls for the doctors to come in and deliver. At this point it's been about an hour and 15 minutes of pushing. And I'm not hooked up to an epidural drip at all so I'm starting to lose my numbness. They come in and go to take the bottom half of the bed away for delivery. And very quickly put it back on because he was coming too fast. The doctors weren't even finished getting their gloves on when his whole head popped out. One of the nurses ran over and in the next push, he was out! I felt his delivery and I felt them deliver the placenta since I lost so much of my numbness. But it wasn't nearly as bad as I'm sure it could have been. I had a first degree tear inside. I felt her stitch it up too 🙄 ow. Within an hour after delivery I was up and walking around. Just from the bed to the bathroom, but that tells you how quickly that one dose of epidural wore off! Baby Bentley was born at 10:13 pm weighing 6 pounds 12 ounces. He was 37 weeks and 4 days gestational age. He passed all his tests with flying colors and is completely healthy.