Sunday, January 25, 2009

Evie's Birth Story




I had spent months putting into my mind that I wanted to have a natural, un-medicated birth. Toward the end, Chris and I even took a natural birthing class. Some people may think I'm crazy, but I wanted to experience what my body was designed to do and meant to experience.

Evie was 4 days overdue and for the last several weeks of the pregnancy, I had developed high blood pressure, so my Dr. decided it was time to induce. Of course, I didn't want to be induced, but I wanted to do what was best for the baby.
When I arrived at the hospital, I was 85% effaced and 4-4.5 cm dilated. We decided to break my water and see if that would jump start active labor. I did start having regular contractions, but I wasn't dilating very quickly so they decided to start the pitocin and it didn't take much. Regular and more intense contractions soon followed and were actually very manageable to my surprise. It wasn't until I was dilated to about 9cm that I felt like I was having a hard time managing. Not only were the contractions intense, but I was having immense back labor because Evie was coming out in the posterior position. Thank god for my husband because he stepped up and was an amazing birth coach! I am so proud of him because if it weren't for him, I don't think I could have made it through. At about 3:30pm I was fully dilated and started pushing. Even though it hurt, it felt good to push and I was amazed at how involuntary pushing is. I had no control over it and I just had to go with it. At first, Evie' heart rate was dropping with each push and for a while the Dr. was saying that I might have to have a C-section. Of course, I didn't want that, but I would have done whatever was best for the baby. Once Evie started to drop down in to the birth canal, she started tolerating the pushing and her heart rate was fine. Four hours of pushing later and at 7:36pm, Evelyn Elizabeth Larson was born without so much as an aspirin for pain.

My entire memory of the experience is both very euphoric and dream like. It's everything that I had hoped for and I feel extremely positive about the whole experience. The Doctors and Nurses at St. Marks were amazing and incredibly supportive of my decision to birth naturally. They never once asked me about pain meds or even made mention of it. My nurse even stayed several hours past her shift to see me to the end and then came and visited with me in postpartum the next day.

If anyone reading this is interested in having a natural and un-medicated birth, please, please read this book. It's full of wonderful information, stories and even images to help get your mind and body ready.