I finally got around to typing up my birth story, and I wanted to share it here because I read a LOT of these stories while I was overdue and waiting for my baby to be born. I hope this helps all you overdue mamas out there pass the time!

About halfway through my pregnancy, I got together with my mom’s family for a gender reveal party. My mom has four sisters, and between them they have 16 kids. They told me that every single one of those pregnancies went overdue, so I figured chances were pretty good that my baby would be overdue, too. In fact, I was so sure about it that my last day of work was actually two days past my due date!

How right I was--maybe too right. I finished up work on a Thursday, the same day my parents flew into town, so at that point the baby was “allowed” to come. I went out to a Mexican restaurant with my coworkers and I asked for the spiciest salsa they had to try and get labor going. That was the first of many labor inducing tricks I spent the next TWO WEEKS spending my time on. It was great to have my parents in town. Although they were patiently waiting for the main event of meeting their first grandchild, they happily fulfilled their secondary task of entertaining their daughter while she slowly went insane from waiting. I had a doctor’s appointment nearly every day to check on baby’s progress, and since my husband was pretty busy tying up loose ends at school before the birth, my mom came with me. I was texting my doula constantly, giving her updates and asking for advice.

I was lucky enough to have an OB that was completely supportive of me going post-dates--up until the two week mark. He was completely chill during the two week wait, remaining calm and encouraging about my complete lack of progress. There was a little bit of concern over lack of fluid, but I spent a day focusing on my water intake and it went back up. I had to go in to see a different OB once during those two weeks who completely stressed me out, wanting to send me the hospital for monitoring after activity was low on the non-stress test. Fortunately, I remembered a trick from my childbirth class and suggested I change positions. That woke the baby right up and I dodged the induction bullet for another day. In the end, though, I still hadn’t gone into labor at 42 weeks, so I was admitted to the hospital for induction on November 4th. I understood that it was the smart decision, medically speaking, but I was still very disappointed that I wouldn’t be going into labor naturally, and I had concerns about the effect induction would have on my plan for a natural childbirth.

I checked into the hospital on Monday night, and met my first nurse, Joan. Joan patiently and with a good sense of humor walked me through all the million admissions questions, answered all of my questions and got me settled in. Joan had a good laugh when I refused at first to change into a hospital gown. My rationale was that there would be plenty of time to walk around half naked once I went into labor, so it wasn’t necessary to get a head start now. I also gave the go ahead for students to be present during my labor, so I saw quite a few nursing and med students during my stay. This was completely okay with me, and they stayed mostly in the background.

The plan was to put me on the monitor for a bit, then start me on misoprodol (cytotec), which is a contraction-inducing pill, around midnight. My OB planned on giving me a dose every four hours, or however long it took to put me into labor. After an hour or so of monitoring, however, it looked like I was contracting too much already to take that medication. Now, I was not actually in labor, mind you. This had been the frustrating situation all week long--I would go in for monitoring and it would show contractions happening about every five minutes, but I wasn’t feeling a thing. I could sometimes feel a little bit of a stretching on the outside of my belly if I touched it and focused on it while looking at the monitor, but otherwise I was feeling nada. It was super frustrating. I was still sitting at 2cm dilated, 50% effaced and pretty high station (-2 or -3 depending on who you asked), so something had to be done. After a conversation between the nurse, the resident and the attending, it was decided to try inserting a foley balloon into my cervix to open it up. I was excited about this option since it is non-medicinal, but in the end it was extremely painful and they couldn’t even get it in. In the end, they inserted a Cervadil ribbon at about midnight, and planned to start Pitocin in the morning. I was disappointed about that option, as everything I had heard about Pitocin contractions made me fearful that I would end up with a C-section. I held out hope that the Cervadil would get things started on its own, but my nurse told me that in the 12 years she had been working in L&D, she’d only seen that happen maybe 3 times.

After they inserted the Cervadil ribbon, my husband and I tried to get some sleep. My husband did amazingly well with this task; I did not. Between being strapped to the monitor, having an IV of antibiotics for Group B strep, being in a generally uncomfortable hospital bed and worrying about the induction, I did not sleep much at all. At around 5 in the morning, I started to feel some pressure in my butt. A quick Google search on my phone revealed that “butt labor” is a real thing, and it’s a signal that the baby is moving down. I was getting increasingly uncomfortable, so armed with that information I started to bounce on the birth ball to encourage her to move down more.

By 9am, I felt labor was getting intense enough that I wanted Bethany, my doula, to start making her way over. My parents came over that morning and hung around with me. At that point, I was slowly going into my own world, but could still interact with them. For awhile I leaned against the window or against the head of the bed and my husband or my dad did some counterpressure on my back, which felt good, but I was starting to run out of ideas to manage the contractions, so I was glad to see Bethany when she arrived shortly after 11am. When she got there, I was doing some laps around the hallways with my husband, pausing every so often to do some counterpressure. I was starting to feel like it was difficult to talk and keep my eyes open. I asked Bethany if we could use the rebozo, which is a big scarf she brought to lift up my belly to reduce the pressure of contractions. She wrapped it around me and pulled back on it as we walked, but it still didn’t feel quite right. We went back to the room to try something else.

By this point, I had a new nurse, Peggy, who suggested I finally sit in the rocking chair for awhile and drink what she called the “Peggy Cocktail,” which was ginger ale mixed with cranberry juice. Peggy got the chair all tricked out with pillows, and I had my feet up on a stool and I was holding someone’s hand throughout (sometimes my husband’s, sometimes my mom’s) while I rocked and moaned with my eyes closed. I think I was there for awhile. By this point I was feeling the sensation that I needed to pee pretty much constantly, but when I would sit on the toilet I couldn’t make myself go; it was just uncomfortable and felt like something was blocking it. During contractions, though, I would have the urge to release those muscles, so I began peeing any old time I felt like it. Peggy was cool about it, and she was setting up absorbent pads all over the place--in the bed, in the rocking chair, on top of the birthing ball, and I was just peeing. I had the vaguest sense of embarrassment at this, but I learned quickly that it’s damn near impossible to maintain dignity during labor. My husband and I had been together nearly five years and had avoided peeing with the door open, but there I was, peeing on the floor in front of him. I also remember squatting down, thinking I needed to pee, and having a bunch of bloody show come out on the floor, which for some reason was extremely alarming. I kept asking my doula, “Is that okay? Is that okay that blood came out of me?”

This is the part of labor that is the most fuzzy for me. I remember a doctor I had never met before coming in to do a check, just as I was nearing the end of my rope and needing some encouragement. I was really hoping to hear I was at, like, a 6. She told me I was at a 4. I absolutely LOST it. I was screaming and crying, which is totally not me, and I remember the doctor looking at me like I was crazy, even for a woman in labor. The discouragement started to get to me, fast, and I was getting really tired. I was really struggling with managing the contractions. I think I was screaming “She’s never going to come out! She won’t! She won’t!” over and over again and my doula was trying to get me to repeat something more positive. My mom asked the nurse if there were any medications she could give me, which I resisted at first. I remembered, though, that the doula at my birthing class had talked about morphine, and how if taken early in labor it can help you take a nap for a few hours and gather your strength, while still giving it time to wear off before you actually give birth so it doesn’t bother the baby. And, often, you can wake up a few more centimeters dilated. After considering it through a few contractions and talking to my doula about it, I decided to go for it.

From about 2pm to 4pm, I slept. My husband, parents and doula had a chance to rest a little, too, which I know they needed. When I woke up, it was getting dark. Peggy suggested that I try taking a shower at this point, which I hadn’t done yet, and it felt really good to point the adjustable showerhead at my belly and my back. I felt like I needed to be on all fours, so I got out of the shower and got down on a towel outside of the shower. I think this was the point where I was pretty much naked for the rest of labor. Bethany used the rebozo to lift up my belly during contractions, and I sort of rocked on all fours for awhile. My new nurse, Darlene, came in at this point and introduced herself. My other nurses were great, and exactly what I needed at the time, but Darlene was a godsend, especially for the last phases of labor. I had gone off the monitor to get in the shower at this point, and Darlene went to get the portable one, got right down on the floor, and checked me from there. She chatted with Bethany about the rebozo. She came in with a lot of energy and enthusiasm for natural childbirth, but didn’t take over what we had going on. My mom said later that she told Darlene about my peeing, and she said “Well, of course! She should pee wherever she needs to pee!” My husband fed me a popscicle.

At some point my arms got tired (even after leaning against the birthing ball for awhile), and I needed to go get another dose of antibiotics, so I had to go get into bed again. My last cervical check said I had made progress, so my spirits were definitely up. Darlene was pretty confident, though, that I would have the baby before midnight, and the doctor agreed, so I latched onto that. My dad, who at this point was relegated to the waiting room, heard that and went off to buy a newspaper for November 5th. Somewhere along the line, I started to “wake up” a little bit. I had spent most of my labor with my eyes closed, moaning, not talking to anyone and in my own world. But late that evening, it suddenly felt comfortable to open my eyes a little. Darlene sent me to the shower again to do some nipple stimulation to get my contractions going stronger (I still hadn’t had any Pitocin, and they were not getting all that much closer together on their own). Again, the shower felt really good. My sense of humor started coming back, I was carrying on a conversation with my mom, and I was starting to get the urge to push. Well, really it was more of an urge to poop--which I did, in the shower, repeatedly. Remember what I said about dignity during labor? Yeah, there’s no way to hang onto it.

I was in the shower for a long time. My urge to push told Darlene that I was getting close to delivery, though I hadn’t been checked recently, and I was getting really impatient in the shower because I expected her to haul me off to the bed to start pushing for real at any moment. But she didn’t, and I didn’t know what we were all waiting for. First of all, I was confused because I’d read that transition is usually the most difficult part of labor, and if I was still in it, why was I feeling so much better? So I just kept showering and eating popsicles and pooping. I was feeling intense pressure in my butt again, and my body was telling me she was still moving down, and needed to get around my pubic bone. So I started doing a little shake with each contraction, trying to get her loose, which everyone applauded (not for my gracefulness, but for working with what my body was telling me to do). At some point I just asked Darlene if I could go back to the bed and start pushing. It was around 11pm, I think, and I was mentally pretty sure I was ready to go, and hoping my body was, too.

The resident, Dr. Peterson, was available to come in and check me, which I was ready for (plus, I had decided earlier I liked this doctor because she had these slender, gentle hands--it was the first cervical check that hadn’t hurt!). She said I was at 9 ½, with just a little lip of my cervix still hanging on. I was so excited to hear that. I started working on pushing a little bit, with Bethany coaching me. I was listening, and really hoping it would be a 10 minute process--remember, I was told this baby would be born on the 5th! Bethany told me I was pushing too much in my face, which I totally could not comprehend in the moment. I kept pushing, and eventually Darlene said that my contractions were too far apart to be making good progress (they were still sitting at 5 minutes, even at this point), so she suggested more nipple stimulation. I bounced on the birthing ball while my husband tried to help me with that, but it wasn’t really working.

Dr. Peterson came back in to check again later (I think by this point we had kissed the November 5th birthday goodbye), and discovered that the lip was still there and it was starting to become inflamed as I pushed against it. She recommended that I stop pushing while I continued to dilate, and that we start some Pitocin to get things moving faster. I was disappointed to have Pitocin added at this point, plus it was extremely difficult to stop my body from pushing on its own. They tried to position me on my side and get me to relax, but my muscles had a mind of their own. It was more painful to resist than to give in. Someone eventually recommended that I get an epidural put in to help me go numb and stop my muscles from pushing against the lip, and again, I was SO disappointed to have made it this far and still need an epidural. But I didn’t want to risk irritating my cervix to the point where I couldn’t deliver vaginally, so I consented. The anesthesia doctors came in, and they didn’t allow anyone else in the room except the nurse. They were totally the typical anesthesia doctors--not native speakers of English, not super adept at dealing with people, and trying to do things as fast as possible. I leaned over a table, holding Darlene’s hand and trying not to move, even though my legs were shaking and I was still having contractions every few minutes.

In the end, everyone agreed that the epidural was a failure. Something about the shape of my spinal column or something made it so that I wasn’t feeling numb AT ALL, and I still could barely stop myself from pushing during contractions. They told my husband to go to sleep and my mom was resting too. I just lay there for probably an hour feeling my entire body spasming, unable to relax a single muscle. My doula was awake, still talking softly to me as I was getting more and more desperate, but I knew she was getting tired, too. I needed her to do something, anything, for me, so I asked her to rub my feet (which I usually hate because I’m ticklish), but her soft hands felt good and almost distracted me. Finally, the doctor came back in to check me and cleared me to push.

That’s when everything started happening at once. There were new nurses coming in the room, the attending came in to supervise the resident, and equipment was being set up for the baby. Someone finally woke up my husband. I started pushing again, and Bethany said again that I was pushing with my face and not my core. Something started to click in my head, and I remembered all those millions of “baby” shows I’d watched on TLC, and how they always have mothers who are giving birth on their backs (which I never thought I would do, but I had the epidural in place) with their chin to their chests. They also always have a nurse counting to 10 with each contraction. Now, nobody around me was telling me to do those things, but clearly I wasn’t pushing effectively so something within me said to try it. As soon as I did, everyone started complimenting my pushing. I couldn’t see anything, even though they had brought a mirror in (I was refusing to open my eyes again), so I just tried to stay in the zone. Darlene and Bethany told me I should only be listening to Dr. Peterson, so I tried to hear her voice over the din of everyone else. It felt like pushing was taking forever, and I was feeling more and more exhausted. I couldn’t figure out why the head wasn’t out yet---where was this baby? They put an oxygen mask on my face. I realized along the line that I hadn’t really let go yet. I was thinking about things like hemmorroids and tearing, and I wasn’t letting my body take the risk. Finally, someone said they saw the head coming out, and I just said “fuck it” and pushed harder and longer than I had yet. The noise around me started getting louder and more excited. I tried to feed off that and keep going. Finally, when I was just feeling and imagining myself tearing in half down there, there was a huge gush and relief as she came pouring out of me. It was the most surreal feeling. After about a second (but it felt like longer), they put her on top of me. She felt so warm and heavy, and I was completely absorbed by her immediately. There was still a lot of commotion going on around me, including the doctor stitching up my tear, but I was mesmerized and totally focused on getting her to breastfeed (she mostly just licked my nipple). She was so alert and everyone was amazed at how big she was (9lbs, 1.9oz and 22 inches long--and I’m only 5 feet tall!). I couldn’t believe she’d come out of me! I was completely high on my success for hours afterward.

Looking back, I realize how fortunate I am to have been able to deliver her vaginally and mostly unmedicated. It all comes back to my support team--my OB, who wasn’t there during labor, but let me go to 42 weeks and called the hospital to check on me every few hours; my nurses, who supported me, gave me information and kept an eye on me and my family; my doula, who was there with me for nearly 24 hours and talked me through every step of the way, finding solutions to every problem; my husband, who as always was completely calm, gentle and present thoughout, and my parents, who flew all the way from Minnesota to be there and supported me in every single way possible. Arduous as it was, there is very little I would change about the experience***, and I’m so blessed to be here with my Autumn Sophia.

***Things I would change: I’d like to have been able to go into labor naturally. I made peace with the decision to be induced, and it worked out fine, but I’ll always be curious about when she would have been born on her own. As much as the wait was torture, I would have liked to begin labor on my own. I also never would have gotten the epidural if I’d known it would fail and I’d end up with a spinal headache that lasted throughout my stay in the hospital and resulted in me having to have a blood patch.