Introducing Baby S

This is the story about my experience at M's second birth which she has graciously allowed me to share. Her first baby was born 10 days late, induced, no drugs and 10 pounds! M was planning to birth at the freestanding birth center here in Colorado. Once a mom is 2 weeks overdue they have to transfer care to an OB, so we were all hoping that Baby S decided to come sooner than his brother.

Baby was due on February 3rd and that date came a went with no signs of labor. I was on call and spent a portion of each day reading about birth and adding various things to my doula bag. I got a text from M at 9:00 am on the 11th saying that she had been working through contractions regularly since 6:30. They were about every 10 minutes and she was handling them fine. I got everything prepped, went to the store to stock up on some stuff and came home to wait.

About 9:00 that night I got another update; things had slowed down in the afternoon but were now revving up again. I went to bed a while later and woke up at 2:00 to a phone call. M's water had just broken. The midwives told her to come on in and she asked me to come over to her house and watch their son until her mom got there. I was out the door in about 10 minutes and got to M's house not much later.

Her mom arrived about 20 minutes later and I was on the road to the birth center. The weather was perfect, the roads were clear, and the trip down there was a breeze. I arrived about 3:00 and M's friend, L, was already there. The room they had her in was TINY! There was a bed, a birth tub, and a small dresser. One stool pretty much took up all the floor space and once they brought in a birth ball it was ridiculous. Since it was so crowded in the room the midwives had us move our bags into the hallway.

After an initial exam we set to work helping M. She varied positions as best she could with the accommodations. The coconut oil I brought was great for rubbing her back and the cold packs I made were great for M's neck. L was kind enough to take pictures and she was helpful in making sure that we always had a cold pack and/or cold washcloths.

M was feeling nauseous and I was able to put some peppermint oil on the handles of the cold pack to help with that and it freshened the room for everyone.

Doula in action

M did amazing and progressed rather quickly. It was helpful to her if we moaned with her and so we did. I'm sure it sounded quite funny to those outside. lol M was able to get in the tub and was pronounced ready to push. However, she wasn't able to do so for long because Baby S didn't like that too much. She was moved to a birthing stool, but it quickly became clear that a transfer was in order as Baby S was continuing to have variables in his heart-rate.

I was very impressed with the way everyone involved handled the transfer. Everyone at the birth center was calm, but there was a sense of urgency as bright overhead lights were turned on, oxygen and terbutaline administered, and an IV placed. L and I went over to the hospital as soon as the paramedics arrived so that we would be there when M got there. Even after having to park on the opposite side of the hospital we walked up to her room just as the paramedics were leaving.

I had assumed from the way that the midwives and M were talking at the birth center that she would be having a c-section and I did some work clearing my own feelings about that on my way over to the hospital. I was confused when it seemed like nobody was helping her. Why weren't they giving her drugs and prepping her? An OB came in and said he wanted her to push and TWO MINUTES later Baby S was earth side! We can only assume that the position M was in on the stretcher (hands and knees) and the jostling of the ambulance remedied whatever the problem was and got Baby S into a better position.

6:40am
9 pounds even

Even though the baby was safely here and adorable to boot, my job wasn't done. I asked the nurse where the heated blankets were and tried to pile them on M to help her uncontrollable shivering. I wanted to give her juice but she wasn't allowed until the placenta was delivered. That took longer than "normal" and she was seconds away from going down to the OR to have it removed when it decided to come on out. Whew!

After M had some juice and the baby was weighed, he nursed for the first time and took right to it! I went into the bathroom with M while she took a shower to hand her stuff and make sure she didn't get woozy, but the shakes were over and she was on a birth high! I left them after they all ate breakfast and M was settled in bed with Baby S. It was such a beautiful day to have a baby!

Honored

Yesterday I had the honor of doulaing my first certification birth. I'm not sure what all is appropriate to post regarding my experience (which was great!) But I did want to document what tools I used and those I didn't.

As previously shown, I made two cold packs with handles. These were great! Another friend of Mom was there and she was super helpful making sure one was in the freezer at all times.

Mom was feeling nauseas, so I put a few drops of peppermint oil on the handles of the cold packs and that helped everyone in the room! It was HOT at the birth center and the smell seemed to cool down the room.

I brought coconut oil for massage and I used quite a bit of that. My hands are still soft. Lol

We were able to get some washcloths and a bucket of ice water from one of the midwives and it was great to always have a cold one on hand.

I brought 4 little battery operated candles which were nice to have when we turned most of the lights off, but I'm not sure if Mom noticed them. Lol

I didn't use any of the snacks that I brought. I should've ate something on my way down there, but wasn't hungry at the time. Mom was too deep into labor to want anything to eat. I did use my water bottle.

Mom wanted lots of video/pictures so I brought my camera and tripod. I passed the camera off to Friend and she captured lots of the action. My batteries died and I almost died when I noticed the spares I brought were the wrong size, but I had spare spares which were the right size. Whew!

My most used items by far were my voice and hands!

Happy Birthday, Baby E!

In honor of my niece's birthday, my sister has agreed to let me post her birth story. This was my first experience doula-ing. My sister (P) and her husband (D) flew me down to Arizona for a weekend and we were hoping and praying that Baby E decided to come while I was there and she did! P's goal was to get further along in labor then she did the first time before she got the epidural. First labor (Baby R) was full of back labor and she got the epidural at 2 cm.

P started having contractions Saturday afternoon. We walked around the mall and then came home to take naps. P woke up and I massaged her hands and ankles, trying to find the acupressure point that would make her baby come out. :p She got up to go potty and then walked into the kitchen. A few minutes later (4:23 to be exact) I heard "Ummmm, I either peed my pants, or...." Zonino! This is it! There's no turning back once the water breaks. It wasn't a whole lot, but I told her to stay in the kitchen in case it burst big. lol

She felt the trickle a couple more times and was having some mild contractions that we chose not to time because it was still too early. She made lactation cookies while I got some red raspberry tea steeping and then we got the herbal bath prepared. D woke up while we were in the process of this and when we told him that P's water broke he said "great! I'll get my shoes on and let's go!" lol We put him to work feeding R, gathering stuff for the hospital bags, and making a list of R tips for her Grandma.

We had started timing contractions about 5:45 and they were coming every 2-3 minutes and lasting about 30 seconds at this point. I rethreaded P's birth necklace and she read the blessings as she had a little snack of string cheese, an orange and some vitamin water. Why we didn't think to actually eat dinner is beyond me!

Around 6:30 D called his mom to come watch R. The contractions were starting to last about a minute and still coming every 2-3 minutes. Her contractions were growing in intensity and she started to moan through them and liked having counter pressure applied to her back. MIL arrived and we were out the door by 7:07. I told P not to be discouraged if her contractions slowed down en route or at the hospital because it was perfectly normal. She said she would welcome the break if they did (which they didn't). She wanted a little something to eat and snacked on a Sweet and Salty granola bar. At 7:30 we arrived at the hospital.

P had a contraction right after she got out of the car and was leaning up against a pillar doing her thing when a lady texting while walking almost ran into her. lol She had to use the potty and then had another contraction in the lobby. A nurse sitting there asked if we were okay and I said that we were great and then amended that to *me* being great, but maybe P wasn't. :p We went up the elevators to level two and P had another contraction. They weren't slowing down in the slightest!

We got put in Triage 2 and Amy was the nurse. After a good 20 minute strip (thankfully, the combo of moaning, affirmations and magic fingers on P's legs made the contractions bearable on the bed), Amy checked P and said she was 3cm 70% effaced and -2 station (which means baby's head was 2 cms above the pelvic bone). Amy got P officially admitted.

Dr. W came in to talk with P and go over her birth plan a little bit. P told him that if she didn't have the epidural she preferred to tear rather than have an episiotomy. He sat there for about 10 minutes trying to convince us that that wasn't the case and we stressed to him that whatever the situation, she would like a discussion before it happened. He said "what difference is it going to make in the outcome if we "discuss" it first?" to which I quipped "It's nice to have informed consent." That shut him up. lol Then he said he would try to remember but if we saw scissors to stop him and he wouldn’t mind. Just tells me that it's so routine for him that he doesn't even think about it.

They moved us to room 2429 and Brooke was our new nurse. I have to say that even though she was restricted by OB "policy" she was really good about trying to accommodate us and she was very patient with all the questions I asked her. She didn't seem annoyed with the "doula" role, either. So, thumbs up to Brooke!

P was allowed 1 hour to labor on her own before they had to hook her up to the monitors again. Brooke asked me to let her know if P felt any pushing pressure, but other than that she left us alone. The contractions were getting much more intense and I was spewing a steady stream of "bicycling up a steep hill" visualizations while either D or I applied counter-pressure on P's back with two tennis balls in a sock. P was doing great with her low moans. I tried a few "blowing water into a pool" visualizations, but they were just so-so. We hooked P's music up to the stereo and she did some swaying, then we moved into the bathroom where she labored backwards on the toilet a little.

P was great about giving us feedback between contractions. "that was a good visualization", "counting doesn't help this time", "try this", etc. If she needed something she would squeak out a "back!" and if we were in the wrong spot or she didn't want something she would shake her head or swat us away. I told her that "please and thank you were implied during labor." lol

It was obvious that P needed more help getting through, so I suggested putting the birth ball in the shower and running the water on her back. Good idea in theory, but the water was shooting out of the shower head like needles and that wasn't helping at all. We abandoned the birth ball after one contraction and got P settled into the tub about 9:00.

P liked to have the water on continuously and we kept the jets on the whole time. D was in charge of keeping the water at a good temperature and letting the water out when it got too high. We encouraged P to take little sips of water and she ate one of her honey sticks.

Minutes later Brooke came in and said it was time for 20 minutes of monitoring. Brooke was fine about P laboring on her hands and knees on the bed as long as she could get a good reactive tracing on the baby. She made it through a few multi-peeked contractions on the bed and then her legs couldn't take it anymore.

I pulled her up from sitting to standing and had her move to the music. I "poured warm and cold liquid light" on her and kept telling her that this was transition, just a few more minutes, the baby was coming... I was SURE that she had been laboring for a few hours by this time and those contractions were coming so fast and furious that there was no way she was anything less than 7cm. P was starting to say she couldn't do it and I was holding on to her, trying to keep positive with tears streaming down my face. Which made D cry too.

We had to unhook her for a second to go potty and when Brooke came back about 9:30 to get the monitors plugged in the right way we had her check her progress. 3-4 cm, -1 station. I could NOT believe it! I knew she would've taken the epidural right then and there if D or I had suggested it, but she had wanted to get to 6cm, so I just kept promising her the tub as soon as her monitoring was over.

Back in the tub at 9:35 and while that helped, it wasn't helping enough. Previously, in the tub it really helped to have me splash the water up onto her belly during contractions, but now it was making her a little seasick. I thought I was lying when I told P that it had only been an hour and that 1cm is good progress for an hour, but when I looked at my clock I realized that it had really only been an hour and a half. The progress was good, but the pain wasn't!

After about 10 minutes of contracting in the tub, P declared that she wanted the epi. We tried to remind her how much she hated the BP cuff, but she was sure that she wanted it. I made a deal with her that she could get it after her hour in the tub and she agreed to that, but wanted me to get the ball rolling right away. (We didn't want labor to stall if she got the epi too soon.) She said she could not handle another monitoring session without the epi. I paged the nurse and told her the situation, and she told me that the Dr would be going in for a c/s soon, so it was either get the epi now (after a bag of fluids) or get it in a couple hours.

I told P her options and asked her to really think if she wanted to do natural or not and she said I WANT IT NOW!! lol I asked Brooke if the IV could be done in the tub and she was cool with that. She got that started at 10:00. I had her walk us through the next steps, IV in tub, get out, get monitors and BP cuff on, take temp, but no need to endure monitoring before epi, they just had to have her all hooked up before the drug Dr (Dr G) would come in.

P realized that she was too far on her back, so she knelt sideways in the tub. This seemed to help her back a little. Brooke came in to apply a pressure cuff to the saline to make it go faster because Dr G was raring to go. We got P out of the tub and I made her take off her wet bra before putting her in a gown. She complained, but was happy about it later. The contractions were making her nauseous and she was given a tiny little barf bucket. She escaped having to use it though. At least for now.

She moaned and swayed through a few contractions before Dr G arrived. I was expecting them to have me leave the room, but Brooke told me to sit on the bench behind P and the Dr. P was sitting super still and would say when a contraction was coming. He threw his hands in the air and shook his head and just sat there waiting for her. I was talking her through the contractions, telling her that this was the last one that she had to feel and Mr. Meanie was just rolling his eyes and laughing. Grrrrrrr!

The epidural was in by 10:35 and P was out of her misery. As the BP cuff went off P said "Ahhh, the BP cuff is my friend!" lol Brooke put a catheter in P and then checked her about 20 minutes after the epidural. She was pronounced 5-6cm, 100% effaced and 0 station. She did it! She met her goal!

Baby E got the hiccups and we all thought that was fun to hear on the monitor. Just before midnight, we tried to settle in for a long winter's nap, but we weren't having very much luck. D and I amused ourselves by texting each other so we wouldn't disturb P. We decided that the Epi pump sounded like someone was taking pictures with a film camera, the BP cuff sounded like someone being buzzed into an apt and the baby's heart beat sounded like Pac Man. lol

P would occasionally ask for her back to be scratched or some ice chips. We faded off again, just to be annoyed with an incessant beeping. D paged the nurse and it turns out the baby's heart rate wasn't being traced and it was alerting us. I'm not sure why we could still hear the HB if it wasn't being traced, but at least she got it to shut up.

We were fading off again (see a pattern here?) when P announced that she was hungry. You know, now that the other things weren't there to bother her. lol Why didn't we feed her dinner?? Why didn't ANY of us eat dinner??

Brooke came in shortly after that at 12:35 to check P's progress. 9 cm!! She put a big peanut shaped ball between P's legs to keep her hips open and let the baby get lower in the pelvis. D went to get some food from the cafeteria around 1:00 before it closed and then gave up trying to get comfy in a chair and made a bed on the floor out of one cushion from the window seat, a pillow, and some sweat shirts. I'm sure he was uber comfy. Not.

Brooke came back in to check P at 2:00 she was completely dilated, but still a little high. She checked again at 2:37 and E had moved to +1 station. She came back in at 3:00 and E was at +2 station. Time for some "practice" pushes!!

It wasn't too long before we were able to see E's head with her dark curly hair! Brooke brought the mirror and P was able to see the head, but couldn't really tell if the baby was moving down. P pushed and pushed and pushed. E's heart rate was a little high, so Brooke called Dr W. She said that with him here he could help the baby out if need be. That was maybe 4:00. He said to keep pushing to call him back if it stayed up or when it was time to deliver the baby. Shortly after she told us that he must not have been able to fall back to sleep because he was at the hospital, ready when we were. D's job was to move the oxygen out of P's way when she was pushing and put it back when she was done.

At some point, P got sick and managed to aim her spew into the tiny barf bucket. I caught myself saying "good job, P, get it all out." lol We took turns holding her legs and telling her when the baby was moving. The lower the baby got, the easier it was for P to push. She'd ask for ice chips occasionally, but never really wanted a cold wash cloth (which I thought was weird because I loved them!) I was so excited to be able to watch as P would push and you could see E moving. I asked her if she wanted to touch the head and she declined.

Dr W came into the room at 5:00am according to my camera. We took P's gown off and just laid it across her chest so that when E came out it would be easier to take it off for skin to skin. Dr W set up his tray and put on his gown. I was fully expecting him to suggest a little cut and vacuum, but he didn't say a thing. P's pushes were *really* productive once he got there (helped that she could feel the baby just hanging out in the birth canal). She only pushed for EIGHT minutes with him! And once she got the head out, it was just one fluid movement up to her chest. I remember saying "open your eyes! look at your baby!" just like D did to me with DS4.

She was covered in vernix and took just a few seconds to cry. She had a very mild cry and was perfectly content to lay on her mommy's chest. ♥ Her official time of birth was 5:08am. D cut the cord right away and the Dr went to work delivering the placenta and sewing up a small tear.

P counted E's fingers and had D count her toes and then I asked if anyone had verified that she was a girl. "Not me" echoed around the room. So D did the honors and girl she is indeed. Her Apgars were 8 and 9, perfect little girl! When Dr W was done sewing her up, he put the placenta on the tray and brought it over to show us. It was really cool to see the sac and umbilical cord and we were all surprised by how lumpy it was on the side that was attached to P. It was smaller in diameter but thicker than I had imagined.

We finally got curious and called in the baby nurse to get a weight a little before 6:00. She put the baby LowJack on E's umbilical stump and then put her on the scale. E didn't like being away from her Mommy very much. I couldn't believe she was 8 pounds! She felt so tiny to me, I guess 8 pounds is pretty tiny all things considered, but still! She had a little red mark on her head; she was facing the right way, but her head was turned just a little bit so that her cone head was lopsided and she got on little bruise on her forehead. Poor baby. :( Other than that she was perfectly healthy!

Arrrr Matey!

* Lessons learned with this birth - 1) Starting labor with the water breaking makes the contractions hurt much worse and I shouldn't make promises that someone is in transition. ;) 2) What works for one mom might not work for the next (I loved cold washcloths, my sister did not). 3) Watching your sister go through labor is an incredibly emotional experience!