My postpartum brain will not be able to wrap these memories up very eloquently, but I love the thought of documenting a birth experience, because, as a dear friend recently said, you forget all the details so quickly! And I don’t want to forget one of the most important days of my life, so here I am sharing our experience of birth and William’s grand entrance into our lives.
I didn’t enjoy being pregnant, so when the final weeks finally arrived and the discomfort at its peak, I was more eager than ever to welcome Baby into the world on the outside of my body.
I followed all the recommendations of the midwives leading into the final weeks: drinking Raspberry leaf tea 2-4 times a day, eating dates, doing squats and walking lots, as well as still keeping up with running as it was still doable and I found it no less comfortable than a walk.
We had my cousin and her family visiting us on Friday, the exact day of 38 weeks. I was feeling pretty decent that day, having even gone on a short run that morning. On the short way home after walking our relatives to their car, I suddenly felt a small gush of fluid wetting my pants. I told Frank, “I think something might be coming out right now–either it’s pee, which I don’t think it is, or maybe my water broke”
I waddled with him inside the apartment and changed my pants, waiting to see if something more came to confirm what exactly just happened, and called my mum in the meantime to ask what she thought. 15 minutes later after a bit of bouncing on the yoga ball I got up and felt a very tell-tale gush of water coming out. No doubt, it was time to have our baby! We were both a little shell shocked, suddenly realising that we didn’t have two more weeks like we thought, but likely less than 24 hours. He wouldn’t even make it into June! My cousin had brought a bunch of baby items for us and these were still lying around the apartment: baby clothes, toys for later, etc. I became fixated on getting everything tidied up and put away so that we’d come back to an organised house, but Frank wouldn’t let me leave the bathroom to go do that. He set me up with towels for my leaking crotch and had me take a shower while he promised to deal with the stuff out in the apartment. I realised later he just hid it in the baby’s room so I wouldn’t see or think about it.
We had deliberated about which hospital to go to for the birth. My first choice was the university hospital right in town where I worked, mainly because of the high-volume of deliveries there, the capacity for handling high risk pregnancies and births, and mostly because of the NICU. But the Corona rules weren’t allowing visitors onto post-partum, meaning Frank would be allowed to stay with me only up until about one hour after the delivery, then booted out for the rest of my postpartum stay (which, in Germany, is standardly 3 days for a normal vaginal delivery). We had found out about another nearby hospital that was smaller and had no NICU but was allowing partners to visit every day of postpartum, and even offered family rooms (based on availability). I couldn’t make up my mind and had a hard time letting go of the NICU, but also hated the thought of Frank not being able to see his son for the first 3 days of his life. I registered at both hospitals and left the decision to be made in the moment. So when my water broke and it came time to choose, I decided I wanted the smaller hospital where Frank could visit. We just had to trust that we wouldn’t be needing the NICU.
Frank called the hospital we planned to go to, giving them a head’s up that we’d be showing up by the end of the night, and they told him they’d rather we come in right away since the water broke. I wasn’t happy about this news, because I had planned to stay at home as LONG as possible, waiting out the labour as long as I could in the comfort of home (good advice I’d received from other moms and the midwife), because I was prepared for the typical first time mother labour that would likely last 10+ hours. I took my time packing my suitcase while Frank threw together an overnight bag for himself and urged me to hurry up. He wanted to start timing contractions when they started up shortly after the water broke, which I saw no need for, assuming it would take several more hours for them to be significantly close together. By the time we were packed up and heading out to the hospital at 22:30 my contractions were about 2-3 minutes apart consistently and starting to be quite painful. At the hospital we were welcomed into a small observation room with an examining table, where I was assessed and put on a CTG. I was 2cm dilated and they swabbed us both for covid so I could be admitted. They kept me in that room much longer than I liked, because there was no delivery room available. I hated being on that table, limited by the CTG to a side-lying position while the contractions started to take over and it became harder to bear them. All I wanted was to get up, move around a little, kneel or crouch, or ANYTHING other than lying on the table. Finally after about an hour we were offered a family room on post-partum if we wanted it, which we gladly said we’d take. The midwife told us I could go on over there to continue labouring while they cleared up a delivery room, and when I couldn’t handle it anymore on my own that we should come back to the L&D unit. We walked across the hallway to postpartum and left our stuff there, while I kept having stronger contractions. I could barely focus anymore and Frank called my mum to ask her what we should do about the antibiotics being recommended because I had never found out my result for GBS in time. I didn’t like the thought of taking antibiotics prophylactically but didn’t want to put Baby in unnecessary risk so we decided together to go for it. I made it through 3 contractions and then started feeling like I needed to a) vomit and b) pass out, so Frank made the decision to hustle us back to L&D. I didn’t quite make it across the hallway this time so in front of the doors I had to drop on all fours to make it through a contraction. We were ushered into a prepared delivery room (I was so relieved to see the sight!). As I made it to the bed and the next contraction came on, I noticed a very distinct pressure that felt like a poop but in my vagina. I couldn’t help but feel like I needed to push, at the same time thinking I’m probably gonna get told off for pushing because surely it’s way too early for that. The midwife decided she’d check me again to see how labour was progressing. She was surprised to see that the cervix was fully dilated and as I got settled onto the bed, still on all fours, she said, “You can go ahead and start pushing now.” I couldn’t believe that we were there already! I was starting to think that I would definitely die before I made it through the labour and was thinking that with the next contraction I’d be asking for an epidural, but when I heard I could push I decided the fastest way to get out of this horrible misery overwhelming my body and mind was just to focus and get that baby out: just push him out. The pushing felt very short in hindsight. It was more horrible than the contractions, but with the small added motivation that the end was near and each awful effort to push resulted in one step closer to the head being out. When Baby’s head started crowning the midwife told me she could see a bunch of hair and asked if I wanted to feel it. “NO” absolutely not, I said. She asked how much I felt comfortable with Frank seeing, and I said I didn’t care–he could see all he wanted. I just wanted to be left alone in my headspace and didn’t care whatsoever who else looked on (a nursing student was invited in to watch the delivery). I also remember being SO extremely thirsty, to the point where I was asking Frank for a drink at every pause and internally wondered how he could be SO SLOW to give me a drink, like he couldn’t pass me the bottle fast enough and took it away way too soon. Baby’s head finally came out and his body next, and suddenly I was shocked to see this blueish slimy baby completely foreign to me lying there between my legs! I was so shocked, I didn’t dare touch him. I just stared. I didn’t know if I should touch him or cry or just pass out. I couldn’t quite wrap my head around the thought that THIS was the same baby that for the last 9 months was growing in me, and I’d imagined a face for and pictured what he would look like. It didn’t register to me that he was the same baby–MY baby! After a moment the midwife told me I was allowed to touch him but not to pick him up yet because he was still attached to the cord, which we were letting finish pulsating before cutting. Suddenly I thought: I wasn’t even considering picking him up…should I have been? Am I missing a feeling of attachment that I should be feeling right now? I was so dissociated from him at this point, I surprised myself with my inability to mentally associate myself and my current situation with this little human that had suddenly appeared in front of me. I reached down and touched him, still scared somehow of breaking the strange mental fog that had me believing this all wasn’t quite real. When I touched him I felt suddenly very relieved, though, like everything was finally over and worth it, and it had resulted in a completely whole, healthy baby boy! The whole ordeal from the water breaking at home, to William entering the world, was over in 4 and a half hours. William was born at 00:53 on the 29 May.
Once Frank had cut the cord I was able to turn over onto my back and my baby was given to me to cuddle. The reality was slowly sinking in, as I held his warm, tiny wet body and kissed his fresh little head. I loved him more than anything.
The contractions continued for a while, still a bit painful, and the midwife told me I needed to push out the placenta. After a very half-hearted attempt she looked at me and said, “I can’t push it out for you, you need to push it out.” So I gave one last effort and out it came. She asked if I wanted to see it. My answer again, “NO”. But Frank was interested so the midwife showed him what it looked like, and explained to him how it was important to examine it for completeness to know that no pieces were left behind in the uterus that could cause bleeding. The doctor asked if we wanted to keep it and we all laughed, agreeing we did not want it. William went with the midwife and Frank to the examining table after a few minutes to get quickly checked over for all his fingers and toes and body parts and get a little wipe down, while the doctor stitched me up. It was horribly painful. I felt extremely weak whimpering and wincing at the pain from the needle, when I had just got the birth behind me, but it hurt a LOT! I asked how bad the tearing was and the doctor said it wasn’t even quite first degree, but apparently lots of micro tears all the way around so she put in a lot of stitches. William came back onto my chest as soon as I was repaired, and we waited in that room for 10 minutes or so until the nurse from postpartum was available to come and get us. She brought us over to our family room, where the 3 of us had our first moments together alone. William on my chest, Frank beside us in his own bed. One of the nurses came shortly after to help me latch William on for his first feed. After he fed he fell fast asleep. About an hour or so later I was going to pass him to Frank so he could have some skin to skin time, but when I lifted him up I realised he’d had his first meconium poop all over me. We called the nursery since there was nothing set up in our room to change the baby, and the nurse took him away to get him cleaned up. She said she’d bring him back when we were ready for him and that we should sleep. Frank and I both realised after a few minutes that she wasn’t going to bring him back until we called, so we decided to go ahead and get some sleep. I had a terrible sleep. I heard the baby in the next room crying for what felt like the entire 3 hour period, and in my exhausted sleep deprived mind, I kept thinking that was MY baby. I thought William was just screaming without stop, and pictured him being SO hungry, crying for me, and the nurses not bringing him to me. A nursing student checked in on me around 06:00 and I asked her if William was ok. She didn’t know as she hadn’t been to the nursery, but assured me that if he was hungry he would have been brought to me. I was getting anxious about it so around 6:30 I called the nursery to ask them to bring him. I was relieved when they brought him, and saw that he was completely calm and sleepy, clearly not the screaming crying baby I thought I was imagining in the night. I needed help again to get him to latch, which the nursery nurse was very happy to do. The following 2 days are a blur but I know we were extremely grateful for the family room. For Frank to be able to stay overnight, being a constant support to me and William, helping me latch William on for feeds and just be a part in general of William’s first days of life on the outside of the womb was invaluable. It was a gift having meals delivered to us, bedding freshly made for us, water brought to us and support available at the click of a call-bell. We were tired, living in a haze of being new parents and suddenly overwhelmingly responsible for an entirely separate human, but also soaking up the support of the nurses in helping me feed him, helping Frank change his first diaper, and giving us tips on how to dress him, how to care for his skin and my sore nipples, and constant help with latching on. I had been minorly anxious in the last weeks of pregnancy at the thought of being the patient for the first time in my life; being at the mercy of nurses’ and doctors’ care, when I was usually the one on the providing end and enjoyed my usual control over the situation. I didn’t know how I’d handle being on the receiving end of care, but the whole experience proved to me that I loved it! I know it’s highly dependent on the particular group a person has as their healthcare team, but I so appreciated being looked after and cared for in those short days. On day 3, a sticky hot day, we were discharged and made the exhausting but short journey home with our fresh new family member.
This is me holding my coveted German nursing license that I got in the mail on Friday. I am crying because it’s been 9 months waiting for it. But it’s more than that, and it may be hard to understand just how valuable this is to me without understanding where it started.
I finished up with my psysch rotation after 5 weeks and am now coming to the last week of my medicine rotation at a different hospital. It’s been a very challenging and different experience, because I’ve had patients from one end of the ‘illess’ spectrum to the other–from palliative to essentially healthy except for some psychological illness. It’s been an opportunity for me to see some great inter-disciplinary collaboration, as nurses work with doctors, with social workers, chaplains, wound care specialists, porters, family, EMS, and more. I’m relieved to be coming to the end of another rotation, because once again, my brain and body are exhausted and I’m looking forward to a 6-day break in a week! I’ve rarely been so stretched as I have in this rotation. Going in, I thought it’d be a grand time, having no lectures to go to, no midterms or finals to write, no long papers, and just hours of “fun” clinical experience. But there is still a seminar on Mondays, hours of daily patient research and care plan assignments that must be completed after each 8+ hour day in the hospital. And the early starts and late nights… My body rebels! For someone who likes to get up at a nice 6:30 or 7 and go to bed at 10:00, waking up at 5:30 and sleeping often around 12:00 is really rough. BUT the clinical experience is good. I’ve managed to get down medication administration, including some heavy, high alert meds like morphine, various kinds of injections, complex dressing changes, preparing a body for the morgue (another mini-rant I could go on. I’ll just say it wasn’t pleasant), so many vital signs and assessments (I heard my first apical pulse in this roatation!!) and preparing IV lines. And so much poop. SO. MUCH. POOP. As usual in all of these rotations, I am coming to the end of it EXTREMELY grateful f
or health! As much as I feel like a worn-down zombie half the time, I know I’m actually ok. My digestion works, I can walk and exercise, I can breathe on my own, I can bathe myself, I can sleep in my own bed. I’m alive! I don’t thank God enough for the precious gift of life. Also I must acknowledge the fact that having Frank here in Edmonton with me is doing wonders for my often-messy emotional health. I’m lucky to have someone so patient and kind, and willing to hug me while I cry over whatever happens to be the tipping point at the time. Next up: surgery!
I’m finding it hard to write or think of ways to express myself, so Timber, this massive beast that has stolen most of my heart (there’s a little heart left for family, friends and boyfriend, but just a fraction), will be my focus. It’s easy to write about Timber because, firstly, he’s so ridiculously funny that just thinking about him dissolves any stress inside me, but also because I think there are a lot of similarities between us.
Timber thinks he’s the king of the universe, and sometimes I do too, which I think is why I tend to be easily disappointed and disheartened–I am entitled. I’ve been thinking a lot about my attitude of entitlement, and it’s been highlighted by my current clincial placement. I’m placed for my mental health rotation at the Alberta Hospital, one of the older psych hospitals in Alberta, in a locked intensive care unit for patients with severe psychiatric needs. One of the words that has been tossed around a bit from the staff (describing patients) is “entitlement”. It’s a barrier to recovery, because anyone who is entitled has difficulties accepting a responsible role in society, an attitude of sharing or caring for others, and of giving back. The scary thing is that I’m extremely entitled, just like Timber and so many of our psych patients. I’ve been feeling a lack of spark in my life, and it surprises me because so many good things are happening to me: my new home and roommates are amazing, my boyfriend who I’ve been separated from for over a year is here in the same city as me, and I gained an incredible new sister this summer. Some soul-searching has revealed to me that I’m just entitled, and I’ve lost my gratefulness for the things I’ve been given in life. It’s SO easy to do that! I’m on a mission to get it back. Starting with expressing my gratefulness in this blog post for a fatty like Timber to love. Seriously, he’s irresistable.
Along the Way 