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Benjamin. Sex: boy Born: 03 May, 2008 Age: 0 years & 162 days Birthday in: 203 days Starsign: Taurus Development: See the 5 months page. Biggest achievement so far: -

Birth details

Type of delivery: Vaginal (without pain relief)
Duration of labor: 4 hours
Weight @ birth: 7 pounds 15 1/2 ounces
Length @ birth: 22 inches

Benjamin`s birthstory

Benjamin was born on Saturday, May 3, 2008 at 8:10am.
7 pounds 15 1/2 ounces and 22 inches long!

My water broke at about 4:30pm Friday and we arrived at the hospital around 11pm or so. I still wasn't feeling any contractions and felt perfectly normal but you have to be admitted when your water is broken anyways. I had been out with my sister and mom before hand so that's who I went with. When we got there we were surprised to see that my brother and his wife, as well as my mom's boyfriend were all waiting for us. They left shortly after when I was put into one of the labour rooms. I got bored quickly and so we decided to go for a walk (pretty annoying when you have an IV shoved in your arm!) and as we walked through the waiting room we discovered that my sister's husband was there! So he joined us for the walk. As we made our way back to my room later my sister and brother in law decided they would go home and get some sleep since I still wasn't in active labour anyways. The plan was that my mom would call my sister when things finally started to happen and she could pick up my baby's dad on the way to the hospital.
Me and my mom were advised to sleep since nothing was happening and likely wouldn't for some time anyways. My mom somehow managed to fall asleep sitting in the crappy chair they had in there lol but I was of course finding it impossible to rest with all the cramping I was feeling. Especially since it just kept getting worse and worse of course!
Eventually I decided I wanted to test out the shower, see if it helped with the pain since I was going all natural and so obviously there was no drugs to help me out!
By that point I was finding it hard to even stand through a contraction. Things were definitely picking up. The shower must have helped out a lot though because when I arrived at the hospital I had been 2cm. From being in the shower I went from 3cm to 7cm in about 45 minutes! (I don't think I was in the shower for that whole 45 minutes, but I was most of it). The walk back from the shower was intense. I honestly didn't think I had it in me to walk the very short distance back to my room and I had to keep stopping in sitting!
I was for sure considering giving in and taking some kind of drug to get through all of the pain. But I was pretty determined to not have anything so I just kept telling myself that I should hold off for a while still and only take something closer to the end if I absolutely needed to.
I had no issue really with the idea of taking the laughing gas, so I just kept that in mind for later.
When I got back to my room (which ironically enough was the very room my mom had laboured in when she had me!!) I tried out the birthing ball (which is the same thing as an exercise ball). When you feel a contraction you're supposed to waddle from side to side on it lol
It hurt so bad but as much as I wanted to get off and lay down in my bed sometimes I couldn't bring myself to do it because I was focusing better and didn't want to move around and lose my concentration lol
My mom thinks the birthing ball calmed me down A LOT and made me focus on my breathing really well.
Eventually I was asking the nurse to get me the laughing gas. She kept saying for me to just hold off on it, give it some time so that way I would have it when I really needed it. Remember I was at 7cm at this point.
You can't be on the laughing gas for too long, so she didn't want me to take it too early and end up not having it when the contractions were even worse. But I knew I wanted it right frigen then!! lol
So FINALLY she said she would go get it but it would take her a few minutes. I was pretty annoyed by THAT statement lol
You have to lay down when you have the gas and administer it to yourself.
My sister and baby's dad got there right about then. I was pretty nervous about breathing the gas in but when that next contraction came I didn't even hesitate to breathe it in! lol I couldn't even care less what was happening around me I was too caught up in the pain.
I started to tell the nurse in between the contraction and the next one that I could feel the pressure. She wasn't concerned about it and just figured I still had some time to go. But I insisted it was intense and so she had the doctor come in for the first time to check on my progress. I had gone from 7cm to 10cm in only 25 minutes on that birthing ball! So needless to say the nurse was pretty shocked and it was time for me to start pushing. I had only even gotten two breaths of the laughing gas in by this point and since you can't breathe it and push it was taken away from me and two breaths was all I got lol
I highly recommend the laughing gas by the way. I may not have had it long at all, but it definitely helped with the pain!
My sister and BD were planning to tag team, taking turns in the room with me.
My sis was in there at first, then switched with my BD and then switched again. When my sister had come back that time, that was when I was having my first two pushes. My mom then told her to go get my BD and while she was off getting him I had another push with just my mom there. Next thing I know my sister comes back and says that my BD and bro in law (who had come up too again) had gone to the Tim Hortons! They thought they had the time since I wasn't pushing yet when they had first arrived lol I wanted to cry, thinking he was going to miss our baby's birth all because nobody believed me when I suggesting it must be time to push already!
Suddenly he came in though and so my sister left and he was there for the last two pushes. There were five in total.
Benjamin had come out with his cord wrapped all around him so the doctor, a resident and my mom had to unravel him! I had no idea this was even happening thank god! He was still blue when they placed him on me because he had stopped breathing when the cord was around him! I oddly enough wasn't alarmed at all of his blueness (still unaware even of what had happened anyways) and just KNEW he was ok.
Then he was finally being placed on my stomach and nobody had announced still if it was a boy or girl...but of course when he was coming my way I saw and it was ME who ended up announcing IT'S A BOY! lol
There wasn't a moment of disappointment about it either.
His APGAR score was 9.9.
I only needed one stitch thankfully (which came loose the very next day!! but it was fine, I didn't need to have another put in or anything because only part of it came out I guess)
Anyways things seemed to go by pretty quickly and smoothly and only a matter of hours later when I was sitting up in my room holding my baby boy, I was a bit in awe of the fact that I had just given birth to my first baby and I felt pretty normal even still! I was thinking to myself about how strange it is that people say pregnancy and labour is so hard and I had it so easy for both! lol
Labour had only lasted four hours!
The trickiest thing I think was naming him! He went without a name until Mother's Day May 11.
I must FINALLY be having some good karma come back around to me because not only was the pregnancy and labour so good (well as good as it possibly could be I suppose) but I also have the best little baby ever! He is willing to sleep through the night (I have to wake him to feed him - but the doc said he can go 5 hours), he only really cries shortly to tell me things like when he needs a diaper change or is hungry (which of course once I do these things he stops and is content again), he is as cute as can be and is such a happy baby!

All in all I would totally do this again. I am very content with just one baby, that's all I wanted anyways, but I wouldn't mind a second. I miss being pregnant kind of and I think that if me and my BD were to have another kid they would be just as amazing as this one. I don't WANT to have another baby with any other man though...and since me and him aren't together it's highly unlikely that we will have another baby together. He has been being so great as a daddy and I am so thankful for how things are working out lately. He stayed with me overnight in the hospital the first night and we just laid in my bed together with our son and eventually took turns sleeping while they other one laid next to whoever was sleeping just holding him.
I was tired as hell but to be able to look down at my beautiful baby boy sleeping in my arms, and look next to me at the man I love - even if we aren't together :( -sleeping was amazing. Watching him hold him gives me such an amazing feeling, I can't describe.
Anyways I'm not really sure what else to write, so that's it!

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