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Summer Rainbow Sex: girl Born: 26 March, 2008 Age: 3 years & 326 days Birthday in: 39 days Starsign: Aries Development: See the 32 months page. Biggest achievement so far: -

Birth details

Type of delivery: Vaginal (with pain relief)
Duration of labor: 20+ hours (after we arrived to hosp) ~ 3 hours of just pushing!!
Weight @ birth: 8 lbs 9.8 oz
Length @ birth: 21 inches long

Summer-Rainbow`s birthstory

Summer was 5 days late. Mama wasn't a happy camper because she wanted this baby out!! I decided that it wasn't working for me to be obsessing about how late the baby was. I stopped coming by this site (on the 40 week page) checking it every second only to find other mom's obsessing about why their baby is late too! So in the middle of the night on a Monday-early Tuesday morning I got up to pee and couldn't go back to sleep. I decided to sit in my rocking chair and just let myself be calm about the whole thing. I figured this baby wasn't gonna come if I was all worked up and stressed about it. My parents were in town for the birth and the days were slowly passing with no baby and their date to leave was slowly creeping up on us. I wanted them to be here for my daughter’s birth!

So on Tuesday we decided to do something fun to take my mind off of the fact that the baby had not come yet! We went to Duke's and had lunch then went swimming in the huge round pool at the Marriott. About 2pm I started feeling contractions in my back. I didn't realize they were contractions, I just thought it was back pain. I was swimming laps in this huge pool having contractions. It was very relaxing just swimming around this big round pool with my mom having contractions. It was very relaxing and a great way to de-stress.

We decided to leave and I stopped of at Duke's one last time to pee before we hit the road. This was around 4:30-5pm. I noticed a lot of dried blood in the water when I wiped and I thought for sure it was my mucus plug. Right then and there in the bathroom I knew this baby was coming sooner rather than later. (I later found out it was just dried blood from my membranes being swept the day or so before.) I walked out and told my mom about it and we got very excited because we knew this baby was gonna come. So we went to Taco Bell. haha, I'm obsessed and I wanted an ice cream cone and the TB here has non-fat soft serve, and I was craving one, so we headed to TB. We started to drive home and I started feeling like I was gonna barf. I looked at the clock and noticed that it was 5:55pm. I called my hubby because he was still at work, but getting ready to come home. I told him that "everything feels different, so I know we're gonna have this baby soon!" (By soon I meant probably that night or the next day)

That night we got home and everyone took showers and we were watching American Idol while I was counting my contractions. They were getting pretty strong and they were pretty close together, but they weren't consistent. However, like I said, it was all very different from anything I had felt before with Braxton Hicks and stuff, so I knew that I was in pre labor.

We went to bed and about 2am that night I woke up to find my contractions even stronger than before. I didn't wake up Todd because I wanted to time them to get an accurate reading of them. I sat in my rocker timing the contractions solid for an hour. They were about 5 minutes apart. I woke up Todd and we timed some more. We then called the hosp and she told us that they have been waiting for us. (Since I was 5 days late!!)

We woke up my parents and got our stuff ready and made it to the hosp around 4:30am on Wednesday. The wheeled me in and I met the nurse who was there from the night shift. She checked my cervix to find that I was only 1cm dilated. (That was one of the most uncomfortable things in the world, having her check my cervix! She was sooooo rough and it felt like she put her hand up there and turned her whole hand with her fingers wide open or something. It wasn't fun at all! The doc had never been that rough. So I wasn't a fan of this nurse.)

She said that she wanted me to hang out for a while and wait for the day shift nurse to check me because if she checked me after a few hours and there was no progress she would have to send me home. But if the day nurses checked me then it would start on their clock so I could stay longer...? I think that is right. It was a bit confusing. Regardless, I wasn't in any position to go home so I just hung out.

It took forever for my cervix to dilate! I walked the halls for hours and hours. My contractions got stronger and stronger and still, no dilation. I mean it was dilating a bit, but not much, and not very fast at all! The doc was very patient though and there was no rush. I was the only person in labor so I had the whole staff and the whole floor to myself.

It was a Hawaiian holiday that day so the clinic was closed for the day (but the hosp was still open of course.) So it was really nice to be able to roam the halls and have contractions in an empty hospital! I hardly saw anyone the whole time I was pacing the halls so it was nice and relaxing for just me and my hubby and parents to be able to walk back and forth a million times while I clung to the rails on the walls every few minutes.

The reason I wasn't progressing very much is because I was having back labor, which was very painful. I have a bad back from a car accident and other back injuries over the years so back labor was my biggest fear. It wasn't traditional back labor per say, where the baby is turned, but I felt everything in my back because it's been weakened over time. So originally I wanted to have a natural labor and for about the first 17 hours or so I did. But because I was tensing up so much from the back pain, I wasn't allowing my body to do its thing and my cervix to dilate. The doc and nurses were strongly advising me to take something for the pain so that I could relax, get some sleep and let my body dilate. I ended up having an intra-thecal (sp), which is a shot in your spine. You aren't numb from the waist down and you could still walk, but they won't let you since you have to be hooked up to the machine so they can monitor you. I never had an IV, and I think they just give you one shot and if it wears off, then it wears off.

The hosp where I gave birth doesn't do epidurals, but they do intra-thecals, which just makes the pain a bit more bearable. I still felt everything in my back though during every contraction, but it let me sleep in between the contractions. However it totally sucked because I don't remember sleeping but I remember waking up to find a really painful contraction so I felt like I was having contractions constantly with no relief. However, Todd told me that I was asleep for most of the time.

I originally didn't want the intra-thecal because then I would no longer be able to get up and walk around, but by that point anyway I was in so much pain that walking around was the LAST thing I wanted to do. I wish someone had told me that you're only really walking around during the early stages of labor to get your body to dilate then when you're in the later stages of labor you're pretty much just in bed, or in the chair or whatever.

I was able to use the birthing ball, which was helpful; I also got in the shower at one point with Todd. That helped but at that point I had not had any medication so I was really uncomfortable. I got to the point where I was moaning from the back pain. It was sort of this animalistic moan and I was making these weird noises like "va-va-va-va-va" every time I exhaled. I couldn't control it. This really worried one of the nurses who then worried my mom because she said that she could tell that I was in so much pain and I was no longer able to really deal with it. I never really felt the pain anywhere besides my back when I think back about it now. Then after all that the doc came in to check me and I was only dilated to 6!!! SIX! I wanted to cry and so did my mom. After all that pain, after all those contractions, after all that walking around, bouncing on the ball, rocking in the chair...I was dilated to 6 and my pain was at about a 7 or an 8 according to me. I sort of panicked and broke down because I wanted a natural birth so bad and I did not want to take anything, but I was only dilated to 6 and my pain was already almost an 8 out of 10...10 being my max to then want pain meds. I have a pretty high threshold for pain too, so for it to already be at an 8, I was really getting worried!

Because I was stressed and panicking and not thinking clearly and didn't know what to do, and not really being able to talk at that point, I had Todd help me make my decisions. But right then we lost the baby's heartbeat on the monitor. I had been hooked up about 30 minutes to an hour at a time then they would take me off so I could move around. At that point I was hooked up and they lost the baby's heartbeat. So they rushed an oxygen mask on my face and they were trying to find the fetal heartbeat, but they couldn't find one. My mom then walked out because she couldn't take it, my dad was in the hall too. Todd stayed by my side and looked concerned, but I was totally calm. I knew deep down that everything was going to be fine. I figured that I had moved or something, moving the fetal heart monitor out of the way, or that baby moved or something, moving her out of range. That is what actually happened, but everyone was kind of freaking out. I think they were freaking out too because I was in so much pain and I wasn't dilating or progressing.

So Todd and I basically had a conversation with our eyes since all this was going on and I was hooked up to oxygen. We decided that I was going to take the medication. It was really helpful to talk to Todd before the labor and clue him in on everything I wanted and didn't want so that we could make our own decisions together.

So after the whole scary ordeal of not finding the heartbeat (even though I was the only one totally calm) and after the medication I was able to sleep and dilate to 10. Finally! My water never broke, so the doc asked me if it was OK to break my water and start the labor. (I have an awesome doc because from other people I've heard from the doc would never ask this, but rather just do it. I always felt informed with my doc.) So my water broke and the doc said I could push. In my mind I was thinking, ok, it will be over really soon. A friend of mine told me she only pushed for about 15 minutes, another friend of mine told me she pushed 3 times and my own mother only pushed 4 times with me! So I was like, OK, I'm ready to see my baby after a couple of pushes...!! Right? WRONG!!!!

I pushed like a crazy lady for 3 hours. I never felt the urge to push; maybe it was from the medication. My mom said that she never felt the urge to push with my brother, but she felt it with me and hated it, so I wasn't missing anything she said. The doc was very patient and I never felt like it was taking too long. The nurses were great and were giving me ice chips and lots of encouragement. I had to "learn" how to push correctly because at first I'd push and I had the breathing all wrong, so the bay would suck back inside even deeper each time. So they told me how to push correctly after the first few pushes of not doing it right. My parents were in there helping out and I (or Todd) could not have imagined them not being there to help. At first I wasn't sure if I wanted anyone in there besides Todd, but now I'm soooo grateful that both of my parents were in there. My Dad had one shoulder and Todd had the other and they would life me to push with each contraction. Then after each contraction they would fan me. It was great! My mom had one leg and the nurse had the other. I could see what was going on in the mirror behind the doc's head and after a while it became very discouraging because I could see that it wasn't progressing. When I finally stopped looking and trying to watch the progress as opposed to just making progress, her head finally popped out. I never felt any pain down in the birth canal area, however with every contraction I felt like my spine was going to split in two, (and this was even AFTER the intra-thecal!!!) So I was very glad I got it because it helped to take away the pain from actually pushing and her getting stuck in there and only left me with back pain, which would have been completely unbearable if I had al the pain to deal with and probably would've resulted in a c-section or something because I would have NEVER been able to deal with al that pain for 3 solid hours of pushing.

As it was, I was able to push for as long as I needed to without the doc and nurses interfering. They just helped the process along with their encouragement and much needed ice chips! At 10:27pm Wednesday night, March 26, 2008 my little Summer Rainbow was born. Immediately she was placed on my stomach while they cleaned her up. And right away she started crying and reached up for my face and touched my face looking into my eyes crying her little heart out. It was the most precious moment I have ever experienced in my life. Then Todd put his hand down and she grabbed his finger with one hand and was touching my face with the other as if to say, "I know you! You're my mom!!!" It was so sweet. They left her on my stomach for a good hour before they took her to weigh her and give her a bath. I was able to breastfeed her and she latched on right away. But Ohhh, dang it hurt!!!

While they were giving her a bath and Todd was in there watching, I had some juice and crackers because I felt very nauseous. This was from the intra-thecal. It also made me itchy like a crack head. My god I was soooo itchy!!! For a few days after too, it drove me nuts! But soon after I felt like I was gonna barf, and of course I did. I barfed up all my juice! And I actually never throw up, so this was uncommon for me. (I only threw up once during my entire pregnancy! and that is because I had a stomach virus.)

After we got home we noticed that one of the nurses had taken our camera and took a ton of pictures! We were so grateful because she captured some very special moments! I'll put some of them up on my page.

So after all is said and done, it was different from what I had expected meaning the back pain and then having to take medication. It hurt like I never thought anything could hurt before. I think I could've done it if I didn't have the back pain. I think for my next baby I'll really try to strengthen my back if I can and get some x-rays to see what is going on in there because I'd like to try to have a natural birth. But I know now that if I start feeling it in my back early on that it is only going to get worse from there as the contractions grow. And although they said that the medication won't take away the back pain I'll at least be aware of it and prepared for it...but man, I'm not really looking forward to that again! Not right now anyway!! Give a little while and I’ll probably forget! Haha!

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