Jordan’s Birth Story: A 30 Hour VBAC During The Pandemic
Early one evening after my third session of acupuncture to induce labor, with just three days to my due date, I lay across the couch while Frozen played on TV and my two year old, Mia, covered my very very large stomach with googly eye stickers.
I had a good amount of energy during my whole pregnancy but this day I was particularly tired and had to take a nap. I knew that if I was going to go into labor anytime soon, I would need my energy. My first pregnancy was a scheduled c-section but this time I was trying for a VBAC (vaginal birth after c-section). I only plan on having two kids and wanted to experience both kinds of birth. I had seen a midwife and an OBGYN during my pregnancy who told me that I had about a 60% chance of success for a vaginal birth based on some hospital calculator. I did some research and read that an epidural could slow my dilation down and increase my need for another c-section so decided I’d try some natural ways to cope with pain from a TENS machine, hypnobirthing techniques, yoga, birthing ball and packing items from lavender sprays to LED candles to make my hospital environment feel as comfortable as possible. I prepared as much as I could, but of course, you can’t always plan for everything…
After dinner, Mia and I decided to take a shower together. She used her magical little hands and softly placed them on my back and stomach while the water ran over us. We dried off, put on her jammies and went to her room with her grandparents who happened to be visiting us. I remember thinking, “what if tonight I end up at the hospital?” And quickly shrugged the thought off. I really had to pee all of a sudden. I sat down and a POP and GUSH of fluid flowed from me. My water broke. I was sure of it. I called my husband to the bathroom. My waters continued to flow (and wouldn’t stop until after my baby was born) - I told him to pack up. His eyes were wide and his nerves were hard to hide. Out the window went all of my plans to labor at home as much possible. I had planned to walk and make cookies and watch a movie, take a long bath... nope. I hadn’t even felt a contraction. On the way to the hospital I had no pain, just a soaking wet pair of pants. We were excited and nervous; doing our best to stay positive.
Due to COVID, the hospital protocol for deliveries went like this: mom checks in alone, sent to triage, COVID rapid test, when admitted to a room, mom texts their partner to come to the delivery room where they’ll have baby and then will be transferred to a smaller recovery room for the rest of the hospital stay. Other than that one room transfer, there is no leaving your room (even in the hallway, or to pick up delivery... nada.) and definitely no visitors.
I hand the nurse my birth plan as she hooks me up to an IV, a blood pressure monitor, fetal heart monitor and takes a couple of blood samples (missing the vein the first time, ouch.) I ask if I will be able to shower, use my yoga ball, rebozo, TENS machine etc., as I was just beginning to feel a bit of the contraction pain - or in hypnobirthing terms, the wave. She responds, no because I’m high risk having had a c section before so they will need to have me on constant monitoring. I am immediately frustrated because none of my providers prepared me for this. I even asked my midwife during appointments if I could use natural pain management techniques and movement to help me dilate without petocin. Unless I needed to go to the bathroom I was to stay to my bed or a rocking chair they lent me, leaking endless amounts of fluid, uncomfortable with monitors, poked and prodded to make sure the baby and I were tolerating the labor. The midwife on call swept my membranes to get my contractions going (OUCCCH). The one thing I could control on my birth plan was to tell my medical team not to ask me about an epidural or use the word pain around me.
At 11pm, 4 hours from my water breaking, I was only 2cm dilated which completely pissed me off. With my broken water bag infection risk and VBAC uterine rupture risk, it was a race against time to have the birth I was hoping for. They started me on low doses of petocin through my IV and immediately the medicine made the contractions stronger and more painful. Needless to say, Alex and I didn’t sleep that night. He “lit up” LED candles and placed them around the room, sprayed lavender and rose scents around me, massaged my swollen legs, fed me ice chips, fluffed my pillows, took pics to commemorate this special life event… but nothing he did made me comfortable. Beyond the pain of the contractions, having to sit in your own fluids for hours on end is not a good feeling, especially when you can’t even take breaks from the uncomfortable hospital bed to walk around. I feel like my lower back still hurts now from having to sit in that bed. When the nurses/docs would come in, my husband would pull his mask on and when they left he would be maskless with me. No one bothered me about not wearing the mask in my room until I was in my recovery room.
The sun came up and I had barely dilated but I did efface to 75% which was decent progress. I maintained my stance of staying drug free because I was worried the epidural would slow down my progress (that already felt like a slow crawl). They increased the petocin a little bit more. By mid-day the combo of no sleep and more pain was too much for me - I began passing out between my contractions. The pain would surge and I would awaken, the pain would fade and I would fall asleep again. And on… and on… for the entire day. The wonderful nurse noticed that I didn’t want to talk much but suggested and moved me into different positions to try and get some pain relief. When I would awake I would rely on this app Freya to talk me through the surges in a positive hypnobirthing friendly way. My husband felt helpless, as he would later tell me. He never wanted to see me in that much pain and he wasn’t prepared for it.
It was about 7pm and we had hit the 24 hour mark from my water breaking - I decided I couldn’t do it without pain meds anymore. I lay there beginning to feel hopeless that this birth would never happen and realized I had no more energy to push even if I had to. With no food or sleep, I really needed help. The midwife checked me (I hated this feeling the most. The sweeping and the checking was so painful… more than I imagined) and I was 8cm dilated. I decided that enough was enough and it was time for me to ask about getting an epidural. The whole team and my husband sighed with relief as they were beginning to worry for me. I had gone for so many hours without pain relief that the mood in the room mirrored the serious darkness as I was feeling. I didn’t experience the glorious “look at me! I am woman hear me roar…” It felt a lot more like, “I’ve had all the pain I can take in 24 hours and I seriously need help because I have no strength left to get the baby out so GET.ME.THE.DRUGS,RIGHT.NOWWW!!!!” I felt a bit defeated but then proud of myself for getting myself to 8cm I was so close and then…
In went the giant needle in my spine and I breathed a gigantic sigh of relief (as did my husband). The mood in the room lifted immediately and the nurses started joking with me and I laughed for the first time in a long time. I quickly fell asleep (as did my husband) and the petocin worked its magic to open me up to 10cm over the next 4 hours while I got the rest I was going to need to push my baby girl out.
11pm - the nurse woke me cheerily, the midwife checked out and I had expanded to 10cm - it was finally time to get the show on the road. First she put me in stirrups and I pushed as much as I could to wiggle my baby down. I was worried about this position not using gravity but it really does work well. Next, I felt my legs were strong enough to squat so I asked to use a bar to hold myself up in a squatted position on the bed and used gravity to help me out. After, I went on my side and then the other side and then finally ended up on my back, in stirrups. I had a mirror to see her head for motivation. PUSHHHHH. Two hours in, I whispered to Alex, “I can’t do this anymore. Can someone just help me get her out??” The nurse lied to me and said she would get someone to help me but I need to push a little more and get her down further before they could intervene. I later learned it was a tactic to get me pushing with more force and it worked.
At 1:44AM we welcomed Baby Jordan to the world. My second girl and last addition to our family. Although I didn’t cry when I met her (nor did I cry with my first daughters birth) I recently thought that perhaps I didn’t cry because holding my girls in my arms felt so incredibly natural, like they were home - just the way it was supposed to be.
