Cooper's Birth Story

Every time I think about the day Cooper was born my heart fills & tears start flowing because it was so amazing, every second was perfect, even the hard ones.  Now as I write this I have an eleven week old sleeping soundly next to me.  Instead of newborn clothes, he's already in 6-9 month sizes measuring an amazing 25 1/2" tall & weighing in at 14 lbs as of his 2 month check up.

In the months leading up to delivery I was terrified.  Everything from not knowing what to expect, when to expect it or whether I'd be able to do this at all.  Then in the weeks & days leading up to early June I became calmer & calmer about the entire process.  We intentionally didn't create a birth plan, & decided instead to go into the hospital with an open mind to what would come.

At 5am on June 6th I woke up with a cramp, followed by a gush of water.  Our birthing class taught us that only around 15% of women have their water break pre-labor so I assumed I'd peed myself, another beautiful pregnancy symptom.  We'd already had an early morning run to the hospital the week prior & were used to middle of the night contractions that would stop by lunchtime the next day; so going into "time to go to the hospital" labor was far from my mind.  I had it in my head that this baby was never coming out, & surely not before my 6/9 due date.

I waddled to the bathroom as fast as I could, only to have two more gushes on the way.  A few minutes later I realized what was really going on, opened the door to ask Eric for fresh clothes, & nervously share that my water just broke.  When I came out of the bathroom, happy tears flowing, it felt like the house had filled with excitement. We were both wide awake & started gathering bags, packing dog supplies & wrapping up things at work (perk #100 of us both working at home).  

At 5:30 contractions started.  We coincidentally had a check-up already scheduled for later that morning & Eric had a doctor's appointment of his own before that.  I told him to go & let me know if he got held up, then called Mom to bring me to my appointment when he ran late. During the first few hours of labor my nesting kicked into overdrive & by the time she arrived I was sitting on the sidewalk outside weeding our the garden. I'll never forget the look on her face seeing me there plopped on the ground with my nearly 40 week belly. 

At the appointment we learned I was only 1cm dilated.  The midwife then hooked us up to check baby's heartbeat & my own contractions. I texted Eric that we were being monitored only to have him walk in with Mom from the waiting room a couple minutes later. Everything looked good until one heart rate drop came through causing concern.  After that we were told to go home, gather our things & head to the hospital where they would speed things along to get baby out safely.  

Home we went, calling to board our dogs on the way, giving mom Etsy orders to bring to the post office & filling the cooler with freeze pops to bring (best tip ever from our birthing class).  After arriving & being checked we moved forward with the Foley Balloon until I reached 3cm & followed that with Pitocin late-afternoon on the 6th.  To manage the pain hubs & I alternating between walking the halls, massage & using the exercise ball.  Walking was the biggest relief, & with each contraction I'd stop to lean on Eric & we'd focus on breathing together.  He was my rock throughout the entire process.

Then we hit a wall- test results showed preeclampsia. Because of seizure risk we needed to start magnesium sulfate which weakens your muscles & confines you to bed (while making you feel like you're sick as a dog).  I asked if there was time for one more walk down the hallway & broke down in tears as soon as we were out of the room.  I thought I'd gone into this with no plan, but in the back of my mind I'd wanted to keep moving & not be bedridden for as long as possible.  This was not what I wanted, being induced was not what I wanted & now here we were doing both.  But Eric was there through it all, talking me down & putting it all into perspective. So we headed back to start the magnesium & an epidural since there could no longer be any movement to manage the pain.  The epidural was fantastic after it was placed right, which took 4 tries.

We settled in for a long night of TV, dozing & the most wonderful nurse who kept an eye on me non-stop until breakfast time.  First thing the next morning I was checked & amazingly just under 10cm dilated. Woohoo!!  My first thought was that baby had decided he'd have a birthday of 6/7.

Then came 4 hours of pushing.  In between a series of contractions I said "Cooper" through gritted teeth, & we picked our baby name from the short list of favorites right then. Because I was on Pitocin which causes contractions & Magnesium Sulfate which causes muscles to relax we'd have a series of 4-5 back to back contractions, then nothing for 20 minutes & repeat.  After a few hours I decided to keep pushing during the downtime.  The doctor suggested assisting with a suction cup a few times which I refused repeatedly, determined to get this baby out my way.

When Cooper was born just over 32 hours after my water broke I hemorrhaged twice.  Going in & out of consciousness I only remember snippets of what followed- not hearing him cry immediately (his mouth was being suctioned), having Coops laid on my chest right after he was born, seeing Eric & hearing the word transfusion.

Eric told me later that the room filled with Doctors & nurses faster than he could believe, around a half dozen in total.  One giving me a shot to bring my blood pressure back up, another ordering blood to be on standby (which I narrowly missed needing), another working to stop the bleeding, others tearing pads open & running all around.  Cooper was taken from my chest because I couldn't hold on to him & placed in the nearby bassinet.  Then I lost consciousness when my blood pressure dropped down into the 70s, causing the monitors to start beeping.  Our midwife took control & they had Eric step back.

The whole ordeal lasted 10 minutes, 10 long minutes.  Then the next thing I remember was holding a freshly cleaned Cooper on my chest with Eric by my side & feeling the Doctor stitch me up.  I was confused beyond belief, but nothing could come close to describing the flood of happiness at finally holding that sweet baby I carried for nearly 10 months.

There we were, a new family of 3.  Our lives were forever changed & everything was perfect <3