Wow! What a week! So I was torn between sharing just the highlight images of our newest family addition, and giving an in depth play by play of the labor and delivery. Since my toddlers are happily plugged into My Little Pony and our new little man is cozy and spending skin to skin time with his daddy, I think I will attempt a little bit of both!
Some background on my first two deliveries with Tessa and Thyme! Tessa was induced three weeks early (dangerously low amniotic fluid) and so I had a delivery from hell, where I was strapped down to a bed with a thousandy cords sticking out of every possible body part (fetal monitors on the belly and up the hoo-haw, IVs on the arms, so on and so on…) – since I have a pretty intense needle phobia, it was hell. Literally… devil, evil, horrid, suckery. The Pitocin induced contractions were hell. I refused the epidural and ended up – barely – having her naturally, with the assistance of vacuum extraction when I started hyperventilating and passing out and got too weak to push toward the end.
With my second daughter, I had a near perfect delivery experience. I went into labor in the middle of the night, and by the time I realized I was actually in labor, I was already pretty far along with contractions 1 minute apart. We barely made it to the hospital in time. I didn’t have time to sign papers or get checked in – I literally got wheeled in, gave a push and a half, and BOOM! Baby in my arms! No IV, no interventions, no starving me in the hospital or trying to strap me down. Easy, natural and (all things considered), pain free.
So I was a little (okay, a LOT) nervous about how my experience with baby #3 would go. What I knew is that I wanted as natural a birth as possible (think home birth type experience) but in a hospital setting near NICU equipment in the rare event it would be required. I didn’t want to be strapped to a bed, or hooked up to IVs. I wanted to be able to shower and walk around and be as comfortable as possible until it came time to push. I didn’t want needless interventions and medications that might increase my chances of needing a C section. I didn’t want blood drawn before delivery (with my phobia, I did not need the added stress of needles thrown in with pushing a human out my vagina). I wanted to be able to eat and drink to keep up my strength. And once the baby was born I wanted minimal interventions from medical staff – delayed cord clamping, immediate and extended skin to skin, no immediate bath, no eye ointment, no vaccines, no circumcision, etc.
So here’s what happened! I went into labor around 2am in the middle of the night. Contractions were about 10 minutes apart, and I wasn’t even SURE they were contractions, but since I was starting to bleed, I figured it was time to start packing the car for the hospital just in case. Once contractions reached about 5-6 minutes apart, and bleeding got heavier, we headed to the hospital around 3am.
After checking me in, they confirmed I was indeed in labor and at 4 centimeters. I got shown to my room, where I was met by a nurse holding a bazilliondy needles and cords on a tray, where she cheerfully motioned to the bed and said, “Okay, let’s get you all settled into bed!” Uhhhhhhhh, yeah. No.
My wonderful husband immediately handed over my birth plan with my detailed wishes for minimal interventions, and I proceeded to decline every poke, prod, and routine hospital intervention that contributes to our nations ridiculously high cesarean rates. The nurses were great about honoring my requests while making it clear they thought I was crazy, and then they turned the doctor on me, who spent an excessive amount of time repeating himself and not taking no for an answer, demanding I allow them to hook me up to every hospital system in the building. (It got a little ridiculous, my husband even got a bit pissed off with the doctor not taking no for an answer and harassing me while I was in active – and painful – labor. Grrrr!!)
Some of the conversation went a little like this:
Him – “You may not be able to deliver vaginally, and if you aren’t hooked up to an IV, you and your baby could die.”
Me – “I have delivered vaginally twice. I am not opposed to IVs in the event of an emergency, but right I am going to decline the IV and other interventions. When I have an IV in, I have a tendency to have panic attacks and claw at the IV in my arm. I don’t need that while in active labor. So my answer on the IV is no.”
Him – “But you are going to NEED to do an IV. How are you going to receive pain medications?”
Me – “I didn’t do pain medication with my daughters. I don’t need any right now. If I decide I do want some, we can talk about that when the time comes.”
Him – “But what about your epidural? You had one with your other kids, so you know you are going to need one eventually.”
Me – “Actually, NO, I didn’t have an epidural with my other two kids. I WILL NOT be receiving one with this pregnancy.”
Him – “Well, if you decline an IV right now, I need you to acknowledge that you are putting your son and your own life at risk of death.”
Me – “Okay, yeah, sure. In the unlikely event of an emergency I understand it may take an extra 30 seconds to put an IV in if needed. But until and unless an emergency occurs, I am going to decline the intervention.”
Him – “Okay but… you are going to need one. So I need to you to reconsider.”
*repeat the above conversation about a bazillion times… all while I was wincing through painful 2 minute apart contractions*
ANYWAY. After successfully fighting off attempted interventions every 30 minutes, I basically spent the majority of the morning showering and walking through increasingly intense contractions. They never got closer together than 1 minute and 25 seconds before I transitioned to the pushing stages.
Since my daughter Thyme came SO FAST (once I felt like pushing, I pushed and she was out!) I had my husband call the hospital staff in, where everyone sat around my hospital bed and stared at my vagina for about 15 minutes or so. I kept feeling the need to push, and I WOULD.. but nothing was really happening.
They kept urging me to push harder, but I didn’t want to push harder when it just felt like hard pushed would just exhaust me and not really DO anything. It was the weirdest thing, trying to listen to and respond to and trust my body, while simultaneously feeling the pressure to “perform” with the hospital staff waiting around and acting impatient and bored trying to get this baby out of me.
Without going into excruciating detail, eventually the pushing started resulting in progress, and after MANY painful contractions (still 1 minute and 30 seconds apart!) I pushed little mister out.
While I was enjoying immediate skin to skin, the doctor immediately cut the cord – I am sure that while pestering me about needless IVs and medical interventions he didn’t even GLANCE at my birth plan and request for delayed cord clamping. But once Dr. Medicine Happy left the room, the rest of the stay progressed surprisingly well, with attentive medical staff that were sensitive to and respectful of our educated requests and individual preferences and wishes.
Rowan Thomas Freeman was ultimately born at 7:29am on October 22nd, weighing 8 pounds 1 ounce and measuring 21 inches long.
I have been unable to breast feed my daughters (long story, but you can read the details on the why from my previous blog post here) but I had heard that by the third or fourth pregnancy, many women can actually regrow breast tissue that results in a partial supply of breast milk. I noticed that I can produce a couple of drops of breast milk with hand expression this pregnancy, so I have been letting Rowan latch to encourage any additional milk let down. He latches like a champ, and the bonding time is incredible, but as of writing, I am still only producing drops (like 2-3 with hand expression) so I thinking I am ultimately a flavored pacifier at this point. But I will take any little bit of bonding with my little man!
We are blessed to have donor breast milk to get him through the first few months of his life, and I will continue to seek out additional donations for him – praying I can find enough to get him through the first year, like I did with Tessa!
Anyhoo, I am rambling, and this post got way longer than I anticipated (still feeling strangely sleep deprived, even as I have slept most of the time since Rowan was born!) so I will just wrap up by saying, my little guy is amazing, and wonderful, and perfect in EVERY WAY!!!! I love him so much, my heart is filled to bursting! The girls are so excited, and every oooh and ahhhhh from the girls just melts my heart that much more!
God has blessed us beyond measure and I cannot wait to see how our little family will change and grow now that we are a family of FIVE!!! <3 <3
ahhh congrats!! guess it’s time to change your blurb and say that you’re now mom to 3 kids (:
ROFLMAO, omg, I didn’t even think about that!! Adding that to my list of things “to do” today! haha! <3
Oh you are all so beautiful, Gingi! I’m so happy for you …
Blessings as you bond, as you love, as you find moments of rest somewhere in there …
Thank you Linda!! We are feeling SO blessed!!! <3
Oh wow, what a blessing! The pictures are beyond beautiful! Congratulations! I was amazed by the description of your first delivery and the conversation about the 3rd one… some people are just so strange, insisting! I am glad you are now a family of five – mine was too, even 6, since one of my grandmothers lived with us. You wll all have so much fun! Bless you and your family!
DenisesPlanet.com
Thank you! We are so excited by the arrival of our little man.. seriously over the moon, you have no idea! (or maybe you do! haha!) <3 <3 Much love Denise!
Congratulations on your new son! Giving birth sounds like so much fun.
Oh it’s a blast!….. of 8 pounds of tiny human out the vagina…..
Great and very interesting post!
Have a nice day, dear!
http://www.recklessdiary.ru
You too sweetie! <3
Eeeee!!!! Yay!!!!! Congratulations! I am so proud of you for standing up to them. I totally caved under the pressure with my middle two, and my first baby having experience sounds EXACTLY like your first baby delivery, right down to the vacuum and the too-exhausted-to push…..Only I actually wasn’t as tough as you. I DID have an epidural. Only it didn’t take, so I didn’t have an epidural.I had never actually planned to go through all that pain. Ha!
You rock! Congratulations again!!
I am super proud of myself after the fact, but demanding they back off while in the moment is seriously the most stressful thing!!! I hate how routine and condescending some of the medical staff can be.. but I am happy that everything went smoothly and (relatively) stress free!! And ouch on your epidural experience!! Yikes!!!
Congratulations my dear, I wish you all everything the best 🙂
Thanks Alice! <3
Welcome to the universe baby Rowan Thomas Freeman! I am sorry that the Doctor did not listen to your birth plan. It is why I am so in favour of Doula’s and home birthing.
My husband is such a great birth advocate that I had hoped he would be sufficient to keep the doctors and nurses in line with my plan. But the doctor moved so fast, even with my husband standing RIGHT there and speaking up, he just clamped and cut little Rowans cord!! When my husband spoke up, he said, “Oh well, it’s already done!” Grrrrrrr!!!!
Congratulations Gingi… he is adorable… kudos to you for doing natural child birth. I had my oldest daughter by natural child birth, I swore never again, due to the insane pain, which I can still recall 36 years later… lol… When I had Val, I had an epidural and the birth process for me was beautiful. I have great respect for women that can do natural childbirth… I think I have a low threshold to pain. I was also incredibly blessed to be able to nurse both my of my daughters, I loved it and highly recommend it to anyone who can and wants too, I am grateful I had that blessing xox
What is with the cesareans down there? Our hospitals are all about natural childbirth and vaginal ones if at all possible. A cesarean is only performed if the mother is totally unable to deliver vaginally… A lot of women here are doing the midwives or dulas… I am old school and wanted to be in the hospital but I think it is awesome there are so many choices here and that all of them are respected xox
I think it is absolutely crazy when women say, “You forget the pain”…. ummmm, nope!!! I still vividly remember the pain from all three!! lol!! Thanks for your kind words Launna! <3
Congratulations on baby no #3 🙂 He looks gorgeous and how proud is his little sister! How annoying that you had to argue so much during labour but glad everything went well.
Yeah, that was beyond aggravating!!! But feeling blessed the rest all went well!
Congratulations it’s always a blessing when a child its born.
Yes it is! We are crazy happy and proud parents right now!! <3
Wow, congrats! He is so cute and I love all the adorable family pics!
Thanks!! Wish my girls would have calmed down enough for a BIG family photo!!
Congratulations to you and your family! Rowan Thomas Freeman looks beautiful and what a great name!
Thanks!! <3
This is amazing news, lady! Congrats!
-Ashley
Thanks Ashley!!! <3
congratulation, very fab notice!!!
kisses
I know, right?! We are over the moon happy!!
How precious. Congratulations.
Thanks Mary!!
Congrats Gingi! your little Rowan is adorable. Thanks for sharing your wonderful birth story, it was amazing.
It didn’t feel like it at the time.. but thank you! hehe! <3
CONGRATULATIONS, gorgeous! He is precious!!!! Thanks for sharing your birth story and these amazing photos with us; I’m so glad to see that you’re breastfeeding, too! Sending much love to you and your family.
XO,
Jalisa
My supply never did come in (which I didn’t think it would, but had hoped for a miracle! *sobs*).. but he IS on donor breast milk, and using the SNS by Madela, we are able to at least have baby at the breast bonding time!
Awww Gingi!! Congrats…..he’s a doll. It’s amazing how much love we have for our kids. And I have the same gender order, girl, girl, boy. And it’s fun having both. Enjoy your little man!!!!!
Yet another crazy thing we have in common! lol!
OMG, congrats! I love motherhood & it’s amazing, don’t you think so? xoxo
Only when I’m not sleep deprived.. 😉 hehe, I kid!
congrats! your baby is so cute and adorable.
Capturing Life Memoirs | aimeebustillo.com
I am inclined to agree!! hehehe!
Congratulations! And welcome to the world, little one!
Thanks!!! <3
Congratulations! These photos are adorable!
Kiss
Maggie D.
Thanks!! <3
Oh my gosh congratulations! You must both me absolutely over the moon!!
aglassofice.com
x
We are!!! You have no idea!!
Aw, congratulations! He’s such a cutie and I’m glad the pregnancy went fairly close to plain, though sorry about the bothersome doctor!
-lauren
Yeah, he was a bit of a douche… not gonna lie…
CONGRATULATIONS! he is SO precious! that doctor sounds like a real dillweed and i’m sorry you had to encounter him! >:/
Yeah, not super happy with his conduct. I’m gonna start calling him Doctor Douchebag.
Aw congratulations!! So cute <3
Thanks!! We are crazy proud parents! <3
My goodness, it seems like you just told us you were pregnant, and the beautiful baby is already here. Everyone looks so happy and peaceful, but I imagine you’re tired. Congratulations! Hugs…RO
It’s easier with my husband being home on paternity leave.. but we are SOOOOOOO so happy! You have no idea! <3
Just passing to wish you a nice week! Hope you have a nice day!
DenisesPlanet.com
You too sweetie!!! <3 <3 Thanks for stopping by, you light up my morning!
He’s so adorable! Big Congrats to your even bigger and happier family.
http://www.fashionradi.com
Thanks sweetie! We are so happy!!
Congrats!!! What a little cutie!
I’m sorry about your experience with the doctor. I understand where you’re coming from. I wanted a more natural birth myself. As natural as I could given that I was preeclamptic and had to be induced. I did decline the epidural though, but they sure didn’t like that much. These places really are medicine happy. Good on you for standing your ground!
I always enjoy hearing about the joy of other babies being born, but I’m sure my glad is grown, gone and raising his own little one in another state. (lol) Hope you’re getting some rest when you can! Hugs…RO
Congratulations Gingi! Look what you made 🙂 He is beyond beautiful. Giving birth doesn’t sound nearly as traumatic as being around doctors and nurses. You are so brave