Remembering My Labour Day on Labour Day

Well in honour of the holiday, I'll share a bit of my most literal labour story (as inspired by this blog).

How long was your labor?

Just under 16 hours.

How did you know you were in labor?

Kind of a sharp pang after having just gotten into bed at midnight prompted me to go to the bathroom to pee, only I couldn't hold in whatever was slowly dripping out--I stood up only to make a small puddle on the floor (I know I know, TMI!) and both Grady and I knelt down to smell if it smelled like "baby" (what they tell you amniotic fluid smells like)--which it kind of did--and we concluded my water had just broke. He promptly went to sleep for six hours (how nice that at least one of us could sleep-!) while my contractions started and I laboured at home throughout the night. My midwife arrived at 6:30am and around 8ish I decided it was time to go to the hospital, which we did.

Where did you deliver?

In Dresden, Germany at a hospital close to our apartment--so close in fact that when I was in active labour I had a contraction right before we loaded in the car and then just started another when I got out at the hospital. Not sad to have missed the contraction-in-the-car experience-!! Plus there was always the backup option of just walking to the hospital, and what woman wouldn't love to not have her husband worrying about parking when they get there?!? :)

Drugs?

Not of my choosing. Who knew after being fully dialated for two hours and not yet having given birth a slight panic would ensue in the surrounding medical professionals? (especially since the water had broken at the very beginning and poor Caitlin's head had been resting in my pelvis the whole time without that cushy water "pillow".) I was urged to start Pitocin because my contractions had kind of petered-out, to which I reluctantly agreed. And the irony is that after an otherwise drug-free (besides the Pitocin) labour my placenta didn't fully detach and I needed to be put completely under for them to perform a DNC. I couldn't even sit up for at least a day afterwards due to the dizziness caused by the strong medication wearing off-! (which equals peeing into a bedpan, having to have Caitlin handed to me and taken from me, etc etc...) Not the most dignified way to enter motherhood...

C-section?

Nope, thankfully.

Who delivered?

My midwife, Doreen, and a doc who stepped in at the very end. Midwives attend every birth in Germany and you either have one from the hospital (until she ends her shift when you'd get a new one) or in my case, a kind of "independent with contract" one who stays the whole time and also does prenatal/postpartum care. Anyway both Doreen and the doc insisted I lie on the bed but because of the excruciating, intensified (thanks to the Pitocin) contractions that radiated from my back, I just couldn't. They graciously sat on the floor behind me as I leaned on the bed (see, I used it) and ended up delivering on my hands and knees. Thank goodness they were so understanding about it!

I don't know that I've ever posted this picture before for obvious reasons (not-yet-cleaned-off Caitlin, my ridiculous expression--just to name a couple) but it just captures those first, magical moments together. Taken minutes after birth!