I’m Back After Giving Birth: The Whole Story
I’ve always loved hearing the stories of how women go into labor, give birth, etc. I find it SO fascinating. So I’m really excited to share my story now.
Throughout my pregnancy, I prepared for a natural labor. I did breathwork, meditations, and stretches. I was preparing like an athlete, which to me meant being physically and mentally prepared. I was excited to experience it. Fully. Not numbly.
At my 20-week ultrasound, the doctor had mentioned that I had slight placenta previa but assured me it would move. 95% of women who have previa at the 20-week ultrasound are typically told by week 30 that it’s gone. I didn’t think twice about it. Placenta previa is when your placenta attaches low (near or on the cervix). As your uterus grows, it should move upward and out of the way. It can’t block the exit! But in my case, a very very rare case, it didn’t move at all.
From 30 weeks on, I kept going in for ultrasounds waiting to be told it had moved and every single week it was in the same spot. I held out hope. They started preparing me for a scheduled c-section and I STILL did not accept that it was happening. I read stories online of how it moves at the last minute. I talked to a midwife in Europe about how they handle it there (could I go into labor naturally or was it far too dangerous)?
The situation was not ideal.
But through it, I learned something of utmost importance as a mother:
The only thing that matters is everyone’s good health.
And also…don’t hold on too tightly to your plans.
On a Friday, I scheduled my C-section for Tuesday.
I couldn’t believe all weekend that I was scheduled for major abdominal surgery. I couldn’t believe my baby was coming early. I couldn’t believe this was not at all (AT ALL) what I wanted. I was devastated.
The night before the C-section, I felt so overcome with grief. It didn’t feel like it was time for the baby. I wanted to go into labor spontaneously to be sure the baby was truly ready. The baby was supposed to decide the timing, not me or a doctor.
I was mourning that the birth day of our child wasn’t going to look like what I had hoped. I took time to really sit with that and then made a decision: I would make it the day that I want it to be.
I told my husband that when my 4am alarm went off, I was going to wake him with a joke. And sure enough, I woke him and said, “Trace, we have to go to the hospital. My water broke!”
4am on the day I gave birth
As we drove to the hospital, I was nervous for surgery and put on the birth hypnosis tracks I had been practicing when I thought it would be a natural labor. It helped. I did deep breaths. I had a surge of gratitude, too, that I wasn’t driving to the hospital in pain. I kept reassuring our baby that it was going to be a magical day, that we were going to meet, and it was going to be wonderful.
And it was.
I dreamed my whole life of giving birth and meeting my first child. And while I did not expect to be in an operating room, it AMAZED me how much the experience was everything I had ever hoped it would be. I watched my baby be born. I held my baby. My baby was born unbelievably healthy with an APGAR score of 9. Did you know they only give out a 10 if the baby comes out a “normal” color, which is exceptionally rare? I love learning new things!
I recovered quickly from surgery.
Everything went well. And even better, my surgeon made sure everything is so perfectly healed that I’m a candidate for a VBAC in the future (vaginal birth after c-section), meaning I can have a natural birth in the future if that’s in the cards for me.
Most most MOST importantly, I am no longer a person who needs things to go a certain way. Because I’ve taught myself that even with curveballs, even if everything isn’t ‘perfect,’ I make it perfect for me.
The same thing happened with my breastfeeding journey. After getting mastitis, I had to stop breastfeeding when our baby was 12 weeks old (sooner than I hoped), but it ended up being a huge positive for my health and our baby is perfectly happy and healthy. Almost everything can be made to be ‘good’ if you really, really look for it.
My thoughts on C-Section versus natural labor
I found the actual surgery to be “easy” in the sense that I was not in intense pain. I was shaking like a leaf from the drugs; my teeth rattled against each other so hard you could hear it across the room. My shoulders vibrated like I was in a giant massage chair. I felt intense nausea at one point, and they injected a drug that got rid of it immediately, but it also made me sleepy. Surgery itself is nerve-wracking and weird. You’re cut open and awake. You feel intense pressure and tugging. But I’m strong in those situations and it didn’t bother me or scare me too much.
That being said, recovery was NOT easy. I’ve never had a surgery or situation where I was unable to walk. Being bedridden is hard. When they took the catheter out and I started getting up to pee, I was in agony trying to make my way from the hospital bed to the bathroom. I was shuffling with tiny little foot movements, trying really hard not to feel defeated. That was the emotion that rang through me when I was unable to walk: defeated. I don’t let pain get me down, but wow, it’s hard not to be able to move.
I asked a really important question before surgery…
“If something is going wrong for the baby or me, will I know?”
They said, “Yes.”
This gave me so much reassurance. Because everything was normal during the surgery. Instead of worrying that they were hiding something from me to keep me calm, I knew that the calmness actually meant everything was truly going well.
Having a C-section absolutely requires that you have an amazing husband
Edit:..Having a baby absolutely requires having an amazing partner. Maybe not required. But certainly makes it so much better for everyone involved.
My husband did everything for our baby except for feeds. I stayed in bed and breastfed. That was it. I didn’t change our baby’s diaper for days, maybe even a week! I wasn’t able to stand or bend. I didn’t do anything in our house for weeks. My husband fed me, did the dishes, took care of our child, took care of our dog and cat, etc. We had our families supporting us, too.
We actually joked at the hospital that they really don’t treat the dads as well as they should. For example, our hospital didn’t provide free meals for Dad, just meals for Mom. But this was definitely a two-person adventure in the hospital. Given the surgery, I could not have cared for our child without someone next to me the whole time.
I skipped Duramorph and it went well
I declined Duramorph for my surgery and was so glad I did.
Duramorph is a narcotic that they add to your spinal anesthesia to prevent pain over the course of 24 hours. It is something you can decline. Duramorph is known to cause intense itchiness and the risk of respiratory depression. My older sister, Stacy, declined all narcotics for her C-section and everything went well, which gave me the confidence to do the same. When I signed a form declining Duramorph, you wouldn’t believe how many doctors came into the room to talk me out of it. Even the midwife who took photos and videos of the birth was incredulous that I was declining it. I never got the opportunity to tell all of them that it went well.
I managed the pain of my surgery with IV motrin called Toradol. When I came home from the hospital, I took extra-strength Tylenol for maybe two days and stopped. The Duramorph may have made walking more comfortable in the days after birth but I believe that feeling the pain (to know what the body cannot do) is useful and important. I took baby steps and barely walked. I healed incredibly well. Because I didn’t mask the pain and I didn’t push it.
This choice isn’t for everyone but I was really grateful to be educated about it ahead of time. Worst-case scenario, if you’re in a lot of pain after surgery, you just ask for the narcotics in your IV. I knew the “risk” of declining was so low because pain medication is always available to you at the hospital when you ask.
If I had to do another C-Section…
I would do two things differently:
After the baby was born, they immediately asked for a name. I was so hopped up on drugs. I didn’t mentally prepare to say, “We haven’t decided yet.” So I kind of named our baby accidentally? Sort of? We had a name picked out for each gender and when we found out the gender, I just assumed we were going with that particular name. It gave me anxiety after I gave birth, wondering if I should have sat with that decision longer upon MEETING the baby and making sure it fit. In the long run, it all worked out, and I love the name. But I think given that we didn’t know the gender ahead of time, it would have made sense to prepare myself that they were going to ask in the operating room! My husband didn’t think of this either. It just sort of happened!
Second, this one is kind of embarrassing. C-sections cause INTENSE gas pains. Not a normal gas pain. Like you feel it in your ribs and shoulder blades, kind of pain. There’s air in your abdomen from surgery. And when you’re bedridden, it doesn’t move as easily. In the future, I’d get up and move every two hours. I would NOT recline the bed. It sends the gas pain up. And last, I would take Gas X around the clock. I’d bring your own from home, and ask for “gas tea.” One of the nurses recommended “gas tea” when I was in tremendous pain and it truly worked. I think it was black tea. My husband was laughing at me for how much pain this caused me, but it literally felt like I had internal bleeding or something was terribly wrong. It’s funny now, but not so much at the time! So I’d stay on top of that better next time. And if you feel a SHARP pain in your ribs, or even your neck, you won’t think it’s gas, but it is.
When you get home from the hospital, I also highly recommend sleeping in a recliner chair like your nursery rocking chair. I wasn’t able to sleep horizontally and get back up without considerable pain, so the chair was a dream come true.
C-sections are birth, too
It was hard for me to accept a different form of birth besides natural. I’m so granola, hippie, natural that it felt so wrong in my soul to have a C-section. But it was the birth that kept my child and me safe. And I was amazed, truly, just how much of a birth it felt like. I felt the baby being tugged out, come up, and cry for the first time. It was everything, everything. I still feel joy thinking back on the experience of meeting my child for the first time.
Toward the end of surgery, they escorted my husband to the recovery room and left our child alone on the warming tray across the room from me. I heard my baby cry. And I said, “It’s okay, mommy is here,” while they were sewing me up. My baby heard my voice and immediately stopped crying. It echoes a family story that has been told to me all my life, that when my dad held me for the first time and talked to me, I stopped crying. It was such a powerful moment for me. Even though my child was now outside of my body, we were still connected, and forever will be.
A love like this…no matter how it comes into the world…is beautiful.
If you’re in a season of trying to get pregnant, preparing for birth, or maybe reminiscing on your own experiences, I hope this story reminds you that you are more powerful than you realize.
