Today my second baby boy turns one year old. His birth was so similar to my first son that it seemed fitting to share his birth story on his birthday in the same way I did with my first. There were so many similarities between the two births that I can’t help but compare them.
I’ve been struggling with writing this story because it’s hard for me to think about it for long periods of time, as was the case with my first birth. Nonetheless, I wanted to document it so that the details will always be at hand. There’s a lot of sameness between these two birth stories. I have tried not to compare too much throughout this post but I did put together a side-by-side comparison at the end.
I hope that one day I can work through my tough feelings surrounding birth (it’s on my list for my therapist, but we haven’t quite gotten there yet due to other issues in my life). You may be able to tell that my heart isn’t in this storytelling in the way that I’d like it to be, but this birth did result in one beautiful little boy that brings me joy every day.
My birth story with my second baby.
I’ll pick up where my third trimester ended. To recap, I was hospitalized at 35 weeks due to concerns about Baby’s health. I spent my birthday and my oldest son’s birthday in the hospital and received steroid shots to help Baby in case he arrived early. I was able to go home for my final week of pregnancy, but the doctors wanted to induce me as soon as I was 37 weeks to make sure Baby was safe.
However, our city was having such a baby boom that I didn’t know when I’d be able to come in for an induction; I was told to just keep my phone on and wait for the call. Well, the call came while we were still unloading our car after a wonderful lunch and surprise mini baby shower with my lupus support group.
I was excited, nervous, relieved, and a little terrified. Ultimately, I was wondering how in the world we’d get to the hospital by the time they’d asked – we’d received the call with only three hours notice. My in-laws came to pick up our three-year-old, packed quickly (I’d been too exhausted to prepare more than the bare minimum), and took final belly photos in a rush.
Ultimately, we did arrive at the hospital on time, though we left a messy house behind. The whole thing felt surreal; after check-in I walked past the room I delivered my first baby in and went to a room that had previously been used for a COVID positive mom and still had the extra ventilation stuff inside (though it had been cleaned and sterilized).
My nurse was very kind, but I felt a little awkward because she was about 38 and a half weeks pregnant and I was 37+0! I could hardly believe a woman that was further along than me was kneeling to put on my compression socks! I let her do it because my SPD was so bad I could barely walk, bend, or move in certain ways.
I had many bruises from four (or five?) failed IV attempts during my previous hospital stay. I was pretty anxious about having an IV placed and my fears came true with two more failed attempts. I insisted on having the specialized IV access personnel come to place my IV line. Some of the staff didn’t like this and let me know it usually takes them a while to show up, but I didn’t care because I wasn’t messing around with any more pain than necessary.
It did take the woman a long time to arrive, I think it was around 11:30 pm when she got to my room. And, since I had a rapid labor with my first birth, the doctor wouldn’t start my induction until I had an IV placed (this is part of their safety protocol). The woman placed my IV via ultrasound guidance and was very calm and confident. She also said my veins were quite difficult and it was the right decision to call for her assistance.
Finally, my doctor gave the all-clear to start my induction. I had a different protocol from my first birth. This was partially due to the doctor’s preference and because of my request for things to be done as gently and naturally as possible. I still felt trauma by how fast and intense my first birth was and thought that was due to how much Pitocin I received (spoiler alert – it wasn’t just the Pitocin).
Throughout the night I received two doses of Cytotec (misoprostol), which is a small pill that you place in your cheek that can start contractions and soften the cervix. I was barely 1 cm dilated when I received my first dose, right after my IV insertion, and then received my second dose four hours later.
While writing this, I learned that Cytotec is not FDA approved for the induction of labor. If I had known this at the time, I likely would have asked for the prostaglandin suppository instead, which I received with my first induction and is approved by the American College of Obstetricians and Gynecologists (ACOG). Thankfully, I didn’t have any negative side effects, but I wish I had taken the time to ask about the usage of Cytotec for inductions.
At 6 am, I hadn’t progressed much at all. I think I was around 1.5 cm dilated. My doctor and I made the decision to break my waters; this is called artificial rupture of the membranes (AROM) and it’s another way to induce labor. This made me nervous since once your water breaks you’re effectively on a 24-hour clock until you have to have a C-section due to infection risk.
With my first child, my water broke on its own shortly before birth. However, I wanted to avoid Pitocin, so I agreed to have the doctor break my waters. It was uncomfortable but not too painful.
Afterward, things picked up a little. I had asked for IV pain meds right away the night before, not because of any contractions but due to the intense pain in my pelvis and left hip from the SPD. My doctor gave me Stadol twice throughout the night, which is a narcotic pain medication. It wasn’t as helpful with the pain as the morphine I received during my first birth, but it did help me stay calm and rest.
When the contractions picked up a bit I received another dose and started listening to a sermon on my phone while I tried to relax. This was my third – and final – dose, as you can’t receive IV pain meds too close to delivery, and I was a bit out of it and I think I even had some mild hallucinations. It’s certainly not my pain med of preference. My contractions continued to get stronger for a while but I was able to breathe through them. After a few hours, however, they started to slow down.
My doctor that started the induction had ended his shift, and my new doctor had not been in to meet me yet. I think it was a busy day, but as the hours passed I became more irritated that she didn’t come to check on me (overall I didn’t end up having a great experience with her). However, the daytime nurse was by my side every step of the way and as my contractions began to slow she checked me for progress – I think I was around 3 cm – and encouraged me to try Pitocin.
I knew that if things slowed down too much I could be in for a very long day and possibly a C-section by the next morning. I agreed to a low dose of Pitocin, since with my previous induction the dosage started off a bit high and they increased the dosage every hour or so, which I felt was too aggressive. This time my nurse hooked up the Pitocin at the lowest dose around 11:30am and my body responded almost immediately.
I couldn’t have any more pain meds (they can’t be given too close to birth for safety of the baby) so I tried moving around once I was no longer able to breathe through the contractions. At one point I sat on the birthing ball with my head on the hospital bed, feeling like I could handle things in that position, and then my baby’s heart rate dropped. Part of me was angry that he couldn’t tolerate the one position that I could. I had to move, so I sat in a rocking chair for a few minutes and the pain started to explode.
I remember reaching a point where I asked my husband, “Why in the world did I think I could do this without an epidural?”
For context, I’m terrified of epidurals. I have no judgement towards people that have had one (in fact, I’m kind of jealous of the women who’ve had good birth experiences thanks to epidurals), but I wanted to avoid one at all costs. However, just like my first birth, I finally admitted I couldn’t go on without an epidural. And, as with my first birth, this was the start of transition and I wouldn’t have time for one.
I realized I wouldn’t be able to sit up through another contraction and I slow-motion flung myself into the hospital bed and got on my right side since I couldn’t tolerate any other position due to the SPD pain. Looking back, if I had not gotten into the bed at that moment then either someone would have had to lift me into bed or I would have delivered on the floor. I think my nurse knew what was happening because I remember her paging anesthesia and additional staff in a quiet, urgent tone.
This is where things get intense.
Rapid labor is one of the most traumatic experiences of my life, and this was the second time I was going through it – so I knew how much it would hurt. The pain began to exceed what my mind could comprehend.
I felt an uncontrollable urge to push; I remembered the sensation from my previous birth. It hit me hard. I had reached the point were I was screaming through the contractions. There wasn’t anything I could do to stop myself. It was the kind of screaming where you scream on the inhale and the exhale and it’s an otherworldly experience. I would have been embarrassed about such long, extensive screaming if I had any space in my consciousness for embarrassment.
I remember that I couldn’t breathe because of the pain. I watched as staff continued to enter the room and I begged them to help me. I’m not sure what I expected. I asked for someone to give me oxygen through ragged breaths and they told me no, apparently they didn’t have any or couldn’t give it because of the pandemic. I’m not entirely sure why the answer was no, but I was stunned and angry.
I still could not breathe properly. It was bad. My nurse, the one who’d been by my side since 7 am, finally got a bit in my face and told me I had to breathe. It reminded me of the doctor during my first birth who told me I had to push the baby out when I told her I couldn’t do it.
I tried my best to breathe. Perhaps I was in shock or something like it.
More staff flooded into the room and they were pulling out equipment and getting things ready. It was all a background blur to me as my body and the pain took over. My body started pushing without me actively participating. It was unbearable. I felt the baby’s head starting to edge out and then retreat a little with each contraction. It was an unpleasant sensation, to put it lightly, since went through transition and dilated extremely fast (10-15 minutes).
At this point, I was still lying on my right side and unable to move – I still couldn’t get in a good breath between the contractions.
According to my medical report, a doctor that was eating lunch around the corner was, “Called to see patient as the nearest MD due to precipitous delivery. Upon arrival fetal vertex was crowning. [Patient] did not have an epidural and felt an uncontrollable urge to push but unable to change position. While lying obliquely in bed with legs closed she continued to push.”
Pushing this way was putting my baby in danger, but I truly couldn’t do anything about it. So the nurses told my husband to help turn me on my back, but this caused me to scream in pain because I couldn’t tolerate my left hip lying flat on the bed. So my husband, with some help from the nurses, held me at a somewhat diagonal angle while I pushed our baby out in one or two pushes. I’m not entirely sure because I wasn’t completely in control of what was happening.
(Yes, my husband saw everything. No, he didn’t faint. He did well.)
To me, it felt like the baby came out too fast. He arrived with the cord wrapped around his neck, but it was loose and the doctor removed it quickly. Suddenly, he was there. It was over (mostly) and we were meeting him.
He was born at 12:43 pm. I had previously asked that he remain with me for the first hour, as I did not get to experience the golden hour with my first son.
Officially, my duration of labor was recorded as one minute since the doctor ran into the room during delivery. My husband sent a text shortly I started pushing uncontrollably and later told me the text was sent five minutes before the time of birth.
As I held him, my newborn was loud. He was crying, wriggling, and fussy. I was a bit thrown since I didn’t remember my first son being this way (by the time I held him, he was quiet and observant). I stared at his face and tried to help him feed as the doctor spoke to me about delivering the placenta.
With my first birth, the placenta didn’t come out. That doctor had to press on my stomach – harder than I thought you could press on someone’s stomach – and kind of push it out for me. That was too much for me to handle (painful birth + placenta extraction + stitches back to back was overwhelming) and I did not want that to happen again. I asked the doctor for a few more minutes. I had to push intentionally this time, instead of my body taking over, and it felt a bit foreign and confusing. Thankfully, I was able to deliver the placenta.
I still had to be stitched up due to a second-degree tear (again, the same as my first birth). I told them I had trouble tolerating previously – and by trouble I mean I could not comply despite my greatest efforts. Holding my son helped me to stay a tad calmer, but I still couldn’t stop flinching.
The doctor recommended that a nurse and my husband provide pressure on my legs so that I could push against them without flinching my body. It worked; she could do her job despite my inability to stay still. I apologized and felt embarrassed, but it’s a pretty painful thing to go through especially AFTER going through a painful rapid labor.
After close to an hour, they took my baby over to the little baby bed and weighed him. My husband and I heard the nurse say he was 7 lbs. 12 oz. but his official birth weight was recorded as 7 lbs. 15 oz.
I don’t think we will ever be certain about his true birth weight, but he was certainly big for a 37+1 baby. He was 21 inches long.
When the doctor came in to examine my baby she pointed out that his legs were swollen. I had mostly been staring at his face for an hour while the lower half of his body was tucked into my hospital blanket. She took photos of his legs to show the neonatologist and gave him back to me. I was shocked when I saw how swollen and bruised his legs were.
The full story of his painfully swollen legs continues here: My Baby Has Caffey Disease.
My postpartum began with the normal things, like ordering lunch and that stressful first bathroom visit (you have to pee within a certain amount of time or they start talking about catheters – it’s a little stressful). Then they took my baby for an x-ray and I felt a lot of stress about what could possibly be wrong with his legs. It could have been really serious and there were a lot of unknowns at that time.
We transferred to the postpartum room and enjoyed our baby while we waited for the results of the scans, met with a lactation consultant, and then finally had the neonatologist come in and talk to us about the likely diagnosis of Caffey Disease and the need to confirm it as soon as possible with genetics.
My baby did have low blood sugar, due to one of my medications, and a very diligent night nurse helped us to avoid the NICU by the skin of our teeth. His numbers dipped pretty low but thankfully they stabilized once that nurse helped us get on top of the situation.
Despite all of the complications, we were able to be discharged around 4 pm the day after I gave birth. The doctors would have preferred we stay one more night, but it was so uncomfortable in that hospital bed. All I wanted was to go home to my bed and my older son. So we left once we agreed that Baby would go in the next day for a checkup at the pediatrician and I’d go to my OB later that week for a blood pressure and PPD checkup.
After my first induction, I wrote that I wished I had experienced a “natural” labor even though I didn’t regret having the induction. I also felt that way this time even though it had been one of my hopes with this pregnancy to be able to go into labor naturally. But, knowing your baby is in distress is a very scary feeling. So, while being induced was awful, I don’t regret it. I also believe that my body would have had a rapid labor regardless.
I’m going to share some of his cute newborn photos here (I shared a separate set of them at the end of my third trimester post if you want to see those) and then talk more about how similar the births were.
These lovely photos were taken by Leslie Mason Photography.
Comparing birth one (left) to birth two (right).
While I’m comparing the births, it’s meant to be more about my birth experiences than reflective of my babies.
Comparing my birth experiences
Even the postpartum rooms and views of the city were very similar.
Thanks for reading along for this tumultuous birth story. Please feel free to share your own experiences in the comment section.
