Birth Story, part 1

Warning: LONG

So the adventure of getting little Eli to arrive was more than your average birth, he was a stubborn one and much like his mama he wanted to do things on his own terms but much like his daddy he apparently decided that he would stay in longer because why ruin a good thing.

It all started in the early hours of Tuesday September 21st...I woke up early in the morning around 3 AM to use the restroom and lost my mucus plug, I got really excited (well overly excited for such a rather gross occurrence) because I thought "finally! Something is happening!".  So of course I had to wake Jeremiah up and tell him the good news, to which he grumbled something like "okay" and fell back asleep.  Throughout that night/early morning I had a few of my 1st contractions but nothing significant but I do remember being so very excited to finally be having contractions.  I know I must sound crazy but being that this was my 1st baby, contractions for me were exciting because it meant I was finally getting closer to meeting my little one.  As Tuesday went on I had very irregular contractions until the evening but they were still to far apart so Jeremiah and I went to Wal-Mart to walk around from 11Pm till about mid-night because that was the only place we could think of that was open.  We walked and walked and walked till I practically memorized everything on our path but still they were to far apart so we went home.  That lasted until around 2 AM on Wednesday morning when I finally was having contractions 4-5 minutes apart on a regular basis for about 1 hour.  Again, I got all excited and called the hospital and they told me to wait another hour or so until they got to be about 3-4 minutes apart and then come in.  Well I waited another hour, all the while tracking them on my handy contraction recorder on my phone, and when the got to about 3-4 minutes apart I said "come on Miah, it's time!!!".  To be honest I think I have been waiting my whole life to say that :).  He jumped out of bed, literally, and we grabbed our stuff and headed out.  Well when we got to the hospital we had to wait about 45 minutes for them to check us in because the maternity ward was packed.  Meanwhile I was having very regular and stronger contractions in the waiting room until finally we were called in to be examined...

What happened next, NOTHING!  As soon as I got a bed and was being examined by the nurses, my contractions STOPPED!!!  Cold turkey, completely stopped!  The mid-wife came in and checked my cervix and said that I was barely dialated to a 2 (I had been barely a 1 4 days before at my last check-up, so I realized this was slow moving).  I was very disappointed and the nurses and a mid-wife came in to tell me that I could either stay and walk the halls till they started back up again or I could go home because it was just false labor.  We decided it was best to go home and hoped we would be back later, so home we went.  Day 1 of no sleep.  Well, Wednesday passed with more contractions but again, nothing regular but still pretty painful.  I spent the majority of the day lounging around trying anything to get them to start back up on a regular basis.  Wednesday night came and all of a sudden they started back up again but stalled out at 6 minutes apart, but I was up all night having contractions and getting very tired.  I decided that in the morning I would go in and have my membranes stripped and be checked again.  That was Day 2 of no sleep.

So Thursday morning rolled around and I called in to UCSD hospital once again to tell them that I was now tired from having contractions for almost 2 days straight and no sleep so could I come in and get my membranes stripped to help speed up the process.  They said, sure come in around 11 AM.  My mom came to pick me up and off we went to UCSD again (Jeremiah needed to go to work and catch up on somethings and thought that I would be right back).  In order to stall for time, my mom and I went to have breakfast and again I was having regular contractions at 6 minutes apart.  Finally 10:30 rolled around so we headed off to the hospital.  We arrived to the birthing center on the 4th floor at UCSD hospital and again my contractions slowed down, apparently my body was not liking the hospital.  While waiting for things to get started, my mom asked why it was that they no longer broke water intentionally and the mid-wife gave my mom a big speech about how it increases the risk of infection and its not good for the baby and they no longer condone the procedure.  So then we got started, 1st she checked me, I was now at a 3!.  Whoo hoo, I was progressing!  Then she  started to strip my membranes, well as she was doing that, I felt a huge gush of warm water and then she said "oh crap! I just broke your water, well guess you are going to be admitted now".  It was rather comical because she had just given that speech to my mom about how it was a "bad" thing.


To be continued...