Aaron's Birth Story

Hanging out on the birth ball during contractions.

Our boy is here!

I think have successfully fed Aaron enough to put him into a serious turkey coma (ala Thanksgiving) enough to be able to catch up on some blogging. I owe so many of you phone calls, emails, thank you notes and the like. Please forgive me as life has been a little crazy of late! I know many have asked for our stories of how he was born, and what life has been like since, so I am turning to my trusty blog to fill you all in! Please forgive spelling mistakes and weird sentences. Time is tight! Now to type as fast as I can…

Wow, has my life changed within the short span of just a few days!!! We are just absolutely in love with this little guy, and can hardly keep our hands off of him. He is so amazing in how strong he is, and how well he has adapted to life outside of me.

Aaron made a dramatic entrance into the world on October 14th. The day before I had one of my weekly visits to the acupuncturist. She has been helping me keep the PUPPPS away as well as toning down a number of other pregnancy discomforts. She saw me on this Wednesday, took one look at the exhausted expression on my face from lack of sleep, my extremely swollen ankles and feet, and looked at the itchy skin beginning to spread across my belly as we were starting to lose the battle of keeping the PUPPPS at bay, and said to me “you’re miserable, aren’t you?” I just about cried, I was just so glad to hear someone validate that for me. She asked if I was ready to get things started, and before she had the question out of her mouth, I was saying “YES!” She did some points to help encourage labor, and sent me home. That night at my 2am pee break (one of many), the pressure of my full bladder along with the incredible weight of the baby my water broke. I was pretty wired the rest of the night, waiting to see if contractions would begin. Chris was sleeping downstairs in the guest bedroom because of my constant restlessness and snoring, being that big. I let him sleep and didn’t wake him since I knew Aaron would need him as soon as he was out for whatever care was in store.

In the morning at a more decent hour, nothing had happened yet. I called my midwife, and she told me that I should make it my business to try to go into labor now that my water had broken. If I go to the hospital, they will give me drugs, which I don’t want. So, it’s time to pull out all the stops on the natural ways of inducing labor. She suggested a few things, but strongly encouraged that I go back to the acupuncturist for another treatment. I got an appointment for 4:00 that afternoon with my doctor’s backup (she was off that day), and did what I could with walking, herbs, essential oils and the like in the mean time. None of it worked. My 4:00 appointment came, and the acupuncturist pulled out all the stops with her treatment. She did two points on the back of my second toe that really kicked off. I had five contractions in ten minutes! I had my mom drive me to my appointment, and I am glad I did because I continued to have contractions the whole way home.

Chris got off work, and he hung out at home to wait for me to arrive back from my appointment. We called my dad to get us some dinner. I needed to load up on carbs for the marathon I had ahead of me, so he got me some pasta. I sat on the birth ball in my living room, watched movies, and hung out as things progressed. Chris would talk me through each contraction while he rubbed my shoulders, back and arms, and occasionally do a hip squeeze movement we learned from my doula that felt fantastic! My parents timed my contractions so he could focus on me. All of it was very tolerable, and exciting because I knew Aaron was coming!

I started to feel sleepy. I had hardly slept the night before after my water broke because I was so amped up. I had meant to take a nap that afternoon, but had gotten busy with the natural labor induction activities and hadn’t slept then either. I decided to lie down and close my eyes for a bit. I slept for about half an hour, occasionally waking up during a contraction. When I woke up for good, I was trembling pretty hard, and the contractions were very strong. We decided that we really needed to get to the hospital sooner rather than later. In between contractions, I made a run for the car before another one came on. My mom drove, and Chris rode in the back with me. Shortly after we took off from the house, I felt the urge to push! I was so desperate to follow what my body was telling me to do, yet, we live a long way off from the hospital and quite a drive left to go. My mom floored it, and she and Chris did their best to coach me through shallower breathing to try to slow things down. This boy had plans of his own, and as we were getting to the hospital, I could feel his head right down where it should be to come out. They insisted on putting me in a wheelchair(!!!) to get me up to labor and delivery. I sat in it crooked to save room for him. We had gone in through the emergency room entrance, and I vaguely remember people looking at me and saying in horrified tones “oh my God…”

They took me to triage where they do the initial check to see where you are. I was +3 station (meaning the baby’s head was right there and ready to come out). They didn’t even bother to tell how many centimeters dilated I was or put me into a hospital gown, and ran me on a gurney down the hall to a delivery room. The nurses were frantically telling me not to push, and holding my legs together. I really didn’t care at this point. I am strong, and I had held him in long enough. Fortunately, the doctor was right there quickly, and I went to town, and had him out in very short order. I had been at the hospital for ten minutes, if that. I delivered him right there, haphazardly thrown into a room on a bed in my street clothes. Nothing mattered. I was overcome with joy at this beautiful little boy that they had placed next to me on the bed. He was gorgeous, and so very alert and pink. He cried and cried, which was just music to my ears. I just looked at him in wonder, and was so incredibly excited and relieved that he was out. We had made it. I had had yet another amazing natural childbirth, and he looked so healthy and active. My mom and Chris were with me through the whole thing. Our poor doula had gotten there a few minutes later. It was just one of those things, though. Aaron had plans of his own, and he was ready to be born regardless of anything else going on in the world!

He was 8 pounds, 9 ounces, and 20 inches long. His head was 14.5 centimeters in diameter. A big boy! They let me hold him and bond with him for quite a while, and then it was time for him to be whisked off to the nursery to begin the rigorous checkup process that had been outlined for him by the Children’s Hospital. They patched me up, and got me moved to a postpartum room. We didn’t have time to bring up any of our things prior to his birth, so everyone brought my stuff up to our room. Our doula remembered that I wanted to go to the nursery to be with Aaron, and asked the nurses if I could do that. They said that would be no problem, and wheeled me in a wheelchair over to him and Chris in the nursery. Chris and I just sat there and looked at Aaron, played with his hands and feet, felt his soft skin, watched his chest rise and fall with each breath, and felt completely elated at this amazing baby we had created! I couldn’t help but cry a little with complete joy at his life, and the miracle of it after all that we have been through. I knew that I loved him deeply, but at that moment, the feeling intensified a million-fold. It had been a wild ride of a night, but here we were at the end with this wonderful spirit to spend our lives with, watching him grow.